Home & Garden Blog

Deals and Steals at Walmart.com

colleen — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 22:17:59 +0000

Walmart.com’s Clearance sale has a perfect selection of outdoor garden and lounge furniture. Think of happier days when the weather was not getting colder every minute–what would you do to be sitting outside, sipping margs with the neighbors in some beautiful teak or wood furniture? Here are some clearance specials to make your dreams come true:

Delahey 6-Piece Wood Furniture Outdoor Set from Walmart.com: $298.00, marked down from $349.00

Bravo Mesh Bench Seat from Walmart.com: $140.00, marked down from $174.00

Shop for more discount furniture at Smarter.com.

garden benches, outdoor furniture, wooden furniture

Celebrity Spotlight: Building with Trees

colleen — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 19:07:33 +0000

NYTimes.com article on the Home & Garden section today talked about revolutionary architect Roald Gundersen, who builds structures, furniture, and whole houses with entire branches and trunks of trees. He bends and manipulates the trees to make beautiful organic structures that liven up any home and give it an earthy and fresh quality. Gundersen likes to build with trees because they represent the outdoors and nature, where he would spend all of his time if he could. Instead of living outdoors though, why not bring the trees indoors? And not in a potted planter or desktop tree simulation. Here are some beautiful pieces for you to add to your collection that are built with wood and make your home fresh and lively:

Canopy Swing Stand : On sale from $800 to $590, this beautifully built and organically curved structure will make you feel alive!

3400 Series Wood Chair : $114.99 Brings you back to memories of the old school house with this lovely, basic wood chair.

Shop for discount wooden furniture at Smarter.com.

celebrity spotlight, chairs

Recommendations from That 70’s Show Interior Designer

colleen — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 17:52:21 +0000

Jason Miller, the interior designer featured on the NYTimes.com this week, talks about the beauty and simplicity of throwback 70’s style. He recommends three things: Polyester, Pop Art, and Plastic. Think Andy Warhol’s factory meets Hippie global world views. What do you do with all this throwback? A classic part of the 70’s that Miller doesn’t want to recreate is the colors–according to him, the cheap fabrics, carpets and furniture of the 1970’s made for flimsy fabric and flukey, dry colors. He recommends springing a few extra bucks and getting some dark chocolate browns and nicely hued colors instead. I like where he’s taking the modern twist.

So what do you do to recreate the 70’s charm? Take a look at these options I found on Smarter.com. Hope it helps! With Halloween coming up this weekend, why not put your whole house in costume?

Retro Modern Chair: $290.99

Momeni Shag Comfort Rug from Walmart.com: $59.00-819.00

Shop for more vintage style furniture and vintage style rugs.

rugs, vintage furniture

Trends: Furniture Rollbacks

colleen — Mon, 19 Oct 2009 18:15:27 +0000

Walmart.com has a specific section of it’s website called “Rollbacks”, which change every week to discount different categories of merchandise on the website that needs to get moving out of storage and into our beautiful homes! This week, furniture is one of the hot ticket rollback items, ranging from sofas to coffee tables to mattresses and bunk beds, everything dropping in price! The only question is: how much do you want to save?

Walmart.com’s Furniture Rollback Offers won’t last forever, and are specifically tailored so even the hottest and newest arrivals are on rollback, not just the after season or leftovers from summer styles. Check out the latest futons or even the sleek Metropolitan Dining Room set, all at prices that are unbelievable, and promise to not break your pocket! These are special deals that you won’t see again until the end of the season, and by then it will only be the scraps and leftovers. If your home needs a little touch-up, this is the thriftiest way to produce a one of a kind look.

Top items from the Furniture Rollback Sale at Walmart.com:

Metropolitan Dining Room Set from Walmart.com: $179.99 (marked down from $199) This 5-piece dining room set is an amazing steal! With fancy espresso finished wood, this is style at it’s thriftiest.

Mainstay’s Contempo Futon from Walmart.com: $149.00 (marked down from $179.00) With a micro-suede cover, this black futon will outlast all the wear and tear of your family. What a versatile piece!

Your zone loft collection metal loft bed from Walmart.com: $149.00 (marked down from $169.00)

Shop for more discount furniture at Smarter.com.

dining room sets, futons, loft beds

Design Your Own Autumn Living Room

colleen — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 23:26:18 +0000

It’s getting a bit frigid here in New England, but that doesn’t mean it’s time to break out the winter clothing and down comforters just yet. There’s still time here (and I’m sure many other places) to take advantage of the season and give your living room and home space a much-needed autumn face lift. Here are some tips inspired by Better Home & Garden’s website . Enjoy!

Start with Neutrals

You want to create a nice, stable baseline for the dark browns and oranges that will certainly make it’s way into your autumn color palette. White is too stark and wood is too cottage-like, you want to create a warm beige base that plays off of the browns, but doesn’t create too stark of a contrast.

Here are some top choices in neutral-colored furniture that will make your autumn accents pop:

Capri Microsuede Sleeper Sofa: Full from Target.com: $779.99

Beige Ottoman and Table set from Amazon.com: $478.40 (marked down from $813.28!)

Loft Leather Chair in Beige/ Butterscotch from SamsClub.com: $668.00

leather chairs, leather sofas, Ottomans, sleeper sofas, table set

Crate & Barrel Upholstery Sale

colleen — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 16:51:52 +0000

Finishing this weekend (October 12) Crate & Barrel’s Fall Upholstery Sale offers three great ways to save: 15% off select Stock, 15% off select Stock Plus, and 25% off all Custom Furniture (the custom furniture sale is only offered at stores, unfortunately. So make it a point to get to a store this week or this upcoming weekend before the sale runs it’s course!)

Top Sale Items:

Steele Chair from Crate & Barrel: $929.00 (marked down from $1,099.00)

Lounge Three-Piece Sectional from Crate & Barrel: $3,137.00 (marked down from $3,697.00)

Lounge Chaise from Crate & Barrel: $929.00 (marked down from $1,099.00)

Shop for more affordable sofas and sectionals at Smarter.com.

sectionals, sofas

Style Spotlight: Victorian New Age

colleen — Mon, 28 Sep 2009 18:38:56 +0000

If Jane Austen makes you swoon and The Frog Prince is still in your top-five stories of all time, then you need a home that reflects your inner princess/damsel-matron of the house. Before we go too medieval and musty, let’s look at the fresh and fabulous styles of the Victorian-era that are being re-interpreted today, as shown in the NYTimes.com photo gallery spread on a family home in Connecticut.

How to emulate this look: think wood, majesty, and patterned silks. Wood ball-and-claw tables and chairs for the dining room and a grandfather clock for the living room to chime the midnight hour. Special details should be paid to the floor and wall papers–no carpets, though rugs can be tolerated. Wood floors and light wood chair-runner panels on the wall give a classic look. Buying big show-stopping Victorian pieces is a pricey endeavor that often requires a few loots of the local antique store.� You can find the Victorian look for less by checking out Smarter.com’s featured selection.

Top picks of Victorian-inspired furniture and home decor:

Victorian Strip Console-Butler : $910.25

Victorian Crochet Bedding : $24.93-99.93

Victorian Floral Petit Pillow : $105.00

Shop for more Victorian style decor.

crochet bedding, floral pillows, Throw Pillows

Savings at Crate&Barrel’s Online Outlet Store

colleen — Tue, 15 Sep 2009 17:37:45 +0000

Crate&Barrel has plenty of quality cookware, furnishings, and bathroom accessories to outfit your home, but they have a tendency to put a strain on your budget. Luckily Crate&Barrel has an online Outlet store to help us still get the quality and the look, but not the depleting bank account. The outlet store is well organized in categories from ornaments to table linens to drinkware and bar accessories. Let�s park down in the Top Rated Outlet section though, to see what fellow Crate&Barrel shoppers think is the best of the best:

Set of 12 Gibraltar Double Old-Fashioneds for $23.50, marked down from a regular price of $30.00. With a customer rating of 5 out of 5, you know these glasses live up to their durability and style.
Next up, the Confetti Individual Bowls for $4.50 each, marked down from a regular price of $5.00. It may not seem like a lot of savings, but these bowls are worth every penny: they are durable, and earth-friendly too: the Confetti bowls are made out of recycled melamine.

Finally, the biggest savings of the bunch: The Reed Coffee Table, on sale for $109.00, marked down from $349.00!! With a steel frame and burnished chestnut wood, this table is an elegant and refined statement.

Happy shopping!

Find more affordable tableware and furniture at Smarter.com.

Bowls, Coffee Tables, Drinkware

Patio Umbrellas on Sale!

colleen — Mon, 17 Aug 2009 16:30:29 +0000

It�s the time of year when things are getting desperate. If you can�t figure out how to keep your guests cool during summer dinner parties or grilling sessions, then you won�t be able to get friends to stay over your house at all. Believe me, I ran that risk last night, where even the slightest boiling of water in my 3rd floor, un-air conditioned apartment resulted in us packing up the dinner picnic-style and moving out to the waterfront bay down the street. It was all in good fun, though not the most convenient, as we didn�t have a proper bathroom or trashcan, but it ended with some fun pick-up wiffle ball games and a good view of sunset.

I digress. Basically the moral of the story is that, at this time of year, even if you�ve gone the whole summer without sufficient cooling devices, you need them now almost definitely. And luckily, a lot of fans, umbrellas, and cooling devices are on sale because it�s so late in the season!

Top picks on sales and clearances for patio umbrellas:

California Umbrella SMCU758: $165.00, marked down from $194.12

Oxford Garden 6 ft Market Umbrella: $111.97, marked down from $159.95

Umbrella Source 6ft Lifeguard Umbrella: $221.22, marked down from $292.50

Find more affordable patio umbrellas.

patio umbrellas

Low-Maintenance Living

colleen — Fri, 07 Aug 2009 19:12:28 +0000

Manhattan designers Russell Groves and Neal Beckstedt have outdone themselves again–their collaborative designs for an industrialist East Hampton, NY house grace the cover of the NYTimes Home and Garden website page today, and for good reason. What makes a house low-maintenance?

The designs, for the exterior, are clean, compact, and a little bit austere. With metal paneling, the house looks well-insulated, but also a bit too modernist and edgy to fit in the standard suburban landscape. It works for the Hamptons, of course, because anything works in the Hamptons if you have the money for it.

For the interior, you want hardwood floors, tall ceilings and white walls for the canvas. The designs should be sleek and un-ornamented. Think basic wood and metal designs with straight lines, all-white sofas and maybe a leather back chair with wood legs, some sparks of color here and there but mostly in the range of white, dark brown and black with metal accents in the shape of lamps and table tops.

The perfect accents for a modernist house: Modernist paintings and photographs, and tall white candles on glass candlesticks. Both bring a different light and energy to the house, which washes over the more basic and plain sofas, walls and colors described above.

How do you transform your home into a Modernist goddess? Here are some thoughts and suggestions:

Candice Olson “Delray” Floor Lamp - 7461FL: $358.00

Bubble Couch Chair by Kartell: $700.40

Clear/Silver Pillar Glass Candleholder: $25.08

candleholders, chairs, coaches, Floor Lamps