Happy holidays from the team here at MAS. We hope you celebrate whatever you believe in, hold tighter to those you love, and indulge a little or a lot. It is a short life. Live it loud or, if you prefer, enjoy the silence.

We heart you. Wherever you are, we wish you your own personal, sacred joy this holiday season.

With epic love and appreciation,
Team MAS

OK so my apologies – in advance. Sometimes things are just executed in a way that – well – is divergent from how I might do things. To each their own – I hope everyone is just out there doing their own thing creatively, hopefully in spite of their critics. I think it is interesting that we can pull ideas even from things we don’t necessarily like. Take this ugly shirt, for example. (Sorry – there it is). But I just happen to not like it. I think it is great if someone out there does. But I don’t.

HOWEVER…there are a few interesting ideas nestled in its design. I love the hand-rendered vibe of the pattern. I love the horizontal lines. I love that there seems to be a bit of mild chaos. Something about it keeps me engaged, if not thrilled. So we borrowed the ideas we liked and created a pattern for our office accent wall (which has *ahem* been blank for just under a year).

We met an incredibly talented Caroline Lizarraga (Decorative Artist: www.carolinelizarraga.com) at a few industry events recently. She was kind enough to come and say hello and a fun dialogue began about this wall idea and how she may help us execute it. I was slightly embarrassed at the onset to show her the image that inspired me. She didn’t know our work and may just think we lack taste. She definitely didn’t see it at first, but we collaborated and she went right on the journey with us. I explained what I liked about it and how it might work with our idea for our accent wall. We wanted something modern and brave, but also calm and innovative. The pattern certainly needed some tweaking. But we “used our words”, pinpointed what could be great, and got there with little difficulty. We toned down the pattern, worked with our existing color palette, and decided shimmerstone plaster was an edgy but sophisticated texture and graphic solution.

Combining our “MAS ideas” with Caroline’s classical training, we were excited to finally fill our space with an expression of our own. In the time since, we’ve gotten to know Caroline, and her adorable personality, fun and (dare I say, “inappropriate”, Caroline?) sense of humor fit right in here at MAS and only enhances her insane talent. We are absolutely thrilled with our new space and hope you all are, too! Many, MANY thanks to Caroline, and also to my incredible team who trusts me (and 100% enables me!) to run with a strange idea. Or two.

(It’s a step up from the art we created that was inspired by a pattern on a semi-truck, no?)

xo

Tony and I had a great time at the Rue Magazine and 7×7 party at DSW the other night. Loved the spontaneous drop-in by the talented designer Agustin Sanders! Always a blast with that one! Didn’t see much from the magazines, but hey, we always love free shoes and cocktails, so no complaints…