the Outdoor
Room with JD
TROPIC CHIC
G
irls just want to have fun, but they want to do
it in style. We wanted to create a sophisticated,
stylish, and fun outdoor space for three
bachelorettes sharing a house together.
After some big changes in her personal life, Allison was
looking to rent out some space in her home to a couple of
roomies. Robin is a longtime friend of fourteen years and
Lilyan is a more recent find, through friends of friends and
the beauty of the internet. Robin says, “I had previously been
living in an apartment with a male roommate that kept calling
me ‘dude.’ I was happy to be moving to a house where there
was great energy, great women, easy parking, a quick commute
to work, and no one who would be calling me ‘dude.’”
These ladies obviously get on famously and love
living together. The only thorn in their side was
their backyard. As Allison recalls, “The yard was SO
embarrassing that we only invited people over at night.
Oh, what candles and twinkly lights can do!”
For inspiration for this garden, I thought of some of the
amazing gardens I’d seen in Miami—a city than never ceases
to impress me. This is a place where design rules! Everything
has a twist, and even a middle-of-the-road Miami pad feels like
a boutique hotel. The energy in this paradise city is palpable,
and there are shocks of tropical color everywhere. All the more
shocking because the colors are usually leaping out at you from
a minimal white springboard of a background. The mood
after dark is seaside nightclub style, glamorous and sexy.
Since the garden is in a beach town area, it was completely
sun beaten, with a dried-out veggie patch, a rear deck the
size of a front door, and an ugly garage sidewall of exposed
brick running down one side of the garden. We wallpapered
the brick wall in a funky outdoor acrylic material which
was printed with a giant fifties-style floral design. We put
a U-shaped deck into the centre of the space with a similar
shaped seating area and an entertainment deck with a
huge white stone bowl fireplace that houses a gas fire.
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