yoo is a residential interior and architecture design firm, the result of a partnership between property entrepreneur John Hitchcox and world renowned designer Philippe Starck. This firm has set out to design the world, with projects throughout Asia, Australia, Europe, Africa, North and South America and the Middle East. And to make this firm even more impressive is its lineup of superstar designers – Marcel Wanders, Jade Jagger, Kelly Hoppen and Anouska Hempel. I don’t think you can go wrong by investing in a yoo property! Especially when they look THIS good….

If you’d like to send us photos to include in next week’s “pets on furniture” post, please ensure your photos follow our basic rules: First, the pet must be on a piece of furniture. And said piece of furniture must be clearly visible in the photo, so it takes center stage rather than your pet. (Think of it more of a photo of a great piece of furniture that you want to show off…and your pet happens to be sitting on it). And second, the photo must be of decent quality. If it’s dark or fuzzy (from a camera phone) then it may not make the cut. Thanks! (Photos, your name, location and a brief description can be sent to desiretoinspirekim[@]hotmail[.]com and PLEASE don’t send me closeups of your pet!)

Miffy catnapping on my reclaimed wooden bar stool from the building site of a knocked down Dalston pub, against a backdrop of several years worth of vintage suitcases collected from car boot sales, skips, charity shops and the streets of London.
– Emilie (London, UK)

My king charles cavalier, Ginger doing what she does best…rest and relax on my living room sofa. Mohair is hard to resist!
– Jennifer (Summit, New Jersey)

I’ve got some pics to submit again. This time its my English Bulldog, Butterball. She always finds different places to snooze but i thought this was really cute. She’s lying on my “magic carpet” on my striped rug. All the colors came together so beautifully. So much viibrance and yet there she was in this vibrant setting sound asleep.
– Stephanie

Here is Pumpernickel, four months old, sitting on my amazing “As is” IKEA find (200$ instead of 400$). The second photo was taken by Daniel Kudish, pet (and wedding) photographer, when she was about two months old.
– Magali (Montreal)

-Joanna (Chicago, IL)

Jamal (11yo rat terrier/chihuahua mix) and Kitty (3yo DLH) don’t agree on much but they can both agree that this love seat is their favorite piece of furniture to lounge on.
– Caroline (Tulsa, OK)

Here’s Good Girl Kitty on the dresser in my entry. She loves to look out the front door from her perch.
– Elizabeth (Nashville, TN)

This photo was a before and after feature on my blog. The couch that Oliver is sitting on was a hand-me-down, but I updated it’s look with new cushion covers from Saffron Marigold. You can view the post here. I live in Oklahoma and Oliver is my energetic yorkie (caught in an unexpected calm moment in the photo). The credenza in the background is actually one of my favorite finds. It is teakwood, Dutch and in a mid-century style, I found it for just $300.
– Caitlin

If you’d like to send us photos to include in next week’s “pets on furniture” post, please ensure your photos follow our basic rules: First, the pet must be on a piece of furniture. And said piece of furniture must be clearly visible in the photo, so it takes center stage rather than your pet. (Think of it more of a photo of a great piece of furniture that you want to show off…and your pet happens to be sitting on it). And second, the photo must be of decent quality. If it’s dark or fuzzy (from a camera phone) then it may not make the cut. Thanks! (Photos, your name, location and a brief description can be sent to desiretoinspirekim[@]hotmail[.]com and PLEASE don’t send me closeups of your pet!)

This is Igby! My four month old Shih Tzu.
– Jessie

Here’s our rescue beagle, Molly Ivins, on two of my favorite pieces of furniture: the consignment shop Century Furniture club chair, and the faux-grass estate sale chair. Though these are family heirlooms, both
are greatly improved by the addition of Miss Molly!
– Jenny

Pls find attached the photo of our family dog. It is called Enzo and he is 6 years old.
– Maria Jose (Mallorca, Spain)

My husband and I just adopted our little 3 year old Beagle/Foxhound named January from the Ottawa Humane Society 2 weeks ago and we love her.  She has made herself right at home on our 2 vintage turquoise arm chairs.
– Jennifer B. (Ottawa)

Mollie, my soft coated wheaten terrier, loves to nap on our red leather sofa, preferably with a pillow.
– Jo

Here’s Trifolio, a 8 years old pet with no defined race. He loves the Cine Boeri sofa, but he believes the 50’s chair belongs to him.
– Silvana (Brazil)

I took these two pictures the other day of my 3 year old tabby cat, Izzy, also known as Lumzy Lou or Izzy Lou Who. I was on the couch reading your blog & she just watched the screen the whole time, I love how the green in your blog header makes her eyes look so bright! Thought I’d put two pics in one since the computer screen one makes it a bit of a close up, so at least this will show our beautiful new Macy’s sectional as well.
– Jessica (St. Pete, FL)

this is a photo of my cat Dalila. she loves sleep on the couch. now she is 9 years old. its a member of my family. this is other picture with Dalila and my old dog Berny on my couch. there were very friendly.
– Milagros (Cordoba, Argentina)

My lazy cats Miki & Minni spend most of the time sleeping during the winter.
– Kadri (Estonia)

As Jo mentioned yesterday we’re back to blogging on weekends. I think I’ll stick with the theme I had ended off with back in December of my blogland favs of the week as that was relatively painless to accomplish in the midst of my usual weekend activities of laundry, groceries, house chores, parental visits and whatever else popped up. But I will be breaking that up with random posts, like for example, new work going on at my house. Today is a random post as I had a busy week and wanted to share a few things before the work week starts up.

Thursday was quite eventful. It started with a little party after work for the launch of the 2011 Interiors issue of Ottawa Magazine. I was SO STOKED because as you may recall back in the beginning of December I mentioned in this post there was a photo shoot at my home. I was interviewed and photographed for this issue of Ottawa Magazine, which happens to be the first time I’ve gotten a shout out locally for being a blogger with some degree of success. And Thursday I finally was able to get my hands on a copy. The story is a page and a half with a rather large photo of me in my kitchen, as well as a shot of my dining room. The photos were taken by Dwayne Brown, who is super talented and SUPER nice, especially when he found out I was interested in photography. He gave me some tips, explained everything he was doing and let me watch as he tweaked the photos on his laptop. And writer Patrick Langston stopped by the house one afternoon and hung out with my husband, myself and our herd of cats and we had a lovely chat about moi and the blog. He also sent Jo some questions are a couple quotes from her and included in the article. Despite having been featured in several magazines around the world, I have to say this one I’m most proud of. Thanks to everyone at Ottawa mag, Patrick and Dwayne!!

***UPDATE: The story is now up on the Ottawa Magazine website HERE!

I had to leave the Ottawa mag party a bit early to make it home for a meeting with our architect who was going to show us his first set of drawings of the additions we want to do to our house. More excitement! It was so great to finally get a visual of how the house is going to look. We talked for a while and came up with more ideas for my husband and I to ponder. He left some drawings with us, and I scanned them and showed my parents and the next day got some feedback from my father. I really liked his ideas so I tweaked the drawings of the main floor to incorporate them. Below are the drawings so far. The red lines delineate the current home (our current office at the back of the house isn’t delineated in red because it needs to be torn down and rebuilt because it is not adequately insulated). We haven’t discussed details like window placement or exterior/interior finishes yet so windows you see on the drawings are just there as an idea. I cannot wait for this work to start – THIS HOUSE IS TOO FREAKING SMALL!!!

The title of this post ends with “and a cat” – so this is the cat part. Most of you should know by now that I am a huge lover of animals, and I must since I have 7 cats in that tiny house above. I’m always willing to help out a cat in need of a good and forever home when I can – and I almost brought this poor little guy home from PetSmart the other day for my parents who are currently pet-less but the timing could not have been worse so no happy ending there. But I would like to help out a reader here in Ottawa, Elfriede, who first emailed me back in October. Her son rescued a cat whom he dropped off at her house saying he would find her a home and so far has not. She asked if I could take her in because she didn’t want to have to take her to the shelter and although my answer was NO WAY, I told her I would be happy to post some photos on the blog in the hopes someone would be willing to give her a home. Elfriede would keep the cat but her new husband has asthma and cannot be around cats. Here is a bit of info Elfriede told me: My son has named her “Gretchen”. I took her to a vet a few months ago and he determined that she is female, 10 years old, and a mixed breed (himalayan and tabby). He gave her all the shots and a check up and issued a clean bill of health. What I know about the cat is that she is totally lovable, very affectionate, and in winter, when she stays inside, she is content to just sleep or watch cat-tv through our picture window. In the warm weather she prefers to be outside and explore. She never ventures far from the house. She likes to be around people and likes to snuggle up to anybody who wants to participate. If anyone out there thinks they could provide a home for Gretchen, please email me (desiretoinspirekim@hotmail.com) and I can get you in contact with Elfriede. Gretchen is SO CUTE and I wish I could take her but that could mean the end of my sanity. Here are some pics:

Ryuhei sent us the following email: I’m Ryuhei, a young interior designer based in Brooklyn, New York. I recently won Behr’s Room for Color 201o contest with the living room from my very first 2BR project. Since the rest of this vintage inspired, yet modern bachelor’s pad is now complete and my client has fully settled into the apartment, I took some photos that I would love to share. This budget 2BR makeover was designed for my friend – a typical, young professional who moved into a small pre-war tenement. As a team, we hoped to create an example of how good even an everyday space could look with some effort and creativity. This apartment is such a great example of using colour to provide interest to rather blah spaces (LOVE the living room colour), vintage finds for intrigue and a homey feel, and funky lighting that functions as art. Fab job Ryuhei!