BIJOU LIVING

Feb 24, 2014

Things that confuse me

Efficiency committees

Initiatives that take the initiative out of initiatives

Feb 22, 2014

Quote of the Week - Lao Tzu

The flame that burns twice as bright burns half as long.
image © Stacy Reynaud

Feb 21, 2014

A Community Plan that Defeats its Purpose

mid-century home demolition West Vancouver BC image Stacy Reynaud

information on issues relating to McMansions and possible District actions to make new housing better fit existing neighbourhood character.

West Vancouver Home demolition image Stacy Reynaud

West Vancouver heritage demolition image Stacy Reynaud

West Vancouver West Coast Modern home demolition image Stacy Reynaud

West Vancouver mid-century home demolitions image Stacy Reynaud

In West Vancouver, there's this mentality that renters are an unruly, degenerate, dirty bunch who will settle for anything (as interpreted by the state of the rental portfolio and letters to the editor of the North Shore News). Those of that particular mindset aren't reading this blog, so telling them to get their heads out of their (gl)ass (house) won't matter. It also shouldn't give them the right to try and rent us a termite-infested crack house off the highway for $3000 a month (such as one on Palmerston & 14th we saw recently) or this black mould mid-century we looked at in 2012.

Just because we live in West Van doesn't mean we'll pay you more to rent your 'tear down' house you just bought until you can afford to put up your 'trophy house.' You know what we see when we're out there snooping around at architecture, kids (usually baby boomers) whose parents just died that are eager to sell off what they perceived as the tacky family home they grew up in. Don't just blame the buyers of these properties for the 'ugly' neighbourhoods transforming West Van; look at the sellers.

Generation X is just now hitting the peaks of our careers, and we are all looking for homes that we can rent and live in for many years. We can't afford down payments for overpriced homes - remember, we moved out of our parents' house when we graduated from high school, worked three jobs and put ourselves through university instead - because that's what you did. We'd love to rent your well-loved, well-kept, clean, tacky family home and make it our home, but we need to be more innovative to pay over $3000 a month for it - the bloody thing was probably paid off forty years ago. So West Van, if you want to keep, or try to attract, a younger demographic with extra money to spend in the community (not on renting a crappy house), get it together because we're getting fed up with this - and because we rent - we can just up and leave, whenever we want. You're losing your history and your future community all at the same time.

Check out the Facebook group I Grew Up in West Vancouver.

Are you interested in moving to West Van to rent but need to figure out what's happening here?

The first of two info sessions on West Vancouver housing is Monday, February 24th, from 4 to 8 pm at the West Van Community Centre.

See you there.

PS coach houses shouldn't cost $1.0 million or $4500 monthly to rent.

Images Stacy Reynaud

Feb 11, 2014

You Know This Pile of Dirt - Another West Vancouver Home Demolition

The Baker Residence

Architect Peter Faulkner Smith

Altamont West Vancouver BC

built 1958 - demolished 2014

image Stacy Reynaud

View my post and interior photos of the home from April 2013

image Stacy Reynaud blueprints from the estate of Faulkner Smith

The home was listed as a significant West Vancouver support building.

The West Vancouver Survey of Significant Architecture 1945-1975, (West Vancouver, BC, 1994), pg 88.

Architect - Peter Faulkner-Smith

Date - June 1, 1958

Location - Altamont, West Vancouver, BC

I'll post a photo of its replacement once it's built.

all images by Stacy Reynaud

Feb 4, 2014

The Internet Killed the Luxury Brand

At the beginning of January I was having a discussion about fashion with a colleague at work - he's Italian and his family is involved with the fashion industry in Milan, so that makes him an expert, right? We have a similar chat every season, however, this time it was different, not because I missed our previous season's discussion but because my views have changed - you've probably noticed I rarely write about fashion anymore. He asked me who and what I was watching and I said no one. I'm done with those shows and mass marketed pseudo luxury.

You see, back in the olden days before the Internet, fashion bloggers, and phony street style street style blogs, one of the defining aspects of a luxury item was the exclusivity of the item itself. One never, well at least in Vancouver, saw an Hermes bag for example, in real life. I remember going to LA in the early 90s and being awe struck over actually seeing people - in real life - wearing the luxury pieces I'd seen only in magazines - well not so much in awe, but maybe blown away that someone actually spent that much money, after all, it was the grunge era, but you know what I mean. The price, back then, signified high quality - hence luxury. Exclusivity was one of the defining aspects of luxury brands that actually made them luxury. One rarely, if ever, saw the pieces except for on the pages of magazines.

Now, because of the Internet, we see these luxury brands everywhere. How many times have you seen that bloody Givenchy sweatshirt with the rottweiler on it or the green Kenzo one with the tiger? Do you think a sweatshirt is luxury? I do, only if it's my thirty year old Oregon Ducks one I borrowed from my buddy in 1986 (and my husband wants to burn).

Today's silly nouveau riche, and their sixteen year old Lamborghini driving children, have turned what were once luxury brands into nothing more than mass marketed, mass consumed, cheaply produced crap. In the music industry the term is, It's not the band it's their fans. For Gucci, the term was Victoria Beckham. For the Le Corbusier estate it was people in general.

To quell this disaster marketers have had to coin a new term - ultra luxury. The term luxury, like the term hang in there - has become meaningless.

So, my colleague and I, at the end of our conversation, could not come to an agreement on how low the Prada side part should go, but we did, without debate, agree that Karl Lagerfeld should retire.

stacy reynaud

Jan 27, 2014

Seriously - they're paving paradise and putting up a parking lot

They're into destroying beautiful things in West Vancouver. If it's not homes or old-growth forests, it's something else. This ludicrous, corporate PR jargon notice from the District of West Vancouver popped up on our front door last week. The District of West Vancouver is actually chopping down a forest (see photos below) to put up a parking lot (they also closed down a tennis court and turned it into a parking lot). I'd like to mention that an arborist is actually employed full time by the district - they are an employee of the district and are paid by the district. Bets that the arborist the District consulted was actually an employee of the District?

Can the public call in an independent arborist to assess these trees? I, for one, would like to hear another opinion.

Look at those three wise old beauties!

Say goodbye to your roost, Mr. Resident Bald Eagle - I'm sure I won't be the only one who'll miss watching you torment the crows and seagulls of the neighbourhood.

The flags in the above photo are at half mast to honour Tim Jones of the North Shore Search and Rescue who passed away last weekend.

This tree is the very tall beauty in the top right of the first photo. It's a daily stop for the bald eagles making their way down to John Lawson Park.

I'll be very sad to see it go and replaced with a parking lot.

It's probably at least 100 years old.

This photo was taken from our deck.

The trees that will be chopped down are the tall beautiful ones at the north side of the building.

So, the next time I post a photo of the municipal hall building, all those mature, beautiful trees will be gone.

Shame.

Nothing like encouraging alternative options to vehicles. Good job guys, well thought out.

Jan 3, 2014

Quote of the Week - Henry David Thoreau

There is no remedy for love but to love more.

Dec 31, 2013

25 Cocktail Party Must Haves

Friends are coming for cocktails tonight.

25 things to have on hand:

hand size snacks such as - popcorn, cheese, pickles, crackers, wasabi peas, Cheezies, or other nibbles - nuts with a vintage nutcracker are always a hit, make sure you have a bowl for the shells
ice, ice and more ice
cocktail napkins and regular napkins
coasters
vintage serving bowls
tea lights, candles, lighter
ice bucket or two
soda, tonic, juice (cranberry, orange, tomato), pop, cold flat or carbonated water
cocktail straws, cocktail picks
garnish - lemon, lime and good cocktail cherries (check what your drink recipes call for)
extra toilet paper
whiskey, bourbon, rye, rum, vodka, gin, dry and sweet vermouth, cognac, two bottles of both white and red wine, beer, bubbly
clean cloth to quickly wipe up spills
plenty of clean hand towels in the washroom
bottle opener and corkscrew
a game - personally I can't stand games but some people love them at parties
burgundy glasses, beer glasses, martini glasses, rock glasses, champagne flutes
list of cocktail recipes - check the drink section of my blog, or Art in the Age and MasonShaker have some of my current favourites
clean house slippers if you insist your guests take their shoes off
organized front closet with empty hangers (no wire hangers)
bitters, simple syrup (easy to make - boil two parts sugar, one part water or 1:1 shaken until sugar dissolves)
an empty garbage under the sink
cocktail shaker
phone number for a cab or designated driver service - the host should pay or prearrange
appropriate music

originally published September 24th 2008

image from the collection of Stacy Reynaud

Dec 29, 2013

Dec 26, 2013

Hot Buttered Rum with Apple Cider

What you need:

2 tbsps butter
1 tbsp dark brown sugar
2 tsps pumpkin pie spice
2 oz dark rum
12 oz hot apple cider - my recipe
Serves two

What you do:

Whip butter, brown sugar and pie spice
Chill until firm
Divide butter mixture and rum between 2 six ounce mugs
Stir in hot cider

stacy reynaud

Dec 20, 2013

How to Uniquely Wrap a Gift

I promise I won't say eco or upcycle. However, seeing as I'm of the make do mend persuasion a vintage silk scarf used to wrap a gift suits me just fine.

Voila - Japanese furoshiki. Interested in more techniques using scarves as wrapping, bags or apparel check out the furoshiki site.

stacy reynaud

Dec 18, 2013

Mid Century Modern BC Binning Home West Vancouver

Binning Home image Stacy Reynaud

Crowdfunding is my latest proposal to save the Binning Home for the public - as Mrs. Binning had bequeathed. Remember I suggested the District of West Vancouver purchase the Binning Home as a marketing and communications expense to compliment the forthcoming West Vancouver Centre for Art and Architecture? Well, only two individuals have stepped up - heritage advocates Kathleen Staples (of the Staples Residence) and Bruno Wall, the nephew of real estate developer Peter Wall - who has been labelled 'partially responsible for Vancouver's City of Glass reputation.' Staples offered up a cheque of $1 million on Friday, December 13th - $600,000 short of Wall's offer of $1.6 million.

On December 13th, the judge (Madam Justice Shelley Fitzpatrick), presiding over the BC Supreme Court fight for the house, stated:

The rubber hits the road regarding who's prepared to write the cheques to maintain this property. Where are they? Where are all these people? Who's prepared to come and make a concrete proposal? At the end of the day, unless you have the government standing behind these types of projects, someone has to pay for them.

So, who's with me on this? For purchase, necessary repairs, continuous maintenance, marketing and administration of the home, I suggest a goal of $5 million. Come by the Bijou Living Facebook page to share your ideas.

Read more of my Binning posts from the past three years by searching Binning at the top of the page.

Read the Supreme Court affidavit filed by The Land Conservancy November 13, 2013.

"The rubber hits the road in terms of who's prepared to write the cheques to maintain this property," she said.
Fitzpatrick added that despite wide media coverage, no one besides Wall and Staples has stepped up with formal proposal to take over the house.
"Where are they? Where are all these people? Who's prepared to come and make a concrete proposal? At the end of the day, unless you have government standing behind these types of projects, someone has to pay for it."
- See more at: http://www.nsnews.com/living/11th-hour-offer-for-binning-house-1.759819#sthash.CSz5ES5i.dpuf