Marble trends that go far beyond countertops and bathrooms!

Post by: Camila da Paz | Source: Miami Design District

This week I paid a visit to one of our best customers, Pure Project Home, a beautiful boutique furniture store in the heart of Coral Gables. While looking around their amazing showroom and talking to the lovely store owner, I realized how the demand for marble dinning, side and coffee table is growing. So, back at the office, I started to look more into this trend and found so many articles! This one from Miami Design District in particular caught my attention due to it's "out-of-the-box" marble pieces:

A coffee and side table can be an effective focal point for any contemporary living space. But marble coffee and side tables are one of the mots impressive and sophisticated options.  It has always been a classic design element but it is currently having a bit of a revival in the top design and fashion spotlight and it looks like it is set to stay for a little while longer.

When you are able to choose one that is well crafted, it can even inspire the decor around it to a high level. The tables included in this post are high quality and entirely unique, making them a bold choice for anyone looking for something more than a place to put their coffee.

Marble is one of those classic materials that has been around – tastefully – for centuries. This stone is formed of recrystallized carbonite minerals, with the end result showing various degrees of unique striations (“veins”) in a variety of colors.

The enormous success of the Metamorphosis Series gave birth yet to another unique creation – Metamorphosis Center Table.  Similar to the dramatic transformation and the sudden change in the animal’s body structure, Metamorphosis Center Table experiences new unexpected design techniques, noble finishes through a meticulous artistic process. The center table is composed by two fragments, finished in mirror and noble marble and beautified by the presence of golden creatures that are prepared for their ultimate metamorphosis.

Modern living rooms always look stunning with some decorative details that improves the style of the room decoration. This beautiful stool has its body full of black and white stripes, making it the perfect piece to add to a modern living room.

Pietro Tacca was a sculptor whose statues were odes to war victories and trophies. Tacca table with its Carrara marble top made like a sturdy yet elegant base, this table is built like the pedestal of a timeless statue. Tacca Center Table brings to living rooms around the world the satisfaction of winning a long day’s battle.

This eccentric side table is almost a geometric impossibility. Jacobsen honors a clean design approach, the same used by Arne himself. Black and white marble set a contrast that challenges the eye with its textures. The inside is visibly hollow and polished, making this marble piece lighter and even more visually stunning. It is reversible and finished with a polished brass top. A true conversation starter for your living room.

Portal tables connect the proportions of ancient structures to daily experience, linking ceremonial and domestic ritual. The commanding forms are expressed in thick Italian marble or sandblasted ash. Notched reveals establish points of entry, emphasizing the tension between mass and negative space, human and monumental.

A stool isn’t a very common piece to use marble, but this one shows how it works so well. You can add a marble stool on your living room as a stylish detail!

The Vinicius Side Table is a perfect example of duality. The white marble contrasts perfectly with the black marble. The golden brass detail in the middle adds a luxurious twist of high end furniture that can convey the same feeling of expensive taste to any kind of interior. Named after a great Brazilian musician, this is the perfect side table to have in your hotel bar or lounge.

AGRA Modern Display Modern Contemporary Design by BRABBU results sophisticated look in a modern home decor. AGRA is the modest setting of one of the most famous and most celebrated monuments in world, the Taj Mahal, also known as the marble mausoleum. AGRA display, just like Taj Mahal, is an impressive display of craftsmanship and elegance. Its delicate work of the robust white stone softens the imposing structure, while touches of brass reflect golden warm tones to the polished surface.

Miller is a stunning rotating center table with four layers. The massive marble top seems almost immovable but smoothly turns with a push of a hand. The black marble makes the center table the head turner piece of every type of interior. Perfect for a hotel lobby or a luxurious penthouse, this piece embodies the knowledge of our artisans. The exquisite noble materials give Miller the ultimate high end look.

YOHO contemporary stool illustrates the expansive glaciers and impressive waterfalls located in the Yoho National Park, southeastern British Columbia. Coming from the Cree word for amazement, YOHO is highlighted by its irregular marble texture on the base, remembering the harsh river courses running strong and fierce.

Marble can be combined with different materials to create luxurious design pieces. This coffee table will stand out in any living room thanks to its glamorous combination of polished brass and marble.

As you can see, marble is one of the hottest trends right now on home interiors. You can use it on furniture pieces or in small decorative details to improve a room decoration. These selection of luxury furniture include the perfect pieces to upgrade your home interiors to a new level of elegance of glamour!

Why A Marble Countertop Might Make You A Better Cook

Post by: Camila da Paz | Source: LGS Granite | Pictures By: MasterClass

During the last few months, I, as many of my fellow quarantiners, have decided to give cooking another try. I am famously bad in the kitchen department, so I knew I needed a backup! I'm taking online classes on the MasterClass platform to explore chef Gordon Ramsay's recipes and quickly noticed his huuuge island made of the most beautiful marble I've seen in a long time in a kitchen. That reminds me of an article I read a few years ago about how a marble countertop might make you a better cook! According to that article, if you're the kind of cook who always has a fresh loaf of bread in the oven, a pie cooling on the windowsill, and a thin layer of flour all over your countertops at all times, then installing a marble countertop might be the best decision you'll ever make.

Marble has been beloved by chefs for centuries because of how it allows them to keep buttery doughs from getting too overheated when being worked. For flaky layers or that perfect tender bite to form in the oven, the butter needs to stay relatively cool when the dough is being made.

How can marble help? The stone has high thermal mass, which allows it to retain its temperature more easily than other materials. In a nutshell, it means that marble can absorb heat from the dough without becoming warm itself. Thus, the action of kneading a butter dough warms it up, but the warmth is transferred to the marble. The marble stays cool, so the dough (and the butter!) doesn't get overheated.

A marble surface is also really advantageous when working with chocolate. In order to have the perfect snap when you bite into it along with a glossy sheen, melted chocolate has to be tempered. Simply put, tempering is the process of bringing chocolate to a temperature that changes the crystalline structure of the material to promote the right texture and appearance when cooled. However, unlike buttery doughs, you'll want to warm up your marble slab slightly when working with chocolate — a surface that's too cold might cause the chocolate to set up too fast. After the chocolate is melted over the stove, chocolate can be poured onto a marble countertop or slab to be tempered, which is done by continuously passing the chocolate over the surface with a spatula, which helps cool the chocolate evenly. Once tempered, the chocolate is ready to be poured into molds or made into a variety of incredible treats.

Finally, marble is also great when making candies, and especially when doing sugar work. Like chocolate, many sweets need to either temper or set, and marble can help this process along more gently and efficiently. In particular, sugar-based candies are often made by boiling sugar and water together over the stove, which is extremely hot! Pouring the mixture on a marble allows the sugar to cool more quickly and will allow you to work with it more easily. Just make sure the combination has some viscosity to it — pouring a liquid sugar mixture onto marble won't do anything but create a hot, sticky mess!

Okay, now many of you may be thinking back to when we’ve talked about the difficulties involved in having a marble kitchen countertop. It’s true that the material is prone to scratching and etching more easily than granite, dolomite and quartzite particularly if the countertop has a highly-polished rather than a honed finish. However, many of these problems can be prevented by using coasters, cutting boards, and being vigilant about cleaning up spills. Many avid home cooks, however, don’t look at these marks as imperfections. Rather, they see them as badges of honor and proof of a well-loved, well-used kitchen. And, in all honesty, those scratches and etches — especially on a honed marble countertop — are probably a whole lot less visible to guests than you think they are.

Have you been using a marble or countertop in your kitchen to make better bread, pastries, and other sweet treats? Let us know all about your experience in the comments!

Inside Jessica Alba's Haven in Los Angeles

By Derek Blasberg | Photography by Stephen Kent Johnson | Styled by Michael Reynolds

Architectural Digest, May 23, 2019

In January 2019, Jessica Alba, the actress and cofounder of the eco-friendly megabrand The Honest Co., threw a 40th-birthday bash for her husband, Cash Warren, producer and cofounder of lifestyle brand Pair of Thieves. Because they had recently moved into a home perched on the edge of a scenic, leafy canyon in Los Angeles, she decided to combine the birthday with a housewarming. And after their beautiful, new, expansive backyard—a hot commodity in this part of town—had been mauled by tents, bars, and wild corn tossers at the extravaganza, she decided to retire the tradition. “He’s in his 40s now, so he can do other stuff!” she says, laughing. “This is our dream house!”

The couple, who had been living in a house just down the street for the past decade, already had started looking for a new one with more space, and a big backyard was on their wish list. “We wanted a place to watch our kids play and grow up,” Alba says. They found it on the very first day of their search. It wasn’t officially listed, because the sellers wanted to stage it first, but Alba cajoled her Realtor into getting her in that afternoon. “I thought, I have an imagination and I know what I want. I walked in and knew within 20 minutes, even though [the previous owners’ style] wasn’t our vibe, this was exactly what we were looking for.”

The couple’s “vibe” has two touchstones. Warren’s mother lives in Provence, and one of Alba’s Pinterest boards is filled with pictures of houses in the French countryside and apartments in Paris. The second is Ellen DeGeneres and Portia de Rossi’s house in Beverly Hills. “They’d have us over for holiday parties, and we’d leave and say to each other, ‘Their house is so sick!’ ” When Alba closed on this property, she asked DeGeneres for an introduction to her designers, the mother-son team of Kathleen and Tommy Clements.

“It’s easy to see why Jess is such a successful businesswoman,” Tommy says. “She’s organized, hyper-focused, and superdecisive—there is no vacillation.” The Clementses left their weekly client meetings with their entire to-do list ticked off. In describing Alba’s style, Tommy notes she was always drawn to organic materials, natural fibers and fabrics, hemp textures, and reclaimed wood, “which didn’t exactly come as a surprise since her company is based entirely on thoughtfully produced, safe products.”

At first, Alba thought it would be a quick and easy renovation. “I was like, ‘I’m pretty much fine with everything; let’s just paint it!’ And then all of a sudden we walked into the house, and it had been stripped down to the studs. I mean, there were literally no walls! I said to Cash, ‘Did we know this was going to happen?’ And he said, ‘This explains the bill!’ ” She laughs. “Apparently you can’t just pop off crown moldings.”

Ultimately, the renovation took 18 months and more than new paint. In order to create a more flowing family zone, the foursome modified the original ground-floor plan, opening the former family room up to the kitchen. In the process they removed a bar to gain square footage and create more storage. (“I didn’t want to see all that stuff—coffee machine, toaster oven, dirty blender—all day,” Alba says.) And they blew out the back of the house and installed a folding glass wall that opened up the space to the incredible view.

Alba also enjoyed hunting for just what she liked. To update the bathrooms, she went to RH (“I don’t have a deal with them; I just think their stuff is supercute”), and she found the kitchen range by scouring the internet (“I’ve been dreaming about a stove like this my whole life”).

“Jess didn’t feel the need to spend money she didn’t need to,” Tommy Clements says. “She’s not the type of person to spend for the sake of spending. She sees through that kind of stuff.” Indeed, Alba is especially proud of the laundry-room flooring, which she found herself at a home-improvement store. “Someone quoted us a $70,000 option, and I thought, There’s got to be something better than that!” she explains. “So I put a hold on the vintage Italian limestone and went and talked to my new friend at Lowe’s.”

Now fully settled in, Alba finishes in an unexpected spot when she gives house tours to friends: “This is our pride and joy,” she says, showing off a meticulously organized and labeled wall of circuit breakers, light switches, and other gear related to the house’s electronics. Alba, who does a mind- boggling job splitting her time between being an actress, entrepreneur, and mother, looks on the display with pride. “All this organization is literally my wildest fantasy come true.”