Archive | Blog

We are back from our trip to Cape Cod (with a weekend in Maine at the end) and it was everything a family vacation should be. Tons of laughter, sunshine, beautiful food and a beautiful beach rental, cuddles and good food and nice wine. And also kids fighting, early wake ups, schlepping and barf (hubby and I had some bad oysters. Oy). A real family trip. So although I feel like I could use a vacation to recover from my vacation (sans kids, maybe?), I also can not wait till we get to go again. I absolutely love Cape Cod. And the only downside to staying in such a perfect house on a beautiful beach is that we never wanted to leave. We never made it to Wellfleet, a place we loved visiting last year. We never made it to Provincetown (too far). We never made it to Boston (we were saving it for a rainy day that never came). I never even made it into any of the adorable looking antique shops in Old Sandwich, a five minute drive from the house. Instead,  I longingly drove by all these cute little antique shops on my way to groceries or with napping babies in the back seat. But it’s all good because the place we stayed at was just magical. There was tons of room, the views were spectacular and it was so private, we barely saw anyone the whole time there. And for the first time in over a year and a half, both our children slept through the night more than once. FOUR times. They slept through. That has NEVER happened. In over a year and a half. Like I said, the place was magical.

view from our bedroom and from the deck

“biodome” Oscar built with his Dad and Grandad -crabs & feathers & seaweed and a buoy on our deck

Rare outing to Barnstable for dinner and a walk on the marina

I fell in love with this little house just a little way down from ours. I walked by it a few times and could just picture living there. That beautiful Cape Cod-style home with its unpainted shingles weathered to a perfect grey, the blue accents, the buoys hanging off the deck. It was small and sweet and a little shabby. I WANT IT.

We also went out to dinner on our last night, this time to the Ocean side of the Cape, to Yarmouth. There was a wait for dinner so we crossed the street to the playground. Imagine taking your kids to a beachside playground every day?

After saying goodbye to the beach (and to the birds, the crabs, the rocks, the sand, the house, the fish and everything else the kids could think to say goodbye to), we packed up and drove three and a half hours to Portland, Maine. The hubby had a ticket to The Festival, a craft beer event and so while he beer tasted, I drove around Portland with the kids while they napped. What you do for love…Portland, at least the parts I drove around, is beautiful and cool and kind of falling apart. It was quite a change from the very well preserved, genteel part of the Cape we had just visited. Industrial areas being transformed, a cool restaurant and beer scene, beautiful architecture, cute shops: we were back in the CITY which felt odd but exciting. Again, held captive by my sleeping children, all I could do was drive and take pictures from the car.

pics from my drive and my kids duck walking after their nap in Old Portland

The kids woke up, the hubby came back to us (flushed with beer and happiness), we met up with one of his relatives (who super graciously invited us to stay with him), and we all went out for dinner to a cool little spot, Duck Fat. I hoped to shop a little for myself before leaving town on Sunday but all those cute boutiques were closed so I had to settle for Whole Foods as my one vacation shopping spree. Not bad, but there are no cute clothes or shoes there. So no antiques on the Cape and no pretty things in Portland for Mama, but that’s not what the trip was about. Not this time anyway. It was all about this :

Next time, though, I am so totally going shopping.

xa

This past week ranks as one of my most stressful in a while. The shop opening was great: people responded really nicely to the design and to the wares being sold. There were lots of return customers during the week and I think that this weekend will be a busy one. I spent most of the week running errands for the shop – once you open and actually have paying customers inside, you realize what the little missing bits are. Like coffee stirrers. Shopping baskets. An umbrella stand.

my kids enjoying oat cakes on opening day

After the excitement and adrenalin of opening came the crash. Not only is there a slight down after the high of trying to get a space ready, but I also spent the latter part of the week in a frenzy of packing, laundry, taxes, and work. Saturday morning we were leaving for a much needed family vacation to Cape Cod. The hubby, kids and I spent a wonderful, cold and rainy holiday there last year – really one of the nicest family vacations ever. This year, we were going with my parents, uncle and aunt (visiting from Germany) and my cousin. So, of course, the kids started feeling feverish on Wednesday. And then the killer blow, my grandma fell at her nursing home Thursday, fracturing her hip. She went in for a hip replacement Friday. My poor dad had to stay behind and try to join us in a few days. So I was leaving excited and exhausted, but with a bit of a heavy heart.

And so our little foursome set out for the States. There were downs: some waiting at the border (really brutal with a cranky 19 month old) and some strange commands from my iMaps (we were ordered to go in circles for a while and then it kept trying to get us to drive through the woods to get to the house). And ups : a three-and-a-half-hour nap from said cranky 19 month-old and a lovely pit stop somewhere outside of Boston.

 kids being adorable somewhere in Massachusetts

And after a lot longer than six-and-a-half-hours, we arrived to this beauty in East Sandwich:

And all the stress of the last week (or last year, really) started to slide away. Seeing my happy family made it all feel better – that and a glass of bubbly upon arriving, a lobster roll for dinner and a sunny day on the beach today. So even though I am preoccupied and we miss Dad, we toasted him with a Bloody Caesar for Father’s Day and started the real difficult job of relaxing.

xa

Today is the big day and I couldn’t be more pleased with the results. On an otherwise super gloomy and rainy day, strangers and friendly faces braved the weather to check out Boucherie Lawrence. When I left at 1:30 to pick up baby girl from my parent’s house, there was a decent line-up for sandwiches. The space is so easy to be in and works really well with actual customers in there. And other than a few small missing items (door mat, better chalkboard because our’s is cute but useless, napkin holders…) it is pretty ready to go. Here are some pics from earlier today:

So rainy out but the counter is still a great spot

The map of Québec and Lou sitting relatively patiently in the waiting area

 Marc filling the fridge with butter

Ethan making cold brew coffee  & the ice tea and lemonade stand & cheese cutting station

Rachelle, our butcher                                

Flowers that I brought last night, cut from our garden

The merch & lunch table + smoked fish

Candace making sandwiches & a mini line-up

mmmmmmeat & view of the room with Sefi prepping for opening

Some lovely people having lunch & the delicious roast beef sammy with horseradish, mayo and arugula on home-made bread that I got to take with me.

And then like Cinderella at the stroke of midnight, I had to rush out of opening day to go pick up my little girl. I don’t remember feeling this bummed about leaving work ever. It is like an artist leaving his vernissage (that sounds pretentious but it’s kind of true). There is something magical about being in a space that you’ve had a hand in creating. And it’s not about the slaps on the back or the high-fives (though that is also nice, don’t get me wrong), it’s about having thought of a space for a long while, imagined it and seeing it all grown up and ready to be on its own in the world. Seeing the happy, exhausted faces of my partners that worked so hard to make it happen and the encouraging, friendly faces of happy customers. I want to go back!

In other fun news, I was asked some questions for this lovely blog that I am a real fan of What Would Gwyneth Do. It is all about juggling working and motherhood and I hope I got my thoughts across in an intelligent way. Today of all days I am juggling like a crazy person: sleeping baby upstairs, writing this, thinking about what I need to pick up/make for dinner,  and itching to go back to work.

xa

Only 4 sleeps left till the shop opens. And the space is coming together in giant leaps and bounds.

The counters are in. The stainless one looks awesome up against the window and is exactly what I pictured.

Basically this top:                                                                                            These legs:

                  +            

= this counter:

I had planned U-shaped counters- one counter against the wall, the stainless window one, and one against the entrance glass.

 the quick sketch of the U counters and the leg sketch

But looking at it installed it just didn’t work. The wall one looked good but the entrance counter was not right for the space, material-wise and execution-wise. The wall mounted counter was installed with a healthy gap between it and the window stainless one and the fact that they are made from different materials works fine. The entrance counter was placed right up against the stainless piece and it just didn’t work. It wasn’t exactly the same height and it didn’t work. It just didn’t work! You really need to not have a huge ego in this line of work. Confidence is essential but I can admit when I’m wrong about a design decision. And maybe had it been perfectly matched up and at the same height it would have worked better and been more what I’d pictured. This U- shaped counter was not worth fighting for. Even though it meant sacrificing some additional seating it didn’t work, for real! And anyway, we don’t have enough actual stools for that extra counter. So there.

But the wall one is nice:

And we even found a use for the extra counter: it will be closer to the kitchen and hold coffee cups and an ice bucket for lemonade and ice tea. Nothing goes to waste here!

And speaking of not wasting anything, there is meat in the walk-in fridge! It really is a butcher shop now.

yum.

Other new elements to the space: art. It so important to me for any space be it commercial or residential to have artwork up on the walls.

Jason Cantoro’s framed strip of the Lawrence wallpaper is up on the wall, right near the window:

I like that passersby will see it and those that know the restaurant will make the link. And it looks so beautiful framed.

We also put up this self-portrait that Sefi made in London in 2005. She was working in a deli and here she is, eight years later owning a meat (and more) shop. I mean it couldn’t be more perfect.

This project is her baby and it seems fitting to have this painting up. I think she was a little bit uncomfortable with it being all alone on this big wall but in my opinion, there was NO better place for it. It is funny and beautiful and weird to have it placed all alone there. Kind of like the painting is funny and beautiful and weird. And it looks so good on my Covington Blue wall (I lOVE this colour more and more each day).

The final artwork that has gone up has been the most difficult to get up there. At my first meeting with Sefi about the space she mentioned wanting a Quebec map somewhere with dots or pushpins showing the location of the farms that are supplying most of what we are selling. A way of demonstrating how very local we are being. Well what started as a framed map became much more. I suggested making it a large piece of art taking up most of the entrance wall. I wanted it to almost look like wallpaper so we asked Jason to help. But after some thought I realized that I wanted it to look like a mural: something graphic and hand painted and really big. In the end after more thought, we decided that Sefi (given her painter’s background) would paint a black outline of the Quebec map directly on the wall with the help of a projected map that Jason put together. I loved where this was going. I felt like the space needed something bold and graphic and handmade. Something that would cut into the stainless steel cold kitchen vibe. Sefi was on board. Then our partners, Marc and Ethan voiced their concerns.  And this, my friends, is where I did a little battling. I believed in it strongly. They tried finding other options for the spot but nothing was right and I stayed pretty stubborn.I felt it needed to be big and it needed to be that. And worst case, if it didn’t look good, I offered to paint the map over myself. And had it been wrong, I would have been the first to admit it. I mean it is in my best interest to have everything work well design-wise in there. And if that means backing down from a bad idea, I’ll do that. But this was a good idea and I believed in it. And I won.

It looks so good. And Sefi even letteraset-ed the names of the different regions and will put dots on the map referring to the villages where the farms are. And later on maybe Jason will screen print some textures and backgrounds to it. It will be a cool, graphic work in progress and I really like it. So there.

xa

The floors are done! They are plain grey floors and they look fine and will look even better once they get a little wear and tear.

I am glad we spent the money and redid them. I know most people would probably prefer the stained ones we had done first (like the landlord) but this is better. It is grittier, imperfect and better for the overall design.

The restaurant equipment was delivered and that meant that one of our key trades could come in to get started. One of the nicest guys we had the pleasure of working with setting up Lawrence was our electrician Robbie. I don’t even know his last name. Not that it matters. A lovely guy and a hard worker, he is great to have on any project.  To me the lighting in any space, but specifically a commercial space, is key. People are often surprised by how early in the design process you need to have your lighting sorted: you need to know where every piece of furniture is going to go (sometimes weeks in advance) and sometimes the lights are installed before you’ve even moved the furniture into a place. Meaning, your lighting plan better be finalized before someone like Robbie walks in. Another good reason to hire a designer – someone that can think about the project globally, see the big picture, know what you are going to want to highlight. At the shop, the big pieces needed to be put into position so that Robbie could get started. It was really neat seeing it all come together. Figuring out how the place would flow and where the large pieces and their lighting should be placed. This is the part of the process when things really start coming together. And when the left-to-do list seems impossibly long.

Robbie & one of the delivery guys                                             The merch table rolled into position

   The very professional sketch I drew up for Robbie’s light installation!

And the lights installed:

At the same time as the lights were getting put up, other major details were getting seen to. The big merchandise table had been on wonky wheels and so Sefi rented hydraulic lifts to raise the table up and to remove the wheels and install feet. The coffee table was painted and the cash table was stained. Bit by bit, pieces were falling into place.

Hydraulic lifts raising the table up                                          Marc hydraulic lifting                                       

Green stain on the cash table                                                     Coffee table top painted in Onyx

The space instantly felt warmer and more put together with the lights up and the big pieces placed. Still there were a few missing links. I needed waiting area seating, office style odds and ends (tape dispenser, stapler, index boxes), some kind of furniture piece for under the cash table to hold bags and paper, and a clock, amongst other things. A flea market trip was definitely  in order… Other than the initial design, this is definitely the funnest part for me – the shopping. So off to the Marché Aux Puces St-Michel we went on Saturday. I shipped the kids off to my parents (after a really lousy night of sleep and quite a few breakdowns, mostly by me) and as the coffee started to work its magic and Sefi and I drove Northward, my spirits started to lift. I ADORE my babies but some mornings Mama needs a break and some retail therapy. This was one of those mornings. My spirits really soared when I stumbled upon these gorgeous chairs in one of the last stalls:

35$ each and in great shape, these were not what I originally had in mind but they totally clicked. They are almost identical to our Lawrence chairs, except unpainted, and the oak-y colour was going to be gorgeous up against my Covington Blue wall. I loved the subtle link to our sister business and I loved the shape and colour. And 35$ a chair? Who can beat that? Waiting area – check.

Next we spotted this piece and decided it would be perfect in the bathroom.

The bathroom is really big and the toilet and sink are weirdly spaced. We needed something in there. This can hold toilet paper and paper towels and also eat up a good chunk of surface area.

The mirror, paper towel holder and soap dispenser need to go up on the walls, maybe some art, and then bathroom – check.

The biggest piece left to find was the office-type thingy to fit under the cash table pictured below:

After the flea, we went to Home Depot to pick up extra lighting and other supplies and then it hit me: why not look for a tool holder style piece of furniture. I had wanted a painted metal something for that spot, maybe something like a tool caddy would work.

The customers would only ever see the back and we would have these great flat drawers for our paper bags, totes etc. I had gradually been bringing in more and more black to the space but really what better way to cut the orange brick then shiny black? It is perfect. Cash area – check.

Then it was off to Lawrence for a late lunch before picking the babies up. And sitting next to me at the bar was this very pretty girl wearing – hands down – one of the best outfits ever. Great patterns, great contrasts, and Holy smokes! – the most perfect nails to pull it together. I asked if I could take her picture and she was game.

Chieu-anh rocking the coolest colour/pattern combo

Writing this thing has made me fearless with the whole approaching total strangers thing. Who knew that writing a little design blog would teach me to be a little bit braver?

xa