Designs for small spaces may be creative and pleasing to the eye instead of banal with the primary desire to hide features. It's a surprise in a Zen fashion to move about in small areas, halls and room, and discover a designed feature, such as this cabinet and bedroom door. Yes, some craftsmanship is required, and design ability that lends itself to art and simplicity. Jaeger & Ernst strive to beauty regardless of the client's resources and space. Good design is of the utmost importance in smaller homes, condos and apartments. What reason is there not to strive for beauty and functionality in all of our living spaces? Jaeger & Ernst cabinetmakers seek custom work: call 434-973-7018

According to Liz, the biggest obstacle was coming up with a layout that worked to meet her design wish list. She explains: “The refrigerator used to open up next to the column. The area between the fridge and the column was the primary traffic pattern from the kitchen to the living room. When the fridge door was opened it would block that access path entirely.” This also limited the style of refrigerator that would fit the space. For instance, a French Door refrigerator with freezer wasn’t an option because the freezer drawer wouldn’t open all the way. This is another reason she opted to keep her existing Whirlpool refrigerator. “Correcting this traffic pattern was a big challenge for me,” she adds. “I actually spent years trying to figure out how to correct it. Plus, because the column was just sitting out in the middle of the room, it was very disconnected and detracted from the rest of the space.” She adds that previously all of the counter space were literally swaths of counter every two feet or so. Not very conducive to food prep or work flow! To remedy this, Liz had added an island cart years ago in the hopes of creating more space. However like the column, that too began to feel disconnected and not cohesive. She explains: “We had to walk around it to get from the fridge to the pantry, oven, and stove. The pantry was also on the opposite side of the kitchen from the fridge and made meal preparation cumbersome.” With IKD’s help, the solution presented itself. She explains: “By moving the pantry next to the fridge and extending the corner and adding the peninsula, we gained large areas of counter space as well as correcting the cumbersome traffic pattern. Baking and meal prep is now so efficient! All of the food is right next to each other. We have dedicated baking and prep areas, and a dedicated cooking area. Previously all of the food, prep, and cooking was all broken up throughout the space.” “As for installation, the only issue was that I gave an incorrect dimension to IKD on the location of the window over the sink. I ended up needing to get different dimension cabinets on both sides of the sink and window. Thankfully I noticed this at the very beginning and we were able to recover really easily from the mistake,” she concludes.

These clients were in the second stage of renovating their stylish Tudor when we were approached to help formulate a final design plan for entertainment, technology integration and lighting design and control systems. Although the plan was to implement the final completion of these systems in stages, we needed to prepare the appropriate wiring to accomplish the end goals. We provided a lighting design plan for the areas under construction and some simple control solutions from Lutron and Universal Remote Control. Once the Family room was completed we brought in the BDI Novia A/V Cabinet in Coco stained Cherry. This excellent piece of A/V furniture was just large enough to house the entertainment system along with the homes WiFi router. The A/V system was built around a Denon AVR 3809Ci. Source components consisted of Comcast Cable HD DVR, Samsung Blu-Ray DVD player and an Apple TV. The Apple TV was the primarily used for playing the clients music and sharing their family pictures on the 50” Samsung LED TV. The Samsung Blu-Ray DVD player was designed with an internet application for Pandora Radio which is a great way to experience a wide variety of music by creating sets of personable radio stations. Listing to the entertainment system is a real joy with the Totem Tribe in-wall speakers. These sealed cabinet in-wall speakers are some of the best in the world for a very reasonable price. The Velodyne MiniVee 10 was used as the subwoofer. Panamax surge protection was incorporated for everything including the TV. The Universal Remote Control MX-980 was programmed to operate the primary entertainment system along with multiple audio zones for Kitchen, Dining, Patio, Master Bed & Bathroom through the Aton DLA6 zoned speaker selector and volume controller. Additional MX900 was used to support the master suite control within that area. A Lutron Graphic eye was used in the Dining room to manage all of the lighting scenes while the Family room was controlled via the MX-980 remote and RF replacement wall dimmers. This was a great balance of budget and appropriate user interface options. Client

M-S Pro Architects announce the completion of an indoor swimming pool in a state-of-the-art, single storey family home set in a picturesque location on the outskirts of Bratislava - one of Europe’s youngest capital cities. Kebony, a beautiful wood recommended by leading architects, was chosen to craft the ceiling of the swimming pool, which is designed to emulate rippling waves as well as for the terrace deck and structural beams. Sustainability and a desire to recreate the close proximity often seen between wood and water in the natural environment were primary focuses in the design of this project. This led a requirement for a low maintenance wood, compatible humidity and with advanced durability, for the swimming pool ceiling. In addition, a high level of precision when cutting the wood was required in order to achieve the desired appearance of waves. Supplied by Leading Market, Kebony was carefully selected for the pool ceiling, which consists of 490 lamellae of timber, due to its versatility, durability and environmental credentials. Kebony was also installed throughout the exterior of this property, both for the spacious outdoor terrace and the exterior and interior beams. One of the reasons to choose Kebony was the unified look of wood in all these different applications. Developed in Norway, the patented Kebony technology uses an environmentally friendly process, which permanently enhances the properties of sustainable softwood with a bio-based liquid derived from agricultural crop waste. By polymerising the wood’s cell wall with furfuryl alcohol, the wood gains greatly improved durability and dimensional stability, giving it characteristics similar to those of tropical hardwood. In creating a wood with comparable properties to tropical hardwood that can be grown in a FSC certified, sustainably managed forest, the demand for tropical woods is reduced, allowing timber to once again be an important part of sustainable construction. Tomáš Hubinský, Lead Architect at M-S Pro, commented: “From conception through to completion, the creation of this ceiling has been a real feat. Despite the challenges faced by such an intricate design, Kebony was the perfect material to convey our desired effect of waves rippling along the ceiling. We will continue to incorporate Kebony into our interior and exterior designs, with wood fast becoming the first choice material for all architects.” Mette Valen, Sales Manager Norway at Kebony, explained: “The distinctive nature of this design cleverly portrays the capability of Kebony, demonstrating both the aesthetic and performance qualities of the product. We would be honoured to work with M-S Pro in the future and look forward to seeing how they utilise Kebony in their future projects.”