2007

Although we still have 4 days left in 2006 - it’s time to start thinking about ‘07. I’m the type of person who is ready to move onto the next thing as soon as something is complete. Christmas is behind us and here comes the new year! 2007 will be an exciting time as I endeavor into new things. I have been enjoying some time off from my show so that I could build up my private design practice. With this came a lot of growth and loads of new opportunities.

This year you will see an improved website (my business manager calls it kennethbrowndesign.com version 2.0) With all fingers crossed my book series will wrap up and be on the shelves by the end of 07. In addition, I am working with a few large retailers to develop a few product lines.

To top it all off, I hope that my new place will be complete in April and ready for me to move in. Below is a picture of the Broadway Hollywood Building which is being converted into Lofts.

Living in a city where most developers’ motto is “tear down and build new”, I am excited to move into this building in old Hollywood and become a part of the trend that respects historical buildings For the past 4 years this building has undergone an extension restoration, down to the hand cleaning of each original brick!

Lots of new things in 07 - and I hope you’ll check back often to stay in touch!

For those of you in Salt Lake City - I’ll be speaking at the Home Show Friday Jan 5. If you can’t make it to the show - I’ll be doing interviews on the local Utah CBS Live News morning show, the NBC “Studio 5” Live show (11-12) and the ABC Talk Show that day as well. Hope you can check it out - or even better - stop by the Home Show @2pm or 7pm when I’ll be on stage talking design and answering your questions.

Oven Advice - keeping the Turkey free for Christmas Dinner

Many of you have written in asking how my oven was finally unlocked. With Christmas dinner 3 days away, this is a good time to revisit my Thanksgiving Turkey story. As some of you read down below, my oven malfunctioned on Thanksgiving and went into lock mode and trapped the Turkey for a week (until the GE repairman came out to open the door with a coat hanger).

Here is what apparently happened.....on commercial grade ovens like my GE monogram there is a safety mechanism that automatically locks the oven when it reaches a dangerous temperature. What happened in my case is the oven had been on all day (6 hours) warming up dishes, cooking dishes etc. When it came time to put the Turkey in to re-heat it, something had spilled near the thermastat and must have caught fire, raising the temp near the thermastat to dangerous levels and locking itself. This is the same thing that happens when you use the self-cleaning option.

The way to unlock the oven is to turn off the oven at the circuit breaker, wait 15 minutes for the oven to cool down and the oven should unlock itself after flipping the breaker back on. Somehow, my oven did not respond to this technique.

At the end of the day, I had to order a new door mechanism and supply a coat hanger to the serviceman (he was a very nice guy and felt really bad - I assured him it was not his fault) Maybe it was a sign to become a vegetarian.

I want to wish all of you a very Merry Christmas - thank you for all of your support this year. Look for new and exciting things coming to the website in the first quarter 07. I also have a goal to get my books out in 2007 too! With love - Kenneth

This year’s Christmas card shows Benson with his favorite ball and Oliver eating (his favorite thing to do)

Design Gifting

How many of you know someone that is hard to shop for? I had just about given up on one particular person in my office. That was until I remembered he wanted to give his bathroom a fresh look. When you’re a designer, it is hard to design for yourself (believe me - it’s true - I am on sofa number 3 for my living room)

So instead of fighting holiday traffic, I found myself creating a design that suited him to a tee. His current bathroom looks like every other bathroom from the 50’s. Green tile, painted white cabinets, standard towel ring, generic light fixture - you know the look (many of you may have the same bathroom)

Working with a smaller space, it was important to make an impact with texture. That is why I placed bamboo blinds over his window (adding interest to an older window). A warm color on the walls was an easy fix with paint, but by creating a pattern on the ceiling the room seemed larger. A wooden vanity and mirror add a masculine touch and the library wall sconce gives the room a unique personality. For additional storage, I suggest using a glass shelf (similar to what you see at department stores) for an interesting way to display things - making the bathroom feel more like a room. By taking down the older glass shower door, I was able to bring in a nice shower curtain that gives the bathroom a custom vibe while at the same time, making the room feel larger. To achieve the look of new tile, a professional reglazer can come in and reglaze the tile for a tenth of the price of installing new tile.

To top if off, he is going to be surprised when he looks here to find his Christmas gift. You know who you are - I hope you enjoy ! Thanks for being such a huge asset to my design firm - I wish you all the best!

Happy Holidays! After.......................Before

What’s been up....

So many of you loved the episode last weekend and wanted to know where to get the table that was featured. The table came from a showroom in Los Angeles called Thomas Lavin. Here is an after picture of the room. If you scroll down, you can see the before picture

Also thought you ‘d enjoy seeing a recent piece in InTouch magazine. It is on newstands now - not sure when a new copy comes out so if you miss it - here is a sneak peak of the spread

Be sure to check out this weekend’s show - it is a home Theater - it took over a year to complete - an amazing before and after -

This Saturday’s episode

Many of you ask when new episodes of my show will air. Typically the network airs new episodes on Saturday nights. In California, it comes on at 8pm but I’ve heard that it comes on earlier in different time zones. Last week, HGTV aired a special in place of reDesign. The good news is that a new episode is slated to air tomorrow - unless, programming changes the schedule last minute (which they’ve done before).

Anyway - tomorrow’s episode was a lot of fun to shoot. It took 4 months to complete. There is a part during the show where I’m testing different color stain samples on the wood floors. A little inside secret - during the taping of that segment the stain samples were all the same color (someone accidently ordered 4 of the same color). We had to cut tape so that my assistant could run out and get a darker color - what looks like something that took 5 minutes on camera actually took 3 hours.

Hope you enjoy the episode - would love to hear what you think about the coffee table (Michael called it a palm frond) and the faux alligator vinyl on the dining chairs.

Below is a little glimpse of the ”before”. I’ll post an “after” photo next week (don’t want to spoil the surprise)

What’s New?

I’ll be speaking at an event on Jan 4th in Salt Lake City- I’ll post more details as they are finalized. I will also be doing the local NBC, ABC and CBS morning shows while there -hopefully I’ll have time to enjoy some winter weather - it was 78 degrees in LA today - far from holiday weather.

I am also looking to expand into larger offices - it is not easy finding the right space. I’m spending most of tomorrow looking at potential places.

The book is coming along, especially now that I have a new mini recorder. As I drive around town (or sit around the office) I record parts of chapters (it beats typing at my computer). I’m lucky to have someone who is going to transcribe everything, hopefully they won’t laugh at the parts where I find myself singing along to the radio while the recorder is on. I don’t think that part will make it in the book -

Benson is checking out what I’ve been talking into over the last few weeks - if it’s not food or his ball, he’s not interested.

Thanks Linda W. for the suggestion for this blog entry.

I have been busy working on my new website and would like to hear from you. If there is anything that you would like to see on my new website, please let me know. I would love to hear your thoughts and ideas. Click on “Send an Email” under questions or comments.