Sheron Cardin's Input...: May 2007

Everyone, I would like you to meet Christine Craig. She is an Interior Designer from Santa Barbara (we all know about Ellen's Estate...was it you Christine?) Christine is new to the staging aspect of decorating and I know she will get the support she is looking for from the rain forest.

Christine just jumped right in asking the BIG questions Your-first-staged-home, To Store or Not to Store, Staging Business Name, and ASP!?!!. and has already received some generous comments and support I promised her she would find here. Thank you stagers and agents for making me look good .)

Christine, we look forward to all your questions and contributions. You are going to be a great asset to the AR community! 

If it isn't yours - don't touch it
* If you open it ­ close it
* If you turn it on ­ turn it off
* If you unlock it - lock it
* If you move it ­ put it back
* If it belongs to someone else and you want it ­ get permission
* If you borrow it ­ return it
* If you don't know how to operate it- leave it alone
* If you use it ­ take care of it
* If you break it ­ repair it
* If you can't repair it ­ replace it
* If you mess it up ­ clean it up
* If it will brighten someone's day- say it
* If you want to know ­ ask

This article was in the Google Alerts for Home Stagers. How did we miss it?

I am decluttering my email today and just happened to open this alert from way back when and it is the best alert I have to date. What a great job that must have been for some lucky stager!  I'm available for this kind of project and I let them know.

Ellen's Montecito Mansion, Estate of the Day

Posted Apr 1st 2007 1:03PM by Deidre Woollard
Filed under: Estates, Celebrity Shopping

Like Oprah, Ellen DeGeneres has a lavish Montecito getaway house but unlike Oprah, Ellen is on the move. She and her partner Portia Di Rossi have put their Montecito home on the market. This beautiful home was built in 1926 by George Washington Smith who designed many lovely homes in the Santa Barbara, Calif. area. The house was renovated a few years back before Ellen bought it less than six months ago. The estate has a four-bedroom main house that includes a 1,300-square-foot master suite, a dining room with a curved stairway, a wine cellar, billiards room, a library and an office. The property also has a guesthouse, a studio, a tennis court and a pool/spa. According to Berg Properties, Ellen also recently sold a 20-acre estate at 2710 Roundup Road in Santa Ynez, Calif., for $3,050,000 and sold a 119.8-acre agricultural property in Santa Ynez for an undisclosed price. Is the house worth $9 million more than it was just six months ago? Probably not but it's lovely just the same. The home is listed at $24 million. After the jump, check out the staging on the home: They set out lemonade in one shot and watermelon in one another.

This is a really crude drawing I just put together from my Paint program but it will have to do for now. Many of you already know my laptop crashed with all my photos locked away inside...that I thought I had backed up...I know...duh! However, I know that arched windows were always a problem for myself and everyone else I know and I this treatment with my staple gun and no sewing. In my original photo that I cannot show you, I used a black and white plaid taffeta fabric from a fabric shop...the kind of fabric used for evening gowns and large skirts...the taffeta is stiff and crinkly and holds its shape well...called a 'good hand' in the business. I am using black in the picture below where the plaid taffeta should be.

Before   After

It is really crude and I apologize for that but I really want to drive my point home here. (Maybe Craig can show me how to do this and make it look great but in the mean time) Nothing is worse than an arched window treatment that cuts into the window or starts half way down and custom fitting treatments are very expensive...costing into the thousands.

So here is what I do: (NO SEWING)

• Purchase a width of fabric the entire parameter of the arched window. This will give you enough fabric for the pull and the puddle (the tightening of the fabric at the top and the puddle on the floor with excess fabric) In this case it would be about 8 yards or 24 feet. You don't have to hem the fabric at all.

• Now select a contrasting fabric for the tabs at the top. Cut the tabs in strips in the sizes you want. 6" width's is a good width. Then decide the tab or strap length...in this case it would be about 10". You might want to experiment with the straps (tabs) to see what looks best. 

• Now all you have to do (using my sizes as an example) is cut your straps twice as wide as the finished width you want and twice as long as the finished length you want. In this case I would cut 3 strips of fabric 18"x20".

• Layout your cut piece of fabric and with the width of the tab to the left and the right, fold the sides to the center and press with an iron. That is it. Now you have a 6" wide strap 20" long. Now it is ready to staple to the wall. Prepare the other tabs (straps) the same way.

• Take the top of the strap and place it to the top of the arch where you want the fabric to be. Imaging if the panel of fabric is going to be 8" all the way around the window...you will want to staple the top of the strap 4" higher on the wall or molding than the actual fabric is going to lay at its' lowest point. This sounds a little confusing but it really isn't. If you center your panel of fabric and place the strap in the middle with the sides hanging down evenly, and place the strap up on the wall where you want it, you will see where you need to staple it.

• Then you take the other end of the tab and flip it up to the wall with the panel inside of it and you will see where to staple it to the wall from underneath at the top. See below...the side with the folded seam will be hidden but is first stapled to the wall with the seam showing

• Repeat with the other 2 tabs or straps.

•  Fluff your fabric and adjust your straps until it is all even and the straps look identical. Then tuck the excess fabric on the floor into a puddle with the raw edges tucked under. That is it.
  

I am going to post this and see if it makes sense to you. If it doesn't, I can reword it, just let me know. You will never go back to little fan window treatments or skimpy scarves again!

I need PRETTY right now. I need a fresh look, a new feeling when I walk through my house. I, I, I...I need pretty.

My new flower I am passionate about are the hydrangea. Although I have always looked at them as a traditional looking flower, the light celery green is really fresh looking so I made one out of silk and love it. It is beautiful, contemporary, and real looking. They are so easy to make and less than half the price if you could find them to purchase. Here is how you can make this arrangement yourself...

According to Ecclesiastes, there is nothing new under the sun. I don't think plastic was invented then, or the convenience of sodas and milk cartons. Costco sells food in two's and three's held together by plastic bands.

Saving money and having the convenience of easy to use food and beverages should not cost the planets animals and birds their life or freedom!

Anytime you purchase an item wrapped in plastic or held together by plastic rings, please take the time to cut them up into little shreds.

Please!

I know real estate agents that will answer their phones in the middle of their own birthday party, in the middle of their 25th anniversary dinner, and even in the middle of the night. Today I could not find a home stager in Seattle in the middle of the day.

This is what happened...I sent out my monthly newsletter as usual and I received a call back message from one of my subscribers in the Seattle area, Kirkland to be exact. And it said "I need a stager for a new listing". OK, I guess he enjoys the information and tips that I write but apparently has never visited my web site which clearly states that I sell home staging forms and instructions, all he knew was he needed a stager now and I was his only lifeline.

I called him immediately and he needed a stager to help his client with the wow factor from his entry. I thought that was kind of cute. He knew what home stagers did but had never used one but now he needs one asap. His client is moving to Hawaii and everything is packed in boxes and ready to go.

I'm not trying to drag this out, I am just trying to tell it just like it happened. This next episode is why I am posting about this particular experience.

I told him that I was in California but I would find him a professional stager immediately and have them call him right away. Well, right away turned into 10 tabs open in my window trying to find a stager from Active Rain that was in his area.

I mapped it out to see what communities were around his office. I opened the dashboard and clicked on the state of Washington, clicked on Kirkland and did not find one stager listed. So I opened Washington again, clicked on Home Stagers and went down the list. I visited their web sites first to make sure their work was good (again the importance of a good web site) and called. What I got was "no answer". I did this 3 more times with no answer. I went to Google to see how many stagers would pop up with the keywords home stagers Seattle. I only found 1 Home Stager on the first page that had an individual web site and was not part of a directory. (I did not want to go through a directory because of the time and sales pitches I would have to weed through.)

I left yet another message with that stager and went on to find a home stager in AR to pick up the phone. I did reach  Sandie Childs because she happened to take the day off. One stager called back but it was too late, she was out unloading her truck. (she was not from AR but I invited her to join of course)

Real estate agents KNOW that their phones are their lifeline to their business and you will never see an agent 10 feet away from their phone at any time (well, that might be an exaggeration) but you get my drift. The time is at hand...Home Stagers will be and are considered real estate professionals and the lifeline to the success of our business will be "who picks up the phone".

I am sure Sandi is going to do a great job for this Realtor and his client and will get many referrals from the lead. Learn from the pros, it is the connections that bring in the work so be sure to keep your phone on and on you. The day has come and it was today.