Aug 31st

Kitchen Make-Over : Part I

By ConceptInteriors
Hey Good-Lookin! What you got cookin?
The kitchen is the heart of a home. A place of delicious aromas. Stews. Soups. Sunday lunches. Freshly baked bread. Time for family, friends and parties. Fanny made a career out of hers in the 60s. In the 70s Tom and Barbara shared a bottle of nettle wine or something stronger if Margo and Jerry popped round. The Golden Girls hung out in there during the 80s. Mr Lewie never ventured out of it.  And today Nigella and Jamie invite you into theirs.

Kitchens speak volumes
The kitchen is the number one improvement that prospective buyers look for. So it's worth investing in yours. Particulary if you feel like you’ve stepped into a time machine when you walk in to make a cuppa. If it’s time for a complete kitchen make over here’s Part I of Top-Tips on how you can achieve a trendy cooking space and still be able to cook.

 Woman in kitchen with hubby and sonFloor show
Good flooring can make or break a kitchen as well as setting the tone for the whole room. It needs to cope with knocks, spills, scratches and stains. Killer heels. Welly boots. Dirty paws. Flood or fire. Well, you’re spoilt for choice. Vinyl. Linoleum. Porcelain. Natural stone. Rubber. Cork. Even bamboo!
Hard-working-worktops
Worktops are one of the most visible elements in a kitchen. So why shouldn't they be as stylish as your wardrobe as well as hard-wearing and hard-working. Choosing the right worktop will take into account design, budget and maintenance. Traditionally the choice was between laminate for the cheap and cheerful, wooden for the rustic country kitchen or granite for a great look that lasts. Now there's quartz as a modern alternative. Looks good and is is super scratch resistant, stain resistant and wear resistant. Hmm! There's a thought.
Put your kitchen in the spotlight
Lighting is key. Be clever. Be creative using a combination of accent, task, decorative and ambient lighting to enhance the overall appearance of the kitchen. Use plinth lights. Incorporate stylish pendants over an island.  Or a chandelier for real dramatic effect.

Fantasy Island
Space permitting, incorporate an island into your kitchen. Mobile or static, it’s guaranteed to add a stylish focal point with a multitude of uses.  From storage and food prep to relaxed dining. Entertaining en masse or drinks a deux with a friend.

The sociable kitchen
Kitchens are not just for cooking. They're the hub of the home. A sociable place for family and friends. For invitations and celebrations. Think about adding a breakfast bar to a work surface or soft seating area for sitting, sipping or snoozing.

Samantha Morgan
Head of Design
Concept Interiors
www.concept-interior.co.uk
Follow Samantha on Twitter @smorganconcept
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Aug 23rd

A passion for purple

By SisterSnog
Yin and Yang
Sister Snog loves purple. The deep purple haze. Rich. Regal with a splash of ceremony and a sense of occasion. Royal with a hint of aristocracy. It sits between the blue hues of the Yin and the red hot sizzle of the Yang. Combine the two. Hey Presto! The colour purple. Sister Snog's catwalk colour palette.

Hello Sweetie
Dip into the purple palette. You'll find Violet Creams and Parma Violets. Quixotic confectionary. If your taste buds can handle it. Rather like Sister Snog. An acquired taste for a refined palette.

Lavender and lilac
Lavender water evokes a sense of elegance. Victorian charm. Genteel ladies with frilly parasols. A walled garden draped in a gown of wisteria. Sipping chilled lilac wine in the gazebo. Humming a little ditty. Lavender's Blue.  Dilly. Dilly. For instance. And dancin'. If yer askin'. I'm askin'. In the rain. Purple rain of course!

Marvellous mulberry
Think purple. Think mulberry. Looks like a cross between an elongated blackberry. A robust raspberry.  Swollen longenberry. Certainly not your 'Average Bear Boo-Boo!' And did you know Buck Pal now stands where there was once a fine mulberry orchard. Then of course there's 'Peace, Love, Mud...and Mulberry'. The epitomy of understated Bo-ho luxury with roots in Biba-land. A peculiar juxtaposition. Rather like Sister Snog.

Mighty mauve
Think purple. Think mauve. First named in 1856 by chemist Sir William Henry Perkins. While he was tinkering in the lab late one night an unexpected residue caught his eye which turned out to be the first aniline dye.  It became known as Perkin's mauve and  the title of his biography Mauve: How One Man Invented a Colour That Changed the World.

Dress to Impress
Colour plays a key component of a brand's personality. Take a step back to think about what your brand colour says about you.  And be sure to dress it in a colour that speaks volumes.
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Aug 17th

Kitchen Table Tycoons

By Virtual Girl

Careers from the kitchen table
The number of people starting and growing a business from home rose to 2.8 million in 2009. Collectively these Kitchen Table Tycoons contributed £284 billion to the annual UK economy according to a survey by Enterprise Nation and BT. And many of the are women.

May all your donuts look like Fanny's
Fanny Craddock may have been crowned the 'First Lady of Food' but she's certainly not the only one who has seen her business leap off the kitchen table into the limelight. You can find  Cheryl Cullen and Kitten Kit keeping company with Sally Preston, chief cook-and-CEO at Babylicious, Rebecca Jay with her Dodo Pad and Julie Pankhurst who captured the desire to reunite with friends. So a big thank you to new technology which has at last created a new liberation for these Mothers of Invention by enabling them to run successful businesses from home.  

Oh! What a circus
Most Kitchen Table Tycoons double up as Mobile Entrepreneurs. Their average day. Rarely typical. And they rely heavily on smart phones, apps and instant messaging to manage their very-much-in-the-now businesses. Organisation. Communication. Accessiblity. Availability. All key to the circus of business. The Mobile Entrepreneur is both Mistress of Smoke & Mirrors and Master of the act of juggling and balancing the needs of the business with the demands of their customer or client. Which is what possibly explains the growth of the Virtual Office.

Step into the virtual world
Time is both the currency and the enemy of every entrepreneur. However, outsourcing telephone answering, admin, secretarial and support services can buy time. Many virtual office companies also have bricks and mortar locations that can masquerade as a business HQ. They'll open mail. Forward mail. Who's to know? They're perfect for a pitch. Marvellous for a meeting. Leaps and bounds better than Starbucks or Costa. And granny gets to keep the flat. It's a no brainer.

So if you can't stand the heat, get out of the kitchen and say au revoir to the kitch'n'sync.

Sally-Ann Mannas
Group Marketing Manager
The Virtual Office
www.voffice.com
Follow on Twitter @aVirtualOffice

1 Comments
May 17th

Eight days a week

By SisterSki

British summer time. Lazy hazy days, ice-cold lemonade, cupcakes in the garden, buttermilk scones, home made jam and clotted cream. So you have to say goodbye to an extra hour under the duvet. So what? But imagine if you could actually get it back. And some. Just conjure up another 60 minutes a day. Every day. What would you do? Get some exercise. Have a relaxing massage. Catch up with a friend you haven’t spoken to in ages. Or would you answer a few more emails, send a couple of extra tweets and fill the minutes with more work.
Flying clock with feather wings

Stressing about a lack of time is pretty widespread. Yet there are people who find time for a daily workout, a hobby, a family, a social life. And run a business.

You could aspire to be Mrs Thatcher and train yourself to exist on four hours’ sleep a night. But would you really want to end up looking like the Iron Lady. Debatable. 

Want to magic that extra hour a day? 

All it takes are just a few minor adjustments.

One for each day of the week.

MONDAY Less is more 
OK so lists may serve a purpose. However if you're a List Queen, here’s a radical thought. Abdicate. Strip down those endless lists to the bare bones. Learn from glossies on packing a capsule wardrobe.  Take your list. Halve it. And halve it again. Everything doesn’t have to be done today. And you don’t have to do everything. Become a Mistress of the art of delegation.

TUESDAY Three is the magic number
Take three tasks. Work on them. If you find one hard going, rotate them and work on each for 20 minutes at a time. Then come back and finish what you started. And www.teuxdeux.com is a nifty little tool which can help you mange your tasks.

WEDNESDAY Keep it real
Be realistic about the timeframe. If you have three hours, you’ll know from experience what you can expect to accomplish. If this is the first time you’re working on a given task, under-promise so that you can over-deliver. Less stress for everyone.

THURSDAY Delicious distractions
Ignore pings, pokes and tweets however amusing, interesting or diverting. Turn them off. Put aside 20 minutes or so at the beginning and end of the day (and the middle if you’ve gone cold turkey) when you can respond. It's rare an immediate response is expected. Try it. You’ll be amazed at how much you get done without become a social media slave.

FRIDAY Meet yourself
Set regular meetings. With yourself. On the agenda. Expenses. PR and marketing. Planning and development.  Turn up at the same time every week and treat yourself with the same respect you would any other important client. Down to the biscuits.

SATURDAY All systems go
This is hard to get your head round if you think of yourself as a spontaneous type but if you have a system in place for managing contacts, expenses, subscriptions, account passwords, standard e-mail responses and client contacts you won’t waste time looking for information. And might even have time for a spot of spontaneity.

SUNDAY Life beyond the desk
Tied to your desk?  Stop worrying about the world crashing down while you’re away. Even better. Let someone else do the nitty gritty.  Use a call minding service, find a bookkeeper and hire a VA. Taking time out feeds the mind. Grab a cappuccino. Walk the dog. Or better still, as you've found some extra time book the next Sister Snog event and hook up with the Sisters! 

And start a new week with an extra day. Who says you can’t have 8 days a week?

1 Comments
May 13th

The trials and tribulations of travel

By Tanguera
Many workers have been affected by transport disruptions. Technically it is their responsibility to get up earlier and find an alternative route into work. In reality, many employers arrange home working which reduces stress and improves productivity.

Vintage carIf you don't have an established car sharing or lift sharing scheme, you should be careful you don't end up setting up liability for uninsured drivers. You should not be ordering or directing employees to get into a car with 'Fred' if you don't know that 'Fred' is insured. If the car is a fully insured company car that's different.

Hourly paid workers are not usually paid except for the hours they work, though salaried workers may be on a different basis. You should check your contracts to see if you do in fact pay people on an hourly basis, or some other way.

Annabel Kaye (Tanguera) is Managing Director of Irenicon Ltd, a specialist employment law consultancy.
T: 08452 303050
F: 08452 303060
W: www.irenicon.co.uk
Twitter: AnnabelKaye
2 Comments
Apr 14th

Monkey Madness and Puppy Love

By Yogini
Monkey mind
Think monkey. Think tree. Link the two together and what do you Girl with monkeysee? Monkeys jumping from one tree to another. That's the monkey mind. The monkey mind leaps from one thought to another and then another and another. Distracting us from living in the present. Which is one of the goals of yoga. Meditation is one of the ways to tame the monkey mind in order to get to a state of peace.

RIP
The quest for peace is universal. In every age. In every country, people have been trying to find peace within their environment. Nations meet continually to search for ways to make peace with each other. There's even a Nobel Peace Prize for individual contributions to this noble cause. People hold up two fingers in the form of a 'V' which symbolises peace and when someone dies, we pray that they 'rest in peace'.

Inside out
The dictionary defines peace as freedom from strife.  A state of serenity, calmness and stillness. Inherent in this definition is the answer to why peace is so difficult to achieve. Life and strife seem to go hand in hand. Yet despite the obstacles, it’s possible to attain a state of peace by undergoing a shift in thinking and changing the angle of vision. Peace isn’t found in the outer world of possessions, positions and relationships. The solution to finding peace requires us to look at the problem from a new perspective. To accept we cannot change the nature of the world or its problems but we can add a new dimension to life that leads to peace. Found within. Reached through meditation. 

Lady with dogPuppy mind
Meditation teaches there’s little or no control over the restlessness of the ordinary mind. Imagine the mind is like an overexcited puppy. So the question is how can you keep that puppy from running circles around you. The answer. Tie it to a post. Give your puppy something to attach itself to. A note. A sound. A word. A mantra.

Brain bliss
Minds are like mercury. Unable to rest for more than a nanosecond before they go zipping off. With thoughts and ideas constantly popping in. Memories of the past. Fantasies of the future. Never the present. Meditation helps de-clutter the mind. It’s invigorating. It’s energising. It’s totally refreshing. The trick is to learn to observe all those thoughts without engaging in them. Think of the mind as the sky and thoughts like clouds passing through.

So be a monkey. Or a puppy. Find your path to brain bliss.

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Mar 30th

A dance of leadership and followership

By Tanguera
Two to Tango
tango_montage2.jpg
Sensuous. Sexy. Intimate. That’s the Argentine Tango. A dance of close embrace. Improvisation. Intense connection and chemistry between two dancers as they move in harmony. One leader. One follower. Traditionally the leader is the man. But the roles can be reversed. Just needs to be agreed in advance! As we live in anything-goes times, men can tango with men. Women with women. It may take two to tango. Who says you have to specify which two? 
 
You lead. I’ll follow.
The Argentine Tango is a living language. With its own rules, etiquette and non verbal vocabulary. On the dance floor the leader responds to the music, his partner and the circulation of the other dancers. The leader indicates the steps or figures he’s inviting the follower to take by his body language. Shifting his weight. A cheeky toe-tapping-flick-kick. Talking with his shoulders. 


Even bears can learn to tango
coupledancing_mini.jpg
In the Argentine Tango, the lead makes an invitation. Not an order. Following a leader is voluntary. It can be resigned at any time. Which means the follower has a choice.  Leading and following inevitably become a complex interaction. A dance within a dance.

Sometimes the follower does something unexpected that actually works. A good leader leaves enough room for the follower to add an element of surprise and Angel Delight. A colourful twist. That's why the circle of 'leader influences follower influences leader' can lead to a rather merry dance. It may not even be crystal clear who’s actually leader of the pack and has the weapon of choice.  

Blame it on the boogie 
There are times when things don’t go to plan. Slightly adrift even. Poor leaders blame followers for not doing the right signalling steps. Wise leaders, rarely find the follower at fault if the dance goes wrong. Which it can. Take one inexperienced follower. Tickle the boundaries. Sure. Just a stone's throw beyond the comfort zone to a place of exhilaration and excitement so the follower has little choice but to exceed expectations and feel empowered. 

When leadership and followership works in harmony the Argentine Tango is mesmerising. Truly wonderful. Hey! Isn't leading in business much the same?
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Feb 21st

Shoes with attitude

By Blueprint
shoess.jpg

Take a pair of toe tappers. Hot red. Ebony black leather. With a sheen that’s glacé. Like a Maraschino cherry. Liquorice laces. Good enough to eat. A cheeky pair of toe tappers. Irresistible.

As fashion follows art and interior design typically follows fashion, here’s how a pair of shoes might walk into a crash pad or club and inspire the interior decor.


A toe tappers crash pad
There's something rather Bugsy Malone about these shoes. So, we're thinking bachelor crash pad with an air of minimalism and an eye for the practical. Space is at a premium in crash pads so everything needs to be easily at hand.  Minus the clutter. Voilà. Built-in ‘storage walls’. Full height. Wall-to-wall giant sliding doors that conceal all manner of things. Kitchen units. Bathrooms. Wardrobes. Even a home office. Not to mention the compulsory sound and vision gadget-tastic-paraphernalia.

Crash pads may be compact but the trick is to make full use of the vertical height of the rooms. Use Poliform. Black leather sliding doors from the Bangkok range. Perfect. Those liquorice laces become a rug. Made of woven recycled bicycle inner tubes.

A splash of red. A touch of the oriental. The result? A statement piece for storage. Come home. Sit back. Crash out. And watch Raise The Red Lantern.

Toe tappers in the club
Roll out a red carpet of light as the toe tappers create a bold statement on the dance floor and inspire the interior of a hot and happening Mayfair club.

A black stallion greets members in the lobby, while the A-listers are ushered through black velvet curtains to the VIP area where acoustic berries adorn the walls, floating lights bob to the sound of Bollinger bubbles being poured into Swarovski crystal flutes while guests recline and relax on red patent leather chairs and giant poufs!
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Jan 28th

Olympic peddle power

By Ranking Miss G

Peddle pushers
Cycling is all set to be the favoured flavour of getting from A - Z  in the capital. His-Mayor-Ness-Mr-Boris-Johnson recently announced £1.49 million of funding for the first two Cycle Superhighways. A Cycle Hire scheme will also be launched: no less than 6,000 bikes will be available from a planned 400 docking stations! Naked bike riders

Good news for the more motivated people of London Town, perhaps. Not so good if you're from out of town or are forced or choose public transport. As the Olympic Delivery Authority (ODA) Chairman John Armitt recently admitted ‘Moving hundreds of thousands of spectators and tens of thousands of athletes, media, officials and Games workers in the summer of 2012 is a huge logistical challenge.’ That's putting it mildly!

Opportunity Knocks! 
However, all this could mean great cheering from creative corner. The London 2012 Olympics is approaching advertising and media agencies with a brief to communicate transport changes around the Games. Professionals in the field of advertising, media buying, digital, CRM and PR are needed.

Winning agencies will be briefed to create a cornucopia of campaigns. Door-drops in the most affected areas. Posters at Tube stations. TV and online updates to keep Joe Public, workers and spectators informed of any day-to-day changes. Travel to and from the sites. Transport disruptions. Road closures caused by the Games. Changes due to building work in the run-up to the event. And any disruption once it has finished.

Sounds like an opportunity to get those creative juices flowing. Then go on. Give Win that Bid a call and you could be your way to Olympic Gold !

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Jan 9th

Nature vs nurture

By Snog The Dog
SnogTheDogDid anyone see The Secret Life of the Dog this week on BBC2? It was amazing! I know that SisterSnogger loves me and I love her but what I didn't realise was why the bond was so strong. Apparently it's all to do with the same amazing hormone that bonds a mother to her baby.

There was an incredible dog on the programme called Betsy who had an understanding of over 340 human words (about the same as a young  child). SisterSnogger says I can manage 3. What she doesn't know is that I actually know loads more. I just choose to ignore her. The other thing we can do is to recognise human gestures, such as pointing. Even chimpanzees can't do that and they're supposed to be next in the intelligence line to humans. I don't think so...

There was also an interesting experiment on nature vs nurture. You may be aware that we dogs are 99.8% wolf. At least that's what our DNA tells the experts. However over the course of thousands of years we've become domesticated and rarely harp back to our canis lupus days. The programmers gave 5 day old wolf cubs to a group who had previously raised 5 day old puppies to see how the wolf cubs would react to being raised in the same way as the puppies. In the very early days there was very little to distinguish them. Until the wolf cubs started to find their independencMother Naturee. And boy did they ever. One cub-carer couldn't even open her fridge door without the wolf cub leaping in to steal any food it could get its jaws into. I know what would happen here if I tried that one...

The best thing of all though for you humans is that we're now helping you to identify genes responsible for human diseases. So mother nature's a wonderful thing isn't she? Now when's the next full moon for me to howl at?
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