Tuesday 16 October 2012

BLEND 2012

 BLEND 2012 was a huge hit this year! We were thrilled to work together with IKEA Canada for the second year in a row; they generously sponsored our event celebrating bloggers, designers, and leading industry tastemakers at the beautiful boutique hotel, the St. Regis.







It was a full house of talented people & a few very special guests! We were lucky enough to mingle with  House & Home's VP of Communications Mark Challen, House & Home Editor in Chief Suzanne Dimma, and designer & HGTV personality Tommy Smythe.

Mark Challen, Rosa of Flutter Flutter, and Suzanne Dimma

Danielle of Urban Walls & Tommy Smythe

Our fabulous special guests had such a way of working the room. A big thank you goes to each of them for making the night extra special!



The food & drinks at the St. Regis Hotel was fantastic! We were treated like royalty by everyone there ...


And the SWAG! The bags from the fabulous people at IKEA were filled with so many goodies for each attendee to take home with them.


So many items to list! We had a fab reusable shopping bag, LAPPLJUNG FÅGEL Reversible Cushion, VINÄGER Bamboo Bowl, GLIMMA Tealights, and VARLIG Tealight Holders in Pinstripe & Houndstooth from our sponsors IKEA. In addition to that, we had fabulous artwork from photographer Tracey Ayton, a 20% off coupon for Urban Walls by Danielle Hardy, Cloverdale Paint Artisan fan decks, FAT Paint chalk-style paint sample-pots from The FAT Paint Company (Victoria Lambert), purse size tape measures and free magazine subscription invitations from Stimuli Magazine, hand painted Annie Sloan Chalk Paint colour charts from The Passionate Home, and a set of 6 hand-rendered cards from artisit Michelle Morelan. Thank you to everyone who donated!


And we had quite an amazing line-up of door prizes as well: we were lucky to have Delta Faucets return this year with very generous prizes, Christine of Just Bella {pictured below} won the Trinsic kitchen faucet with Touch2O technology!


Others who donated prizes inclue: IKEA's grand prize of a $1000 gift card & a $500 gift card, and fabulous goods from The Passionate Home, The Cross Decor & Design, Zoe Pawlak, Urban Walls, Once a Tree Furniture, Heather Ross, EdinHome, Nancy Marcus, Lulu & Drew, Indigo, and Spruce Collective.



A huge thank you to Madeleine of IKEA Canada and her colleagues who made this event possible! We already can't wait to see what BLEND 2013 will have in store!!

If you would like to see more of the IDSwest 2012 show and our BLEND 2012 event, be sure to check out these posts by our members:

Sheila of SZinteriors here, here, and here
Stephanie of Lulu & Drew
Barbara of hodge:podge
Rosa of Flutter Flutter here and here
Danielle of Urban Walls
Christine of Just Bella here and here
Nancy of Marcus Design here and here
Amy for Style at Home blog
Jan of Poppytalk

and Karla, Barbara, Danielle & Victoria

Monday 15 October 2012

Recap: IDSwest 2012

IDSwest 2012 has come and gone, and what an excellent show it was! Everyone from the seasoned veterans of design, to the 'Future Master's' were out representing the amazing talent we have here in Vancouver.

Our Canadian Design Bloggers West attendees were invited to tour the booths before the official opening on Thursday night, which meant ample room to explore & the perfect opportunity to snap photos before the crowds flooded the exhibits! A big thank you to the IDSwest event manager Leonie, and show director Jason, for making it all happen. Here's a tour of some of what caught our eyes {all images via members of the Cdn Design Bloggers West}:

 
 
 
 
Lovely ladies Sara, Christine, Amy, and Kerry
 
Mth Woodworks via Jan of Poppytalk, photography via Janice of Pinecone Camp
 
Phaulet via Jan of Poppytalk, photography via Janice of Pinecone Camp
 
 
Our very own members, Michelle & Rosa had their fantastic images of Kelly Deck's kitchen featured in the Globe and Mail!
 
 
 
And of course on the Saturday, a highlight for all of us was taking in the seminar by one of our favorite Canadian designers, Tommy Smythe! He spoke on solutions for small spaces - a pefect topic for a city with so many condo-dwellers.
 
 
A HUGE thank you to all of the organizers at IDSwest that made us feel like royalty as we toured the show and took in the talks with VIP seating! And we have to say thank you to all of the out of town bloggers who came out to celebrate the weekend of design with us Vancouverites, it's so exciting to watch our community grow. We already can't wait for next year!
 
Be sure to pop back tomorrow for a recap of our fabulous IKEA-sponsored blogger event, Blend 2012!
 
and Barbara, Victoria, Danielle, & Karla