Housewares

By day, Frederic Lazare of Bourgeois Boheme is surrounded by 19th and early 20th century French antiques. By night, he's surrounded by ostrich eggs and a power drill. Lazare designed the ostrich egg chandelier shown here with Boheme co-owner Tim Norr. Lazare has the bronze bases cast at a local foundry, then gilds them himself. He drills each of the chandelier's 12 ostrich eggs, purchased online, then fits them over the light fixtures. The final effect? Midcentury modern meets Modigliani.

Michael McMillen describes the retrospective exhibition of his work now in its final weeks at the Oakland Museum of California as "40 years of experiments. " The choice of words is characteristically deliberate. Until part way through college, McMillen aimed to be a scientist, and a spirit of inquiry — physical, historical and perceptual — permeates his work. He conducts his investigations by way of storytelling, creating palpably convincing fictions in sculpture, installation, painting and film.

I RECENTLY surprised myself, and everyone who knows me, by buying a house in Palm Springs. Sure, lots of people in L.A. buy homes in Palm Springs -- second homes. Not me. In a glorious celebration of backward living, we bought our second home first. Greg and I first came to the desert to celebrate our fifth anniversary at Two Bunch Palms, the famed resort where you can soak in a hot mud bath while you "soften your gaze" at Al Capone's hideaway.

As one of the many vendors who sell designs to CB2, the affordable modern offshoot of Crate & Barrel, Bernard Brucha was used to working anonymously. Last year, one phone call changed all that. "They asked if they could use my name and likeness on the website," said Brucha, founder of the Venice, Calif., furniture firm Mash Studios, who now appears in a designer profile on the CB2 blog . FOR THE RECORD: Designer decor: An April 23 article in the Home section about mass-market stores marketing special designer collections said that West Elm does not have in-house designers to create any of its furnishings.

New York architect Matthew Bremer calls it "the bare bulb aesthetic." Originally designed for industrial use, the caged lamp bulb has come roaring back in versions that range from authentic antiques to futuristic interpretations, including some that are gussied and gold-plated. "These caged lights first appeared in factories and construction sites, where the bulb had to be protected from breakage," Bremer says, noting that the metal bars still serve the same purpose, albeit in a different setting.

Even without this weekend's annual street fair, Sunset Junction is a funky alternative to the higher-priced design districts in Los Angeles. On a few blocks of Sunset Boulevard, just east of Santa Monica Boulevard in Silver Lake, vintage furniture is stacked on the sidewalks next to clothing stores with hip housewares and outdoor cafes with small bazaars tucked away inside. From ethnic to beatnik, industrial to whimsical, the Junction is a meeting place for almost every taste and pocketbook.

SUMMER'S here, the lazy days of summer, so what do we want to do? Speed up the barbecue, of course. Vacation time and long bright evenings are terrible things to waste. And that's why some companies want us to buy vacuum marinators. The idea sounds good. The most time-consuming part of barbecue is the marinating. Having to put your meat in aromatic liquid hours before firing up the grill just throws a cold blanket on the spontaneity of the whole thing.

We admit it. We failed to alert you to the sample sale last weekend at Tortoise General Store, a great importer of Japanese design in Venice. The good news, however: Because our notice never got published, the usual crowd never showed, leaving us (and you) with a second chance. The store will stage another sample sale today starting at noon and ending at 6:30 p.m. -- earlier if everything sells. The merchandise will consist solely of sample pieces from the owner's buying trips to Japan.

Though it's made in Sheboygan, Wis., this is the pan that Vicki Fan and the crew at Beacon use for stir-frying rather than a Chinese (or Japanese) wok. Smaller and easier to handle than many traditional woks, the Vollrath pan has a single long handle with a "Gatorgrip" coating -- which means the handle won't get hot and you can maneuver it much like a saute pan. The flat bottom sits level on the stove and doesn't require a separate base like many older-style woks do.

The products introduced at the recent International Home & Housewares Show here straddle the divide between a rising generation that started keyboarding in kindergarten and an aging group asking for larger digital readouts on alarm clocks and microwaves. Tom O'Higgins, who heads a marketing and design firm, tags the groups as tech-obsessed "geeks" and over-50 "geezers" -- "segments of the population who increasingly rule the market."

Los Angeles is a luxury testing ground where brands such as Prada and Chanel try out new retail concepts influenced by Southern California's acclaimed modern architecture, sunlight and indoor-outdoor lifestyle. With the debut of its Beverly Hills flagship, Missoni also takes advantage of the location to bathe the fashion house's seasonal collections, accessories and housewares in natural light. The Missoni store is a glass, steel and concrete box wrapped in woven aluminum bands (inspired by the house's signature knitwear)

With so many stores closing and retail spaces going empty, the concept of a so-called pop-up shop -- a temporary boutique in an otherwise unoccupied storefront -- has found fertile ground wherever "vacant" signs abound. Fashion boutiques such as the Gap and Gucci were some of the first to adopt the idea, but lately furniture and home accessories stores are taking the temporary retail route as well. Modern housewares maker Alessi and accessories designer Jonathan Adler are among those opening pop-ups, some of which may last a weekend, others a whole season.

Dutch design superstar Marcel Wanders has built some buzz for his first holiday collection for Target. Not everything is a winner, but the porcelain pieces -- some reminiscent of the flowerpot hats that '80s pop group Devo wore -- are irresistible, particularly at $14.99 for a large bowl or a set of three smaller bowls. The dishes ($4.99 to $12.99 each) have a granny-ish gold scalloped edge. The glass dinner bell, which doubles as a place card holder, is a winner at $2.99 but looks better in red, silver and gold.

Two designs by midcentury legend George Nelson are getting another look. The designer's classic Bubble lamps -- so iconic in white -- have been released in a muted blue-green called "mist" and a yellowish color labeled "ivory." Purists may liken the move to Ted Turner's colorization of classic black-and-white films, but only time (and sales) will tell how well the new hues are embraced. The lamps are available in three shapes ($359 to $435) from Room & Board, which has showrooms in Culver City and Costa Mesa; www.roomand board.

New York architect Matthew Bremer calls it "the bare bulb aesthetic." Originally designed for industrial use, the caged lamp bulb has come roaring back in versions that range from authentic antiques to futuristic interpretations, including some that are gussied and gold-plated. "These caged lights first appeared in factories and construction sites, where the bulb had to be protected from breakage," Bremer says, noting that the metal bars still serve the same purpose, albeit in a different setting.

We admit it. We failed to alert you to the sample sale last weekend at Tortoise General Store, a great importer of Japanese design in Venice. The good news, however: Because our notice never got published, the usual crowd never showed, leaving us (and you) with a second chance. The store will stage another sample sale today starting at noon and ending at 6:30 p.m. -- earlier if everything sells. The merchandise will consist solely of sample pieces from the owner's buying trips to Japan.

SPENDING an average of $600 per person, the back-to-school set amounts to a $2.6-billion dorm-furnishings goldmine, according to the Container Store. While JCPenney hawks its MTV Cribs furniture collection and Sears has TYU, Ty Pennington's Extreme Makeover: Dorm Edition, the Container Store gives shoppers a chance to define their style through three multiple-choice questions at www.thecontainerstore.com.

Spuds McKenzie made it to the Las Vegas Convention Center last week, showing off his flashy red and white garb in Libbey's holiday barware items. But this time there was no crowd to see Spuds, the year's phenomenal party animal for Bud Light's ad campaign. The retail buyer turnout was scarce at the First Annual Houseworld Expo, which ran for three days. Aside from Libbey Glass, there were about 400 houseware, giftware and home-furnishings manufacturers' booths.

For reasons known only to the pop-culture gods, IKEA -- the Swedish retailer of cheap, lingonberry-flavored furniture and other shinola -- has suddenly become a ubiquitous presence in the ether. Example: in August, when the 2010 IKEA catalog came out, people went utterly bonkers because the designers had changed the print font from the familiar Futura to Verdana -- an esoteric difference, to be sure. The story rocketed to No. 2 on CNN.com's most-read list, according to Mona Astra Liss, IKEA's director of public relations.

The bidding was fast. Inside a packed showroom at Bonhams & Butterfields, auctioneer Carolyn Mani was moving quickly through lots of antique furniture, clocks and artwork. Images of the items flashed on overhead screens as Mani solicited bids, selling most items in less than a minute and often under their preauction estimates. A Japanese elm chest sold for $397. Six Louis XV chairs barely fetched $300 apiece, and a George III mahogany side table -- appraised at $500 to $700 -- hammered at $305.