Pottery Barn launches summer collections with curated settings
Cecile Zamora-Van Straten, Robby Carmona, Christine Jacob-Sandejas and Mikaela Lagdameo-Martinez use pieces from Pottery Barn, West Elm and Pottery Barn Kids to showcase the moods of summer.
Pottery Barn celebrates summer with four stylish personalities. Chuvaness.com blogger Cecile Zamora-Van Straten, fashion and events director Robby Carmona, TV host Christine Jacob-Sandejas, and VIP personal shopper Mikaela Lagdameo-Martinez put together settings that were unsurprisingly very different from each other.
And that’s the beauty of the store. When it launches seasonal collections from Pottery Barn, Pottery Barn Kids and West Elm, you can dress up every room in your house without it looking like everything came from one catalogue. There’s a wide range of styles, moods and atmosphere you can design with and around.
Stores Specialists Inc. (SSI) president Anton Huang walks around the settings and says, “I’m quite happy to see the summer collections. Pottery Barn’s always been well received by the local market and I think one key to its success is that we bring in regular additions and collections, so there’s a lot of newness in the store. From a furniture standpoint, that’s very unique in terms of what’s available in Manila.”
Anton adds, “We have a lot of repeat customers. Even if we have only two seasons in the Philippines, people like to have new pieces because they have relatively large spaces to decorate their homes with different themes and motifs.”
What from the store does he have in his own house? Anton says the bedrooms in his house are “more Pottery Barn while the rest of the house is more West Elm.”
CECILE ZAMORA-VAN STRATEN
Cecile used West Elm pieces to create a lounge area and dining table. More contemporary and streamlined, West Elm is very New York with the brand founded in Brooklyn.
“I love getting people together at home to catch up and share good food. I love beautiful spreads and table settings. It also helps when music and gossip are good,” says the Chuvaness blogger and fashionista.
“I want a different kind of table setting, I don’t like normal and boring,” she says. “West Elm has a line called Fishs Eddy, which I love — and they’re on sale! When I saw them, I thought I had to use them. I like navy, wood and white, I don’t like color. And I’m a West Elm customer. It’s more casual and very me and it’s for younger people, while Pottery Barn for me is classic Americana.”
Her dining table is a mix of wood (chargers) and white (dinnerware) and gold (cutlery). There is a certain sense of minimalism and restraint; something, she says, that’s very different when she was a young entrepreneur launching fashion lines in her store Grocery.
Now with three kids and a very busy schedule, dinners at home with guests are mostly catered, but she always injects a lot of fun on the table setting.
CHRISTINE JACOBSANDEJAS
TV host and former Olympian Christine Jacob-Sandejas put summer colors on her dining table — literally. Using Pottery Barn’s light melamine dinnerware (they’re glazed so well they actually look like stoneware!), she layered shades of blue, orange and green. She also matched the dinnerware swatch with throw pillows on outdoor furniture.
“This is very me,” Christine says. “When I entertain at home, I never entertain inside my house, it’s always outside in the garden. This would be something that I’d do, bohemian-style outdoors.”
She chose the melamine collection because “with five kids, I cannot do the fancy plates. My eldest is 16 and my youngest is eight, so this is perfect for a growing family. Even the drinking glasses, they look like real glass.”
A former competitive swimmer, the sea is something that’s she always find inspiration from. She used starfish as napkin rings to bring a beach theme.
“We entertain a lot at home and it’s always outdoors. My house is gazebo-type, I don’t have a formal living room or dining room. There are no walls, you see the outdoors from everywhere.”
ROBBY CARMONA
Fashion and events director Robby Carmona has orchestrated some of the biggest shows Manila has seen. Looking at his setting, you know it mirrors his personal space at home.
Robby used Pottery Barn’s wooden furniture pieces with straight lines and earthtone cushionings, and then threw in colors with cheerful block, striped and printed pillows. But what makes this setting very Robby is that he put mixers on a console behind the sofa because in his house he has a DJ’s booth.
“I play all kinds of music, depending on who my guests are. If it’s friends who like ‘80s music, I play that; some want to hear pop music or standards like Frank Sinatra.”
When he directs fashion shows, he starts conceptualizing at home. “I also do my music research at home. I need to hear it very loud so I can feel kung magandang ilakad ng
mga models.” What else inspires him in his work? “Aside from thinking at home, I tend to come up with concepts in a moving vehicle. I like movement, whether on a plane, train, automobile, kahit sa tricycle like in Boracay going between the stations.”
MIKAELA LAGDAMEO-MARTINEZ
It took SSI personal VIP shopper Mikaela Lagdameo-Martinez 10 minutes to set up her Pottery Barn Kids table. “It was inspired by my kids and summer. I have three kids — 13, 8 and 10 months old — and I know what catches children’s attention. They like it when things look very festive and they like lots of colors that pop out.”
Her nursery for her new baby is all Pottery Barn Kids. In fact, when the store opened, she changed all the bed sheets in her house to Pottery Barn, including the bedrooms of the two older children and the furniture and accessories.
“The sheets are so homey and last long. No matter how many times you wash them, they don’t fade or thin out.”
Perfect for children, she says, because when they have their friends over, “they do a lot of art and tumble around. We play board games, watch movies and order pizza. It’s very chaotic. My son has his eight-year-old friends, my daughter her teen friends, and my baby’s there. Our week isn’t complete without hosting a get-together at home!”
Pottery Barn, Pottery Barn Kids and West Elm’s summer collections are now available at Pottery Barn in Central Square, BGC.
Visit the author’s travel blog at www.findingmyway.net. Follow her on Twitter and Instagram @iamtanyalara.