You can’t swing a dead cat without seeing a cowhide rug in a magazine these days. Maybe the frenzy is the designer’s response to the foodie steak craze—they have their cow, so we aesthetes get ours. Anyway, a few Saturdays ago I woke up and realized that the Tibetan rug in the living room was all wrong and absolutely must be replaced by a hide. (Dissatisfaction with one’s digs is a job hazard.)
But where to find one? Buying from Ikea seemed terribly un-PC for reasons I couldn’t quite explain and I couldn’t remember seeing any in Boston stores. Naturally, I turned to our trusty friend, the Internet. Continue reading “Bostonista Goes Cowhide” »
Nikki Dalrymple, owner of new North End home boutique 
Bostonista is not one to jump into bed with just anyone, but, let’s just say, if this anyone happened to have the linens showcased at 
Yesterday was dark, moody, with occasional downpours, a perfect backdrop for a trip to check out one of the strangest buildings I’ve ever stumbled upon in Boston. Squeezed between the Fenway and the turnpike is a creaky, century-old edifice built specifically for artists during the gilded age, called 
Sophomore year of college, I lived downstairs from a bunch of football players. Every Sunday, the boys would venture off campus to a teammate’s house to play a game they devised called “Can You Fry It?” in which they’d batter various items, most but not all of them edible, toss into a fryer, and see what happened. They’d return in the afternoon to report their findings: Doritos — you can fry it! Cat food — you can fry it! Cupcake frosting — you can’t fry it. And so on. This lasted an entire year. It never got old.
Like many apartment-dwellers, we’re oh-so-nostalgic for the fireplaces and campfires of our youth. But we’re also the owners of a mild fire phobia—not a three-chimney Wellesley Colonial.
I once had a boyfriend who loved to brag that he knew what ‘decoupage’ was — and, he’d add, he wasn’t even gay! (At the time, that is. In retrospect, I should’ve known. First, decoupage. Second, no man folds a swan napkin with such ease or willingness.) But the kid knew cool, and decoupage — the art of decorating an object by gluing colored pieces of paper onto it, once the territory of crafts classes and Martha Stewart — has never been chicer than in the capable hands of John Derian. 
The sun is blaring and the humidity is high. While you’re in the office, who cares? At home, though, battling the heat has economic and global implications. Sure, you could crank up the A.C. (or hold the freezer door open and insert your head), but that’s a tad impractical. Try out these 7 tricks to combat the heat without maxing out energy-hogging appliances. 
Bear with us as we sneak in one last SATC post. Today we’re analyzing the wardrobe of a minor player: 
