Homes + Gardens Northwest | December 2007

Editor’s note

Come on in, we’re expecting you

There’s something about this time of year that makes me want to go home. And, for me, home is the ranch-style house my parents built in Miles City, Mont., in 1950.

Six children, two parents and a cocker spaniel in a four-bedroom, one-bath house on North Cottage. Modest in every way — and not nearly as beautiful as the Lake Oswego home featured on today’s cover — it was still my mother’s dream house. The windows and the open floor plan made it seem bigger than it was — we didn’t even know it was odd to have just one bathroom for eight people.

My parents are both gone now, so I won’t be returning home for the holidays. But my memories often take me there.

It seems fitting, then, that this premiere issue of Homes+Gardens pays homage to the home that so many of us have known: the timeless — and now oh-so-popular — ranch.

Its unassuming and functional style is most appropriate in the Pacific Northwest. And thus, it makes a simple and graceful statement about our mission for the magazine: We will guide you through real homes — from quietly tasteful to trendy, from built-to-be-green to simply gorgeous.

We’ll introduce you to people such as Shelli and James White, who did a beautiful remodel of their modified ranch home in Rock Creek, and the experts, such as architectural designer Chris Robinson, who can advise you on how to update a ranch by taking advantage of its adaptable structure.

We will also take you outdoors — a place we Oregonians love to be — to see the latest in garden designs, give you tips on plants that thrive here, and introduce you to people passionate about gardening. In this issue, for example, we’ll show you how third-generation Oregonian Darcy Daniels took a barren Beaverton backyard and created a tiered garden screened from neighbors. Using beautiful, low-maintenance plantings and inventive hardscapes, she sculpted spaces both for privacy and for entertaining.

At the same time, we’ll show how you can take advantage of the local marketplace to find your perfect furnishings — such as the chairs we feature — and seasonal must-haves — such as the handsome fireplace screens and tools.

The environment is given careful consideration in Homes+Gardens Northwest as we write about the latest products and ways to reduce your impact on the Earth while continuing to live well in this beautiful place. You’ll learn, for example, how to create dynamic colors with recycled, inexpensive paints.

So, start turning the pages to see what we’ve put together for you. We hope that you try out some of designer JJ De Sousa’s holiday decor ideas, enjoy the arresting photos of tree bark at Hoyt Arboretum, and get a chuckle when you see how you can perk up your potted paperwhites.

You’re going to like it.

Kay Balmer
Editor, Homes+Gardens Northwest

© 2007 Oregonian Publishing Company