January 2010 Home Accent

home accent Living with style in skagit county

January 2010

INSIDE

‘FROM UGLY DUCKLINGS TO BEAUTIFUL SWANS’ Anacortes house ‘flipper’ transforms sad homes Architectural design awards Guemes Island cabins, Skagit Valley Medical Center honored

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1 8 1 0 E a s t D i v i s i o n • M o u n t Ve r n o n

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S k a g i t

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J A N U A R Y

ELCOME

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inside this issue

S k a g i t Va l l e y H e r a l d P u b l i s h e r Stedem Wood

Niche Editor

Gordon Weeks

The art of faux painting

Contributing Writers Te r u L u n d s t e n , G o r d o n W e e k s

Design and Production

Anacortes woman gives makeovers to worn houses with the intent of flipping them

Dawn Geluso

Copy Editor Kathy Boyd

Cover Photographer F r a n k Va r g a

Photographers

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F r a n k Va r g a

Display Advertising Manager Deb Bundy

Advertising Consultants Sandy Everett, Stephanie Fussell, S t e p h a n i e H a r p e r, L e a h H i n e s , M a r c M c C o y, P a u l T i n n o n , Kathy Schultz

Advertising Operations Manager Monica Piercy

Ad Production A s h l e y C r e r a r, J o d y H e n d r i x , Gabe Mannino, Christina Poisal, Patricia Stowell

Cover Skagit Publishing Commercial Printing

Inside Pages S k a g i t Va l l e y H e r a l d Š 2010 SVPCo. Home Accent is published monthly in the second Sunday edition o f t h e S k a g i t Va l l e y H e r a l d .

Eating lifestyles Pleasing the meatless and heatless eaters in your life

16

Architectural prowess Honoring northwest Washington’s special structures

f e a t u r e s The Wine Guys ................... 11

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Infused with ambiance, panache

Goldina Gonska’s living room features a brocade couch with throw pillows, a burgundy marble fireplace and Gonska’s cross collection.

artist’s

An

‘H

ouses are my canvases,” Goldina Gonska said. “Just as an artist has no use for a painting after it is done, I have no use for a house once I’ve redecorated it.”

Gonska “flips” houses. “I buy really sad houses that are crying out for TLC,” she explained, “and I transform them from ugly ducklings to beautiful swans.” Her home in Anacortes’ Skyline neighborhood is the 13th house she’s purchased with the intent of flipping.

Gonska studied interior design in Los Angeles, where she continued to live for 35 years. She balanced family life with her interior-decorating business and flipping houses, and she learned Continued on Page 3

S to r y by

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Teru Lundsten v Photography by Frank Varga

home accent / January 2010

January 10, 2010

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The sandstone-colored walls in the living room are faux stone blocks.

Continued from Page 2

the craft of faux painting.

Gonska came to the Northwest in 1992, when she bought and flipped a house in Sammamish. She purchased her Skyline home in early 2005. “What attracted me to it was that it was in really bad condition,” she said, “but it had good bones and was in a good neighborhood.”

The only homes Gonska buys are ones she can fix up herself. She never hires an architect, builder or landscaper. “I won’t do construction, just cosmetics,” she said.

Six renters occupied her Anacortes house before she purchased it. “It was dirty, and it had old 1970s fixtures and colors,” Gonska said. The colors dated further back than 1992, when the house was originally built. “The average person is a bit behind the trends, but it was only paint,” she said.

For the holidays, Gonska placed Christmas trees in every room.

Continued on Page 4

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January 10, 2010

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Faux painting ‘personalizes a house.’

The informal dining room highlights some of Gonska’s trademarks: the area rug, the leopard-print chair, the paneling technique. bedrooms on the lower floor and kitchens on both floors. The The first thing Gonska did was home’s square footage is 3,458, to paint every room beige, giving split almost equally between the house a cleaner look. Over floors. time, she added faux painting to Gonska has focused her efforts most of the upstairs rooms. “I just on the top floor, where she lives. love faux painting because that’s She uses the lower floor primarwhat personalizes a house,” she ily for storage. said. “It’s that special touch, like jewelry on a person.”

The sage green house is not eye-catching from the street.

In the entryway, the dove “You have to fit into your neigh- gray walls have a faux linen finborhood. Otherwise, it’s not good ish and faint painted-on silver for resale,” Gonska said. The leaf “seams” — a faux-painting house also looks smaller than it technique called “paneling.” A is, and only the red front door Japanese secretariat sits against gives a clue to the warm ambione wall; a mahogany leaf panel ance inside. hangs on the facing wall.

The house was originally built A magnificent Christmas for two families. The top floor is tree, resplendent in red and on the street level and the lower gold, stands tall just beyond the floor is basically a daylight base- entrance. “This year’s theme is ment. There are two bedrooms Asian,” said Gonska, pointing to on the top floor, four smaller the top adorned with a bouquet Continued from Page 3

Setting a theme

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home accent / January 2010

of several large open fans. She explained that only one-third of the ornaments are Asian, but that is enough to establish the theme.

“Last year’s theme was Moroccan,” she continued. “There were lots of feathers — I’m always over the top!” Gonska is partial to patterns and objects from Asia and Africa, especially Morocco, even though she has never been to those places.

The kitchen and breakfast room, basically one room, lie beyond the Christmas tree. Most walls are khaki colored, finished to look like suede. Since the room has a vaulted ceiling, Gonska again employed the paneling technique. “It brings the eye down, making the room cozier,” she said.

Other walls are a terra cotta color, finished to look like croco-

January 10, 2010

Continued on Page 5

published by the Skagit Valley Herald

Continued from Page 4

dile skin, an effect she invented. This scaly look is achieved by scraping with a toothed rubber tool.

As she did elsewhere in the house, Gonska mixed all her own colors.

Gonska likes jungle animal prints, and they appear throughout the house, providing continuity. She has leopard-print dishes and stemware, and her little, blind, three-legged dog sleeps under a leopard-print blanket on his doggie bed.

Delighting in details

Gonska “repurposes’’ objects, pairing items that don’t normally belong together.

Throughout the house, Gonska “repurposes” objects, meaning she uses items in ways they weren’t originally meant to be used or pairs things that don’t normally belong together. “It’s the wow factor in my accessories,” she said.

In the breakfast room, an ornate Chinese bamboo birdcage functions as a nightlight, and a leopard-print vase with an elegant mesh food tent on top of it combine to create an unusual new object.

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home accent / January 2010

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LEFT: High above the stove hangs the skull of a steer.

Continued from Page 5

Gonska did not replace the original white kitchen appliances, oak cabinets, or the beige Formica countertop. “It’s a clean palette,” she said. “My accessories show up better.”

Granite countertops are popular now, but Gonska thinks their patterns are too busy.

“Sometimes it’s best not to go with the flow of what everyone’s doing,” she said.

High on the wall above the stove hangs the skull of a steer that Gonska bought at a garage sale for one dollar. It was cracked white ceramic bisque.

She repaired the cracks and painted it with three metallic glazes.

Gonska also faux finishes furniture; she especially enjoys working on chairs. She bought a simple wooden chair for a dollar at another garage sale and painted it in African designs.

The chair now livens up a corner of the breakfast room.

Gonska’s cross collection is displayed in the living room.

“You should have an accessory you love in every room,” she said. Though she is not a churchgoer, she loves the symbol of the cross. “It makes me feel peaceful,” she said.

The sandstone-colored walls are faux stone blocks, with faux bricks around the front window. Short pile Berber wallto-wall neutral-colored carpet and a dynamic area rug cover the floor. “Area rugs ground the furniture and vignettes,” Gonska said. “They pull the eye down.”

BELOW: The walls in the formal dining room are dark red with a faux leather finish, the ceiling gold leaf, applied to look like clouds, with a hanging bowl of swimming goldfish.

Continued on Page 7

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January 10, 2010

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The wall-to-wall carpet stretches throughout most of the house, with an area rug in each room. Only the entryway and kitchen differ, sporting oak floors.

Living room furniture includes a brocade couch with lots of throw pillows, a Japanese oval floor screen with Fu dogs (guardian symbols) at its feet, a four-paneled Chinese screen high atop a cherrywood bookcase, a burgundy marble fireplace with a floating mantel and an abstract tulip lamp.

The dining room is small, intimate and red — a color said to stimulate the appetite. The walls are dark red with a faux leather finish. The ceiling is gold leaf applied to look like clouds, with a bowl filled with swimming goldfish (meant to contain floating candles) hanging above the elaborately set table for six.

Shiny enamel round “chargers,” or lightweight plate holders, are set at each place. Matching square chargers are repurposed in a china cabinet, propped up behind

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January 10, 2010

home accent / January 2010

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Continued from Page 7

Gonska’s hurricane lamp collection to form a dramatic, reflective background.

“People look luscious in this room,” Gonska said.

Blending style and purpose The hall leading toward the bedrooms is lined with several Chinese mother-ofpearl panels that depict birds and flowers. These walls, too, are faux paneled — “to get that gallery look,” Gonska said. “It gives more presence to artwork.”

Off the hallway, a stairway leads down to the daylight basement. A door opens into the laundry room, and an opposite door opens into the powder room. The bronzecolored walls of the powder room are finished to look like elephant skin, an effect achieved by applying tissue paper, which shrinks and wrinkles as it dries.

Two different paint rollers were used on the ceiling, one covered with cheesecloth, to create a cane effect. A gauzy dark red decorative shower curtain loosely drapes over the functional one in a leopard print.

Continued on Page 9

The hall leading toward the bedrooms is lined with Chinese mother-of-pearl panels that depict birds and flowers.

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home accent / January 2010

January 10, 2010

published by the Skagit Valley Herald

LEFT: Gonska mixes her own paint colors.

BELOW: Gonska faux finishes furniture, and especially enjoys working on chairs.

Continued from Page 8

The bedrooms are at the end of the hall. One is used as the TV room, which is currently full of unsold Christmas items from Gonska’s recent in-house bazaar.

(Acquiring and shedding accessories is a continual process for her.)

There is no faux painting in either bedroom. Walls in both are celadon green, a peaceful color named for an ancient style Gonska is partial to patterns and of Chinese objects from Asia ceramics. and Africa.

In Gonska’s bedroom, with adjoining bathroom, the bed is covered with a leopard-print duvet and zebra-print throw pillows. The repurposed headboard pairs a bamboo floor screen with a red bamboo medallion.

The bench at the foot of the bed and a stiletto chair are Continued on Page 10

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January 10, 2010

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The stiletto chair in the master bedroom is upholstered in leopard prints.

Continued from Page 9

upholstered in leopard prints.

Accents include palm fronds in a tall vase, a twisting rectangular lamp, a Thai mask of Buddha and copper-painted branches decorated with Christmas ornaments, in keeping with Gonska’s practice of having some kind of Christmas tree in every room.

Gonska’s yard is designated a Backyard Wildlife Sanctuary by the state Department of Fish and Wildlife. In back, a graceful iron gazebo houses a round patio table, a matching miniature gazebo at its center.

In front, birds chirp and flitter from a bank of conifers to a water bubbler and feeder, cheering up the wintry yard. An ornamental weeping cherry tree stands near the front door, its canopy of now-bare branches already covered with the promise of tiny buds.

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The bronzecolored walls of the powder room are finished to look like elephant skin, an effect achieved by applying tissue paper, which shrinks and wrinkles as it dries.

January 10, 2010

published by the Skagit Valley Herald

2 010 b ub b l e s t o th e s u r f a ce

I

t is during the holiday season when we think most of champagne. Wine distributors and retailers know their customers will buy more sparkling wine between November and January than any other time of the year.

The reason for the surge in sales is obvious. We associate the holidays with celebration — the good times greeted by laughs, friendship and hope.

What better way to embrace 2010 than by opening a bottle of champagne with friends or family this month?

And why won’t a bottle of premium cabernet sauvignon do? It’s the bubbles, of course.

Champagne undergoes a secondary fermentation — an unavoidable byproduct of Champagne’s cold climate where, in the old days, fermentation would resume when the spring weather warmed. The accident created an effervescence in the bottle. These bubbles bursting to get out creates hundreds of pounds of pressure, which is obvious to any klutz who fumbles an uncorking.

Although the French monks who first made champagne saw the bubbles as an embarrassing flaw, the world delighted as they danced in the mouth.

But beware — those bubbles speed alcohol into the blood stream, so you might keep an eye on your giddy guest.

We like to greet our wintertime guests with champagne because it sets an elegant tone to our gathering and most people so rarely have it. Although champagne can be matched with many foods, it shines best as an aperitif. One or two glasses — accompanied by smoked salmon, shrimp or caviar — is enough to get your event off to a spirited start.

California is making some excellent sparkling wine and often at prices equal to champagne — a name reserved for sparkling wines that come from France’s Champagne region.

Champagne may have the cachet, but we have found sparkling wine to be as luxurious as champagne.

Recommendations

m Nicolas Feuillatte (France). A perennial favorite of ours, Feuillatte remains a great value in champagnes. published by the Skagit Valley Herald

Working with 5,000 growers, it makes a lot of wine that is easy to find in the market. We like the brut rose, a copper-colored cuvee that is 60 percent P a t r i c k D a r r & T o m M a r q u a r d t pinot noir.

It has generous raspberry and strawberry flavors and good mouthfeel. Feuillatte’s brut reserve — a blend of chardonnay, pinot noir and pinot meunier — is an equally good champagne if rose isn’t your thing. m Veuve Clicquot. This producer’s yellow label is one of the easiest champagnes to find. For less than $50, it delivers a lot of pure fruit in the classic French style. We love Grande Dame, an expensive luxurious cuvee. But across the board, Veuve Clicquot makes excellent champagne. m Schramsberg (California). Hands down, Schramsberg is probably the best sparkling wine producer in California and relatively easy to find. The 2006 blanc de noir ($40) delivers opulent strawberry and citrus flavors with good toast and hints of spiced orange and cinnamon. Schramsberg 2006 blanc de blancs ($36) is made entirely of chardonnay and has more elegance than the forward blanc de noir. Apple and tropical fruit dominate the flavor profile. If you can find one of the 200 bottles of luxurious J. Schram ($65), it will be one of your most enjoyable wine experiences of the year. It’s expensive but great. m J Cuvee. The Cuvee 20 Russian River Valley brut ($20) is more than a stunning label. It has simple but generous grapefruit flavors and honeysuckle aromas. It’s a good value. m Mumm Napa. Perhaps this producer isn’t as elegant as other California sparkling wine producers, but it delivers good fruit for the money.

Check out the Mumm Napa Cuvee M ($20). t h e

w i n e

January 10, 2010

g u y s

m Taittinger. This prolific and historic French producer makes excellent champagne from largely chardonnay grapes. At the top is its luxurious Comtes de Champagne. The reasonably priced Brut La Francaise ($45) is fresh on the palate with the elegance that comes with chardonnay-dominated champagnes. It offers pear and peach notes with bread-like aromas. We also liked the chardonnay-pinot noir blend Taittinger Prelude Grand Crus NV ($100). Intense bread, yeasty nose with good fruit and balance will delight drinkers’ tastebuds. m Perrier-Jouet. Famous for its flower label, this champagne house founded in 1811 — “recent” by champagne standards — makes consistently reliable wine. We like the rose and grand brut.

Tom Marquardt and Patrick Darr have visited vineyards all over the world and have been writing a wine column for 20 years. Courtesy of Relish Magazine.

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home accent / January 2010

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ACCOLADES

in architecture T

The Guemes Island summer house, designed by

HKP Architects of Mount Vernon, was praised for its “very disciplined composition with nothing out of place.”

he Skagit Valley Medical Center in Mount Vernon, a summer house and guest cabins on Guemes Island, and a modernist house on Chuckanut Ridge were among the structures honored for their beauty and functionality at the 20th annual Architectural Design Awards sponsored by the Northwest Washington chapter of the American Institute of Architects.

The awards were presented Dec. 7 at McIntyre Hall in Mount Vernon. NWAIA members and affiliates serve Skagit, Whatcom, San Juan and Island counties. Members must be registered architects, and associate members must be working toward registration.

Jerry Ernst, Ed Weinstein and Continued on Page 14

Story by

Gordon Weeks Photographs courtesy of the

Northwest Washington chapter of the American Institute of Architects

The Guemes Island sleeping cabins were honored for being “a real union of structure and land.”

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home accent / January 2010

January 10, 2010

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home accent / January 2010

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NOTABLE

The designers of the Chuckanut Ridge house, according to the judges, “took the challenges of a difficult site and treated them as opportunities.”

Continued from Page 13

William Dietrich judged the contest entries. Ernst is an architect and certified planner with more than 40 years of experience in architecture, physical planning and urban design. Weinstein is an architect with more than 30 years of experience in the Puget Sound region.

A resident of Fidalgo Island, Dietrich is an author, journalist and university professor who teaches environmental journalism at Western Washington University.

The Guemes Island sleeping cabins received the Honor Award. They were dubbed an “outstanding example of architecture worthy of study by the entire

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profession.” The cabins also received the Glen Hunt Award, which “recognizes seamless integration between architecture and landscape.” The two cabins were created by the Seattle-based firm Bosworth Hoedemaker LLC. The master cabin and the guest cabin are located behind the main house on the Guemes compound’s lawn. The jury called it a “very appropriate compound.

The three elements create a place. The meadow is the fourth element. ... The Guemes sleeping complex was a particularly effective rehabilitation of a loggedover parcel into a wood-and-meadow landscape that unites the cabins while Continued on Page 15

January 10, 2010

published by the Skagit Valley Herald

NW structures

Skagit Valley Medical Center in Mount Vernon won the People’s Choice Award after receiving the most votes cast online.

Continued from Page 14

also giving them privacy. A real union of structure and land.”

The cabins’ architect, Thomas L. Bosworth, served as principal in charge along with Steve Hoedemaker. Bryan Chilcote worked with Boswoth and Hoedemaker on the project’s design. Swenson Say Faget served as consultant, Malgosia Mazurkiewicz as structural engineer and Garen Wilkens as builder.

The Guemes Island summer house, designed by HKP Architects of Mount Vernon, won a Merit Award as “an outstanding example worthy of study on a regional basis.”

The judges praised the house for its “very disciplined composition with nothing out of place.

The Guemes summer house was appealing in its logical simplicity. ... It was the most inviting

published by the Skagit Valley Herald

house, for casual living, that we reviewed.”

David Hall was the principal in charge and the project designer. He paired with Adair Orr as the design team. West Sound Engineers were the consultants, and the builder was Indigo Construction.

The other Merit Award winner is a Chuckanut Ridge house in Skagit County designed by Prentiss Architects of Seattle.

The jury described it as the “most conceptually insistent project that we have seen.”

The judges lauded the house for its “very clear circulation network and zoning” and noted that the structure is “beautifully detailed in an abstract modernist manner that is an appropriate background/container for the owner’s Asian art. The Chuckanut Ridge house took the challenges of a difficult site and treated them as opportu-

January 10, 2010

nities. The house takes on the linear form of its rocky ridge while capitalizing on views and capturing its own water and electricity. It has a sophisticated elegance.”

Geoff Prentiss was the architect and principal in charge. Dan Wickline was the project designer, and Eric Nebel joined him on the design team. The builder was Emerald Builder, and Perbix Bykonen was the consultant.

The People’s Choice Award — given to the structure that received the most online votes — goes to the Skagit Valley Medical Center in Mount Vernon. It was designed and built

by Fisher & Sons Inc. of Burlington. Shepard Cutler is the architect, and the design team was Larry Dodge, Michelle Anderson and William Langley. The consultants were Peterson, Strehle, Martinson Inc. and Skyline Electric, CPI.

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TO SUIT THE CHEF

A cor nucopia

G

iven the fervor over vegetarianism, you’d think it’s something new. It’s not. It’s a tenant of Hinduism and Buddhism, and past advocates of a plant-based diet range from Pythagoras to Tolstoy to Hitler. Reasons to become a vegetarian include health and ethics, and proponents tell us that it needn’t be an all or nothing proposition. If you aspire to be one — or to feed one — here are some permutations.

Vegetarian: Abstains from animal flesh.

Lactarian, lacto-vegetarian: Dairy, yes. Eggs, no.

Ovo-vegetarian: Eggs, yes.

Dairy, no.

Ovolactarian, ovo-lactovegetarian: Eats eggs and dairy but no meat. This approach offers the simplest way to assure adequate consumption of protein without eating meat.

Pescetarian: Land animals are off the menu, but fish is fine.

Vegan: Abstains from all animal products, including

By Jo Mars hall w R e l i s h M a g a z i n e C o n t r i b u t o r

eggs and dairy, as well as less obvious offenders like honey and gelatin. Serious vegans don’t wear wool, silk or leather and check toothpaste labels to avoid calcium derived from animal bones.

Fruitarian: Eats only fruit.

Reported benefits include spiritual awareness, freedom from cowardice and pleasant body odor.

Flexitarian: Strives to eat mostly plants but occasionally eats meat or fish.

Semitarian: A flexitarian with rules, generally a schedule for when meat can be eaten. Cookbook author and food writer Mark Bittman, for example, is a “vegan until dinner,” when all bets are off.

Raw foodist: In the belief that cooking kills nutrients, raw foodists avoid meals heated above 115F. He or she might be vegetarian; some raw foodies frequent sushi bars. Usually passionate about juicing and sprouting, raw foodists “bake” through dehydration. Reported benefits include weight loss and heightened energy.

Chilequiles Verde Recipe by Crescent Dragonwagon Cooking spray 2 cups prepared salsa, divided 8 to 10 (6-inch) stale corn tortillas, torn in quarters 1 (8-ounce) package Neufchatel cheese 2 eggs 3 tablespoons cornstarch 8 ounces extra-firm, water-packed tofu, crumbled 1 1/2 t o 2 cups lightly steamed fresh vegetables (zucchini sliced in 1/4-inch rounds;

16

OF EATERS

Mark Boughton / Relish Magazine

string beans sliced in 1/2inch lengths; chopped, cooked Swiss chard) 1 cup fresh or frozen corn kernels 1 (10-ounce) can green chile sauce 4 ounces shredded sharp cheddar or Monterey jack cheese 1. Preheat oven to 350F. 2. Spray a 15-by-10-inch baking dish with cooking spray. Spread about 3/4 cup salsa over the bottom of pan. Scatter one-third of the tortillas on top.

3. Place 1/2 cup salsa, Neufchatel, eggs and cornstarch in the bowl of a food processor. Process until smooth.

Stir in crumbled tofu.

home accent / January 2010

4. Spoon half the Neufchatel mixture over tortillas. Scatter vegetables and corn on top. Drizzle with remaining 3/4 cup salsa, and top with half the remaining tortillas. Cover with remaining Neufchatel mixture. Top with remaining tortillas. Spoon green chile sauce over top.

5. Bake, covered, 40 minutes.

Remove cover; sprinkle with shredded cheese. Increase heat to 375F; bake 10 to 12 minutes, until cheese is melted and slightly browned. Serves 8.

Per serving: 322 calories, 15g fat, 90mg cholesterol, 16g protein, 32g carbohydrates, 3g fiber, 660mg sodium.

January 10, 2010

published by the Skagit Valley Herald

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