Editors play musical chairs at Architectural Digest, House Beautiful, Elle Decor and more

The halls at 6300 Wilshire Blvd., the home of Architectural Digest, will be quieter come September. Magazine publisher Conde Nast announced that Paige Rense Noland, retiring after 35 years at the helm of AD, will be replaced by Elle Decor Editor in Chief Margaret Russell. Perhaps the bigger news: AD will move its headquarters from Los Angeles to Manhattan.

Russell held various roles at Elle Décor and raised the magazine’s circulation from 470,000 to just under 600,000 during her 10-year tenure. (AD circulation is in the neighborhood of 850,000.) The October issue will be Russell’s last at Elle Décor. Her successor has not been announced; Executive Editor Michael Boodro is acting editor in chief.

The news is the latest note in the shelter magazine game of musical chairs. Sarah Humphreys, editor in chief of the now-defunct Martha Stewart Omnimedia publication Blueprint, became an editor at Real Simple. Editor in Chief Deborah Needleman has moved from the toppled Domino, Conde Nast’s Carrie-Bradshaw-on-a-budget title, to the decidedly upscale Wall Street Journal magazine, WSJ. Domino Style Director Dara Caponigro has taken up residence at Hearst’s Veranda, replacing founding Editor Lisa Newsom.

Stephen Drucker was named editor in chief of Town & Country after successfully reviving the 114-year-old House Beautiful with a 20% boost in circulation. He is succeeded by former Style Director Newell Turner. Eleanor Griffin, editor of the shuttered Cottage Living, was promoted to vice president of Southern Living brand development at Time Inc.

Not everyone has found a new magazine to call home. After House & Garden closed in 2007, editor Dominique Browning wrote a book, “Slow Love: How I Lost My Job, Put on My Pajamas and Found Happiness.” Donna Warner, the editor whose Metropolitan Home published its last issue in December, wrote in an e-mail that she is training horses, writing a children’s book and will soon be consulting “on a cool website. There is life after publishing, although it takes a while to figure it out.”

-- David A. Keeps

Corrected: A previous version of this post misspelled Dominique Browning's last name as Brown.

Top left photo: Deborah Needleman. Credit: Evan Agostoni / Getty Images

Top middle photo: Margaret Russell. Credit: Andrew H. Walker / Getty Images

Top right photo: Paige Rense Noland. Credit: Alberto E. Rodriguez / Getty Images

Bravo's '9 by Design' unleashes two designers and their 7 children in your living room Tuesday

Bob and Cortney Novogratz may be the new reality stars to love/hate.

Their show, “9 By Design,” premieres Tuesday on Bravo and chronicles the couple’s work as high-end designers and property flippers in New York. The two routinely gut and renovate buildings, transforming dingy digs into urban-cool, art-adorned spaces. But there’s just one little detail: The Novogratzes have seven kids, and they often flip their own homes, which means that some of the show’s drama is based on the reality of living as urban nomads with a passel of children in tow.

The show follows the family as they tackle a series of design jobs over six months, including a 24-room motel in New Jersey. And even though the Novogratzes' signature high-low style is more high-end than Target, the show makes a point to focus on affordability.

“We really were aware of how people shop across the country, what they can afford, because we’re going through financially challenging times ourselves,” says Cortney, who added that first-season projects include a Brooklyn home redone entirely in Pier 1 Imports products. “Then for a 4,000-square-foot Hamptons house, we install an IKEA kitchen, but then for the same project, we also commission artist Richard Woods to do an installation on the front of the house. So it’s a mix.”

Amid the multiple projects, the Novogratzes still have time to be hip. Bob looks like a cross between Quentin Tarantino and Robert Evans, and Cortney, whether she’s pregnant or not, is always perfectly SoHo stylish. Love? Loathe? You be the judge.

-- Alexandria Abramian Mott

Keep reading to see images from the Novogratzes' book, "Downtown Chic" ...

Preparing for the seder with the planet in mind

The Jew and the Carrot, the blog documenting the "new Jewish food movement" with a focus on health and sustainability, has some thoughts about bringing ecological awareness to Passover. Some are simple: Rather than cut flowers on the seder table, use potted plants for decoration.

Other suggestions require more effort.

In many homes, preparing for the holiday, which this year begins at sundown Monday, means a serious cleaning to make certain no leavened products -- even crumbs -- remain in the house. The blog suggests doing that cleaning with products that don't contain harmful chemicals.

Charoset, one of the foods eaten for its symbolism, often is made with apples and nuts. The Jew and the Carrot suggests using local apples and fair-trade nuts.

Take a look at the post for more ideas.

-- Mary MacVean

Photo: Al Seib / Los Angeles Times)

King house, three L.A. architecture firms among 2009-2010 Western Home Awards winners

The winners of Sunset magazine's 2009-2010 biennial Western Home Awards demonstrate why Los Angeles has a reputation for cutting-edge architecture: Three of the eight winners are based here. 

The awards, sponsored by Sunset and the American Institute of Architects, were given to: the Opie-Burleigh itHouse in Three Rivers, designed by Taalman Koch Architecture (best small-space); the King house, shown above, designed by John Friedman Alice Kimm Architects (best custom home); and the Vienna Way residence, at right, designed by Marmol Radziner, (best indoor-outdoor living).

In addition, three local firms earned honorable mentions: Jesse Bornstein Architecture, Marmol Radziner and Ras-a Inc.

The winners were chosen by a jury including David Baker of David Baker + Partners in San Francisco; Barbara Bestor of Bestor Architecture in Los Angeles; Wendell Burnette of Wendell Burnette Architects in Phoenix; Jeff Kovel of Skylab Architecture in Portland; and Sunset editor Allison Arieff.

The Home section wrote about Erin and Matt King's best-custom-home winner back in February 2009. For a look inside the house in the Sunset Park neighborhood of Santa Monica, click to our photo gallery.

-- Lisa Boone

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Photo credits from top: Glenn Koenig / Los Angeles Times; Joe Fletcher

Best of 2009: Most-read L.A. at Home articles

Home editors and home readers are in agreement: We loved Barbara Thornburg's look at the family that called Case Study House No. 22 home. It is a fascinating article about an ordinary man with a not-so-ordinary dream: to build one of the coolest houses in Los Angeles. You also loved our story about the piano's declining importance as a middle-class status symbol, as well as the battle over the clothesline.

Below, the 10 most-viewed Home stories from the last year, with excerpts from each.

1. Case Study House No. 22: The story behind L.A.'s original dream home: "Perhaps the most surprising fact is that the original inspiration for the design may not have come from architect Pierre Koenig but rather his client, Buck Stahl. ... Taken in July 1956, 16 months before Koenig received the commission, the image shows a shirtless Stahl posing with his nephew Bobby Duemler next to a large-scale model of a glass-and-steel house. It bears more than a passing resemblance to the iconic design attributed to Koenig. Is it possible that Stahl deserves some of the credit for the house?"


2. Piano's prominence in American homes declines: "Many forces have contributed to the acoustic piano's troubles. Start with electronic keyboards and digital instruments, with their improving quality and alluring gadgets such as metronomes, USB ports, headphones and recording devices. ... [F]or students, there is ferocious competition for the hours between school and sleep: Homework or video games? Soccer or ballet? Facebook or TV? In a survey of piano teachers conducted in 2005 for the Piano Manufacturers Assn. International, 89% said that the primary reason a child drops lessons is ‘too many other activities.'"
   


3. Parentology: Sending you child away to an outdoor behavior therapy program (published in November): "There are times -- emotionally exhausting and agonizing times -- when parents realize that something in the family system has gone horribly awry and that for a kid's safety and future, the son or daughter is better off living somewhere else. It is a terrible decision to have to make -- one that is scary, expensive and humbling. So what makes a parent do it?"


4. Is your clothesline illegal? "When clothes dryers account for at least 6% of the electricity used by U.S. households, is it any wonder that line-drying is coming back? In places where the practice is banned as an unsightly nuisance to neighbors, right-to-dry activists and blogging eco-moms are forming an alliance. Their cause: to reduce energy consumption and to call upon sunlight rather than bleach to get those whites even whiter."
   


5. Lost L.A.: Century Plaza Hotel, symbol of modern life out West, faces demolition: "Donald A. Robbins, senior designer for manager Western International Hotels, decorated the 800 guest rooms. Each had cutting-edge luxuries: wide sliders that opened onto balconies with an ocean or a mountain view, soundproofed walls, central air and heating, electric blankets, built-in vanities, ice machines, radios in the nightstands, and color television a decade before it reached most American homes."


6. Victory gardens sprout up again: "When the National Gardening Assn. compiles its annual data later this month, market research director Bruce Butterfield expects to see a 10% rise in food gardening. ... 'People want to have more connection with their own world,' said Yvonne Savio, manager of the Common Ground Garden Program for the Los Angeles County UC Cooperative Extension, which includes a master gardener program that aims to help poor people grow food. Applications, she said, have doubled in the past three years."


7. Barbra Streisand, the collector, puts her antiques up for auction: "Question: Do you get a good deal because you are Barbra Streisand?  Answer: That works both ways. Sometimes people will see that I like something, and even though I'd be happy to pay for it, they insist upon making it a gift. And other times, there are dealers who think they can charge me double because they know I can afford it. That usually doesn't work for them because I have a pretty good idea of what things are worth."


8. 'Double Indemnity' house gets a fresh dose of glamour: "Mae Brunken wanted a home with a past. And in a plot with an only-in-Hollywood ending, the interior designer and set decorator found her period piece -- one with a film noir pedigree."


9. Lost L.A.: The old Robinsons-May Beverly Hills, a shop that may drop: "The home furnishings department was on the 'garden level.' It was the highlight of the store, a boutique with a living-room feel. Floor-to-ceiling windows looked out on a California patio. Instead of department store counters and wood floors, there were streamlined cabinets and wall-to-wall carpeting. The Loewy firm was proud of the tables illuminating imported cut crystal, porcelain figurines and plates. It had used modern design to make the traditional look new. The message to the decorator-housewife: You too can belong to the future."


10. Ryan Brown of 'Flipping Out' finds a home worth keeping: "The 35-year-old Brown, known as the voice of reason on the show, realized that with the real estate market shaky and his own personal life in transition, it was time to focus less on remodeling for profit and more on getting his own house in order. As fans of 'Flipping Out' know, Brown and his domestic partner, chef Dale Monchamp, became fathers to a daughter born through surrogacy. After living in a succession of flip houses, the couple wanted to put down roots. 'We've moved seven times in one year,' Brown says. 'When Chloe came along, we had to get off that roller coaster.'"

Photo credit: Stahl Trust

Metropolitan Home magazine closes

The publisher of Metropolitan Home announced this morning it was shutting down the magazine and laying off the staff. The December issue will be Met Home's last.

Hachette Filipacchi Media said it will focus on its other shelter title, Elle Decor, which the company touted as "the ad-page leader within the U.S."

The entire home magazine category is suffering because of the housing slump. Ad pages for the first half of 2009 were down 27.8% compared with the first half of 2008, according to the Publishers Information Bureau.

For the first nine months of 2009, Met Home's ad pages were down 32.7% compared with a year earlier. That compares with a 34.1% drop at Elle Decor, a 49% drop at Architectural Digest, a 45.8% drop at Dwell, a 29% drop at Martha Stewart Living and an 11.9% drop at Sunset, according to the PIB.

The closing of Met Home, which stated its circulation at about 560,000, follows the demise of Domino, House & Garden, Cottage Living and O at Home, among others.

-- Craig Nakano

Correction: A previous version of this post said Home & Garden instead of House & Garden.