About Candice Olson: Candice Olson is a Canadian designer. She was the host of the Toronto-based home-makeoveDivine Design and Candice Tells All, which aired on the W Network in Canada and on HGTV in the United States.
Ask any teenage girl to describe her perfect bedroom, and you'll get answers like 'a room with a private phone line, a place to hang out with friends, and for it to be way-cool and funky.' Ask parents the same question, and 'a locked door that opens ...
I never try to be the poster child for the perfect mother/wife... You prioritize, you do the best you can possibly do, and you don't beat yourself up.
Today's kitchen is all about a well-planned space that makes cooking a completely interactive experience among family and friends.
Bathrooms are, on a square foot basis, the most expensive room in the house to renovate. If you want to test your heart's fitness, try shopping for simple bathroom faucets. Add in the cost of the required valves, mixers and trims, and you may need re...
I firmly believe that if your environment works for you and your family, it translates into a better life.
The type of renovation I do most often is opening a kitchen to the family room.
We're a very active family, and I like everything in its place. I'm all about designing every little space. It will help me in the business of being a mom. Every single day is so crazy with my work that I just need to be able to come home and do that...
Look for inspiration in books, magazines, and even other people's homes - then be brave and take a chance with a room in your home.
Strip makeup lights just don't give you a fighting chance no matter how good looking you are. Light sconces that flank the mirror illuminate your entire face evenly.
One of the most common reasons people renovate their homes is a change in their lifestyle - an upcoming wedding, a new baby, or grown children moving away.
Mom raised me all by herself, and although we went through our share of lean years, she always worked hard to make our home warm and welcoming.
When I'm doing kitchen planning as well as bathroom design, I try to walk through the day with the homeowner. If we're talking about a kitchen, it will be: So, we are walking in with the groceries. When we are taking them out of the car, where will t...
Great French design is often about unexpected touches.
It's great to design a beautiful, modern, sleek home like you'd see in a magazine. But if it doesn't suit your lifestyle, it's really wasted.
Sometimes living in a room that's badly designed isn't the worst thing in the world. Trust me - this is a fact! Living in a room that has no design whatsoever is even worse. I've learned this from my many clients over the years that have moved into n...
I credit my mom with inspiring in me a love of design, matched by her creative problem-solving abilities. This is a woman who could find an old, discarded piece of furniture, bring it home and turn it into something fabulous.
I never want to hold myself up as the poster child of the successful mother-businesswoman. It's a total 'Gong Show.' I won't pretend. When you do so many things, something always suffers. You just can't be great at everything.
Spaces I love to do - the uglier the better - tend to be really old, dated basements - especially from the '60s to the '80s. I love those.
I love doing kitchen renovations where we're opening up the kitchen and creating open-concept main floors. I think that's one renovation that really changes the way people live in their homes.
Now that our kids are getting older, they need their space. We dug out the basement so they will have a place to go crazy in the wintertime. My son is already talking about how he's going to make a skateboard ramp. It's just a mosh pit down there, so...
