Design Happens

We’d like to welcome sisters and designers Amie and Jolie Sikes – better known to their legions of fans as The Junk Gypsies. Amie and Jolie’s new show will premiere on HGTV  on Sunday, November 27, but this Friday night, HGTV fans can get an exclusive sneak peek with an online video premiere of Junk Gypsies over on our HGTV Facebook page.

In advance of Friday’s Facebook premiere, we asked Jolie to join us at Design Happens for a guest post and to share a little bit about what makes the Junk Gypsy design aesthetic so special.

The Design Happens Team

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Hi y’all. My name is Jolie Sikes-Smith, and together with my big sister Amie Sikes we are the women behind The Junk Gypsy Company, a Texas-based interior design studio and retail gallery.

Over the years, Amie and I have developed a design style that’s eclectic, yet also recognizable. We tend to work with a palette of vibrant colors, and we pull together the chic with the shabby, and the down-home with the upscale in a way that our clients tell us is both liveable and inspiring.

Me and Amie

We come by the word “junk” honestly because where many other designers see throwaway items, we see potential. Our rooms combine chippy-peely flea market furniture with elegant chandeliers, and you will also find some hippie Texas flair thrown in for good measure. The Junk Gypsy look is southern fried cowgirl pride (after all, we really are native Texans!) combined with a dash of Moulin Rouge eccentricity, and we always seek to create spaces that really reflect the people who live there.

Over the 12 years that Amie and I have been creating and refining Junk Gypsy style together, we’ve been lucky enough to work with some amazing clients, including country artists Dierks Bentley and Miranda Lambert.

Here are some shots of the design we created for Miranda’s Airstream trailer. She loves it and so do we!

We were also so honored when Miranda asked us to create the look for her recent wedding to Blake Shelton.

We are also so honored to now be part of the HGTV family. As longtime HGTV fans ourselves, both Amie and I are very excited to offer y’all a sneak peak of our new show over on the HGTV Facebook page. We hope you will join us this Friday night for some Junk-Gypsy style inspiration!

We’re super excited to tell you that HGTV and Hearst Magazines are introducing a new title: HGTV Magazine.

The magazine will cover decorating, renovating, gardening and real estate, of course. You’ll also find content like entertaining and food, to help you make the most of your home. Look for lots of your favorite HGTV talent and behind-the-scenes scoop.

Sara Peterson, formerly editor of Coastal Living, is the editor-in-chief.

Look for the first test issue in October and the second the following January. If people love it as much as we think they will, full-scale production will kick off in 2012.

Now’s a good time to speak up. What would you like to see in our new magazine?

Click for the Full Press Release

Design bloggers love Emily Henderson, and we’re no different. In just 10 short days her show will premiere on HGTV. She’s so excited she put a countdown on her blog. Then we lifted it and put it on our blog too. You’ll see it over there on the right. Since we can’t all be together in person that night, HGTV and Emily are having a Twitter party and you’re invited.

The details:
Live Twitter Party with Emily Henderson (@em_henderson) during “Secrets from a Stylist” Premiere
Sat, 2/26 from 9-9:30pm ET
Hashtag: #HGTV

You may notice things look a little different on HGTV.com.

We know that lot of you think about design by room, so we updated our navigation to make exploration easier.
 
 

 
 
Some topics, though, cover the whole house. You can find those under Decorating.
 
 

 
 
We also know you care a lot about color. You’ll see this grid on various pages throughout the site. Use it to search thousands of photos of designer rooms.
 
 

 
 
We’ve packed a lot more information into our pages. On our section fronts, like Kitchens and Landscaping, you will see, along with other good stuff, our regular programming joined by the latest and the most popular articles in that section.

You may see some glitchy pages while we transition to the new format. We hope you’ll be patient while we iron out the last few kinks. We’re working hard behind the scenes to bring you the best HGTV.com ever!

All these changes are based on feedback and requests from readers. Let us know in the comments if we did right by you. And if you’re lost, let us know that too. We’ll get you pointed in the right direction.