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Fresh Configurations

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Welcome to Fresh Configurations!

Fresh Configurations is a service that provides guidance and physical assistance to express your own style with items you already own. Suitability, Simplicity, and Proportion are three components that need to be consistently  addressed when configuring  any space.  There are times when one element may take precedence over another when one is creating change, but these principals are symbiotic with one another.

Suitability

Whether your house needs refreshing at the turn of a new season, you are merging two households or introducing a new member to the family, or you need to accommodate a number of people for an event, your space needs to be suitable to your needs.

Proportion

What is the relationship of a part to the whole?  Striving for balance in a space is paramount.  Proportion is not only working with scale in a space, it is also about establishing harmony.  The issue of light, color, materials and textures are key elements that weigh in on proportion.

Simplicity

Simplicity introduces ease into one’s space.  Organization and purpose for the components at hand is addressed with simplicity.  What is essential?  What brings you comfort?  What things are you weary of contending with?  Dealing with these types of issues can be very liberating!

So Satisfying!

The idea is to never eliminate character or personality when reconfiguring a space, rather the opposite in fact!  Reconfiguring a space brings forth and celebrates elements that are unique and important  to one’s style.  Read on & see examples of how we may be of service for your home or business.

How we can be of Service, examples…

Family Home & Organization

Create Structure for the entire family to share common areas, such as integrating adult office & kid project space.
Optimizing space in children’s area(s) for play, learning, and creativity, including toy & book management.
Organization & consultation for wardrobe.
Refreshing & de-cluttering rooms and storage spaces.
Strategize & support for household purge.

Design & Decorate
How to be more confident and playful with an eclectic mix of furniture & accessories.
Choosing paint colors, patterns (fabric), textures (rug & furniture) to enhance what you already have.
Integration of art and decorative pieces. Refreshing art with new frames.
Adjusting a space (interior & exterior) for an event, using what you have.
Staging a home for real estate or preparing a home for short-term rental.
Holiday decoration and seasonal shift and spruce up.
Other ways I can help
Furniture re-arrangement~ room by room freshening up, light cleaning and organizing
Bucket List~ create a task list & plan for what you want to accomplish over time
Look Book~ create a memory book of your beautiful home and its special details
Table Top Pop~ setting and seating for a special dinner party using your things
Porch & patio~ container gardening, fresh flowers, and interior plants
Sourcing~ furniture, home accessories, textiles, colors, art framing
Coordination & connection~ sub-contractors and specialized services
FRESH CONFIGURATIONS for BUSINESS

Annie Taylor brings 30+ years of expertise to business owners.  Here are some examples of how she can be of help to your retail establishment, restaurant, hotel, or other business.

  • Visual Merchandising
    • fresh displays that celebrate the product’s beauty & potential
    • product placement to maximize sales
    • psychology of the shopper’s relationship to the product
  • Branding
    • how does your product support and sell your business?
    • product development to enhance the spirit of your business, fill in the gaps?
    • creating collections of products that are unique to your business?
  • Packaging
    • packaging is promotion on the street. Is it dynamic?
    • product protection, gift wrap, special touches
  • Configuration
    • store fixtures & furniture, is it important to rearrange regularly?
    • store fixtures & display complement or compete with the product & shopping experience?
  • Storage & Organization
    • back stock storage, inventory accessibility, tidy sales station
  • Signage & Information
    • pricing method consistent, effective, efficient, informative
  • Customer Service
    • staff training & workshops on customer service, sales techniques, keeping a tidy shop, and product knowledge
  • Creating, Sourcing, Buying
    • help in finding special products to achieve sales goals and further promote the philosophy of your business.
  • Pop-Up Shop
    • taking your wares on the road, trunk shows, bold presence at public events.
  • Holiday
    • celebrating and maximizing big shopping times.  Being prepared ahead of time.
About Annie as a Retail Consultant

Annie Taylor has been passionate about retail all of her life.  Her first line of work (as a youngster) was working as a shop girl.  It was an opportunity to be around the things that she loved~ art supplies, photography, clothing, books, fine art, plants, furniture, and the decorative arts.  The environments seemed to suit her love for satisfying customers, keeping things tidy, visually pleasing, and being a salesman.  As a teenager she had freelance jobs creating window displays for the shops in the small town of Flagstaff, where she grew up.

At the Cleveland Institute of Art she immersed herself in color, composition, critical thinking, with a focus on fiber arts.  Upon graduating, an apprenticeship with the Fabric Workshop in Philadelphia, and various odd and interesting jobs, she felt the need to further round out her design skills and ventured to New York City to attend a professional certificate program at Parsons School of Design / The New School for Social Research.  This was a self created master’s program focusing on Retail Design.  Her thesis was the manifestation of Annie’s Omnium.  A visual business plan encompassing graphic design, typography, interior & lighting design, visual merchandising, fashion forecasting, and then some. New York City was the ultimate classroom and her professors became mentors for her talents.

Austin, Texas seemed like a good fit after New York and Annie quickly fell into dynamic work at an internationally acclaimed life-style store and landscape architecture firm called Gardens.  There, Annie put her passions and education into play as retail manager, visual merchandiser, and buyer.  This was an incredible chapter in her development as a designer.  Gardens closed its doors after 25+ years of adding grace, sophistication, and beauty to the community.

Annie’s creative services have continued in various ways.  She and her husband Jason Minshew have owned and operated a successful landscape design business, called JBird & Company since 2008.  She has been a consultant & visual merchandiser for retail establishments, created branding for the successful restaurant Dai Due, and was chosen to make a mural and signage for the Dell Childrens Hospital, to name a few projects she has been a part of over the years.

Why Work with Annie?
Testimonial~

How we Work & Pricing

Step One, On-site Consultation~

We take an honest look at your starting point. Our discussion will include challenges, priorities, goals, time frame, budget, and ways of accomplishing the task. I will provide advice, encouragement, inspiration, and some strategy during our time together.  Our initial meeting & consultation session is $150.00 for 2 hours.  Contact Annie at annietaylor1@mac.com or call 512-619-6146 to get started.

Step Two, Proposal~

I take the information that has been gathered and create a proposal for how I think we need to proceed given the tasks at hand, your budget, time constraints, and business dynamics.  The provided estimate is based on the scope of service and complexity of the project.  An hourly rate is charged for all services. Contact Annie at annietaylor1@mac.com or call 512-619-6146 to get started!


Annie Taylor

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I feel the most sparkly when...

I set off to work as a ‘shop girl’ in a pretty dress and practical shoes, to tidy and change up  the space, making striking displays out of the thoughtfully edited merchandise.  The inventory plays off of one another… color on color, textures, materiality, straight rows or one object ‘talking’ to the other object.   I love kibitzing with the clientele and sending them out the door with specially wrapped packages, knowing that we will see one another again soon.  If they are traveling through,  I want them to leave feeling infused with loveliness, inspiration, and a sense of place.  I enjoy working around others and feed off of being part of a team.  The days go by with a rigorous rhythm of moving and relating to others.

At the drawing board

I crumple up paper and do a lot of erasing.  It takes great concentration for me to get settled and into the flow, the zone, the peaceful place where one looses a sense of time.   I like to draw critters and people in fanciful, folksy clothes.  I often find myself going back to a place as a child where I was enchanted with miniature worlds of mice, doll houses, acorns, and tea cups.  I would fall asleep to my 8 track player on repeat to Harry Nilsson’s THE POINT, and Peter, Paul, & Mommy, and Schubert’s Noble  Waltzes. Illustration has been a  common thread throughout my creative career, although it has not  been a career in itself.

Mother, wife, and the nurturing life...

I met my husband Jason while working at Gardens.  He managed the outdoor nursery and I managed the retail shop.   Together we cherish two beautiful boys, Oliver (2007) and Theodore (2011).  We have lived in a 740 square foot house (aka the Hobbit House) on a half acre property  near the center of downtown Austin since 2004.  I made the choice to stick close to home with my children while providing office support for JBird & Company, our landscape (design, build, maintain) business that was founded in 2008.  We have learned a great deal about running a small, home (& backyard) based business and have an impressive portfolio of design work to show for it.   In addition to  mother and wife and Quickbooks keeper I  would occasionally  have the opportunity to wear my creative hat for freelance illustration and design work.  Many of these jobs I have are on this site for viewing. Studio sharing with my talented friends at Eye Like Design has been creatively refreshing!

What is the Omnium?

Years ago (mid 1990’s), I had a drawing desk in the downstairs sales floor of Humphrey Summit Ski.  A note appeared on my desk saying Annie’s Omnium.  I liked the sound of it, looked  up OMNIUM in the dictionary and it stuck.  From that point forward my creative world was Annie’s Omnium~ one woman art exhibits, Extra Sensory Production’s Flagstaff Fall Music Festival concessions’ stand(s), and specialty made items were under the Omnium umbrella.  I received my BFA degree in textiles from the Cleveland Institute of Art and decided that I needed to strengthen my design skills and expand my portfolio. I packed my bags and went off to New York City to study Retail Design and Visual Merchandising at Parsons.  For this program I decided to funnel all of my education and big city experiences into developing Annie’s Omnium… a visual business plan.  I consider this chapter graduate school and equate it to a masters thesis in design.  I studied under vibrant professionals and created a prolific body of work and added great sophistication to my portfolio.  Most importantly, I developed a very in-depth conceptual vision for Annie’s Omnium.  It is continuously evolving and it thrills me to finally have a strong presence on the world wide  web.  Pop up shops will keeping popping up  and eventually a brick and mortar Annie’s Omnium will be around the corner. In the meantime keep Annie’s Omnium on your radar in the form of Fresh Configurations, my service business, Annie’s Omnium On-Line Emporium, my Etsy Shop, and other happenings and events here and there and everywhere.

Annie is from Mars!

At least that is what my Dad used to say!  My  childhood was curious, colorful, and full of adventures.  I grew up amongst beautifully creative people, my Mom, Nancy Taylor, being the biggest inspiration.  She banged away on her floor looms weaving exquisite vegetal dyed yardage which she transformed into finely tailored clothes.  Sewing, knitting, painting furniture… there was always something coming from her dexterous hands.  Our family (sister, Mary Taylor Miller and brother, John Taylor) was surrounded by a dynamic community (Flagstaff, Arizona) of scientists, artists, outdoorsy characters, and nurturing souls. My Father, Walt Taylor, was a family doctor for a great many in the community. The Museum of Northern Arizona, practically an extension of our backyard  had a dynamic research department  in addition to being  home base for talented Hopi and Navajo craftsmen.  I have always had great pride in the fact that ‘my homeland’ is the Colorado Plateau, one of the most beautiful places on the planet.  I have loved living in various cities over the years and feel so blessed to have amazing friends from all the different places (since 1968) that I have lived, but it gives me great joy to be returning to ‘my homeland’ as a mother, wife, daughter, sister, artist, and designer!

Shop

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Annie’s Omnium & her on line emporium

Annie’s Omnium is NOW OPEN and her wares are available through her Etsy Shop. You will find ephemera by Annie, Table Top Pop! her series of coordinated placemats and cloth napkins, and other items that are collected along the way. Please check back periodically to see what has been added to Annie’s Omnium and her on line Emporium.

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Shop the rest of Annie’s Omnium Emporium on Etsy

Contact

email:

annie@anniesomnium.com

phone:

512-619-6146

around the web: