It’s official…we’ve changed our name to Abbott | Reed Inc.! A change in name only, Abbott | Reed is still under the same ownership, comprised of the same capable team, all driven by the same commitment to build better. Effective immediately, multidisciplinary construction and real estate development firm, Robbins | Reed is now known as Abbott | Reed.

When it comes to changing things up in the new year, focusing on your home is a natural place to start. Our homes in San Luis Obispo provide the foundation for our lives – the starting points for work, play, rest and rejuvenation. So, whether you live in a home, apartment or your custom dream house, we’ve come up with four New Year’s Resolutions for your home to help you get a jumpstart on a great 2022.

1. Organize, Organize, Organize

Clutter is the enemy of positive energy and progress. But even if you don’t buy into the existential aspects of how clutter affects your Zen, it just feels good to clear your home of messes, doesn’t it?

Also, we can’t think of a better way to embrace new beginnings than streamlining how your home functions.

First, go from room to room and get rid of all that stuff you don’t use, purging everything that you don’t love and saps your energy. Then, make an additional resolution to think long and hard about the new stuff you bring in to make sure you’re not just making space for more junk to accumulate.

For the stuff you’re keeping, find new and creative ways to store items that don’t add to your home’s aesthetic in clean and organized drawers, cabinets, or baskets. Then, get ready to breathe a little easier in your home.

2. Create a New Cleaning Routine

We all know how easy it is to backslide on cleaning commitments, so make this resolution easier by breaking it down by daily and weekly obligations.

Daily:

Do the dishes.

Start fresh every day by preventing having to wake up to an energy-draining dirty kitchen in the morning.

Pick up and put away.

This goes back to eliminating clutter; make sure everything that doesn’t have an aesthetic is stowed away in its designated spot at the end of every day. Also, don’t forget to start the day off right by doing something as simple as making the bed – it really can set the tone for greatness!

Weekly:

Clean the entire house. This is a task that’s easier when it’s broken down into segments.

First, keep all of your cleaning supplies, including rubber gloves, sponges, and rags in a portable carry-all so it’s easier to move from room to room.

Focus on one type of cleaning at a time. For example, wipe down surfaces first, windows, mirrors, appliances, and countertops. Once that’s done move on to sweeping and then mopping floors.

Don’t forget to divide cleaning jobs among the family!

3. Get Ready for Entertaining

We’ve all been spending way too much time apart from friends and family over the past year and a half, so make 2022 a year of gathering together with loved ones. Might as well make your house the epicenter for memories that will last a lifetime.

Consider flex rooms, such as creating a place to gather around in the kitchen, or an office that transforms into a game room at night.

Or go all in and make a dedicated room for entertaining with a wet bar, home entertainment system, and lounging area.

4. Up Your home Office Game

Almost all of us have had to work from home in some capacity over the past year and a half. If you’re still juggling paperwork and computers at the kitchen table, it’s time to dial in that home office.

Go back to the spirit of renewal and get rid of all the junk you never use in that spare room and move in a desk, bookshelf, some artwork, and voila, you’ve got a home office. Don’t forget some good lighting for those video calls.

Even if you don’t have the space to dedicate a full room to your office, there are ways to ensure your workspace is organized and professional. Set up a small desk, lamp, and shelving in the corner of a bedroom or family room.

For more New Year’s resolutions for your home, or for help making your dreams come true in any of our homes in San Luis Obispo, reach out to us.

Selecting the style of your new home is one of the first, and biggest, decisions you’ll make during this very important process of building a custom home. Finding a style that speaks to you while also determining what fits within the specifications, parameters and terroir of the homesite is a fun and creative process.

Whether you’re ready to start seriously planning to move into a new home or just in the daydream phase, who doesn’t love imagining unpacking in a space you’ve made your very own. Who doesn’t secretly peruse through sites like Zillow for your dream house? Now, picture a “build-your-own-home” tool that becomes a reality.

That’s what Gran Cielo de Vina Robles, our premier gated community of custom homes in Paso Robles wine country, offers: the perfect backdrop for this exercise in expression. From modern farmhouse to mission revival, we’ve come up with a list of custom home styles at Gran Cielo de Vina Robles to help guide your journey of creating your dream house.

Modern Farmhouse

Modern farmhouse style is traditional without being fussy, classic without feeling like a museum, and comfortable without the clutter. Modern farmhouse style is a bit less rustic than traditional farmhouse and adds more contemporary touches like a neutral color scheme and smooth lines. Modern farmhouse is all about mixing comfortable furniture with salvaged materials like reclaimed wood and antiques that aren’t meant to be museum pieces but utilitarian and tactile.

Modern farmhouse retains a certain level of sophistication rather than kitsch and needless accessories.

Mission Revival

The mission revival style is perfect for Gran Cielo because it was born right here in California, based on the styles of our 18^th and 19^th century Spanish-style missions. Distinctive features include a mission-shaped dormer or roof parapet, as well as stucco walls and a low-pitched red tile roof. Arches, twisted columns and central courtyards providing privacy for outdoor living are all features of this style.

Mediterranean

Similar to mission style, Mediterranean homes are known for their excellent combination of indoor and outdoor living. Based on Moorish, Italian and Spanish architecture, the floor plan is open and flows from indoors to out, allowing for airflow and accented with plants and natural elements.

Roofs are often low-pitched and often incorporate clay tiles, and the exterior is typically finished in stucco in white or earth tones.

The open plan keeps the environment cool and comfortable in a warm climate, perfect for Paso Robles’ sun-drenched afternoons and cool evenings.

Craftsman

Another architectural trend with California roots, the Craftsman home was born of the Arts and Crafts movement of the early 20th century. The Craftsman has reemerged as a popular architectural style in many parts of the country after peaking at the turn of the 20^th century.

The style emphasizes natural materials and symmetry incorporates wood siding exteriors, low-pitched roofs with gables and overhanging eaves. Wide front porches usually feature tapered columns or pedestals that extend to the ground.

Homey is the name of the game when it comes to Craftsman style, and they fit well into most neighborhoods, including Gran Cielo.

French Chateau

Gran Cielo is in the heart of California wine country, after all, so the chateau-style seems appropriate. This brand of architecture is elegance personified, featuring steeply pitched roofs and ornate rooflines, turret-like features, dramatic chimneys, and of course, striking curb appeal. The French chateau is an homage to the medieval castles of Europe and fits in well within grand neighborhoods. Of course, in Paso Robles wine country, winery chateaus are scattered throughout the vine-covered hills; why not make one your own.

Whether it’s helping you realize your dream of an ornate wine-country chateau or the airy and openness of a mission revival, our passion is building a home that plays on your passions. Get in touch with us today to make your dream a reality at Gran Cielo de vina Robles.

Our interior spaces have become so much more these days than just a place to hang your hat. Spending most of your time in the home became the go-to for 2020, and that trend doesn’t appear to be going anywhere anytime soon.

So, we’re all paying way more attention to the spaces we call home, and 2021 design trends in San Luis Obispo are certainly following suit as expressions of utility, sanctuary, artistic voice and so much more. Here are some new design trends you can find at Noveno that make our innovative new build homes an extension of the aspects in life we’re all finding more important in our new normal.

Flexible Spaces

Needless to say in today’s new norm that what were once single-uses spaces have become so much more out of necessity. The home has become all things to its inhabitants, not just a sanctuary for family time and relaxation.

Not only do we live in our homes, we now work, exercise, vacation and enjoy “nights out” in them. It makes multi-use space a necessity.

This translates to everything from furniture – for example, an office chair that doubles as something comfortable enough to lounge in – to adding elements that divide rooms into multiple uses. Creating an office space inside a bedroom, ensuring a kitchen doubles as a beautiful space to entertain family and friends or even create a stunning “Zoom” background are now all key requirements that our Noveno homes achieve.

Tech Integration

The home has always been a place to sit back, relax and be entertained – and that’s even more true now – while also catering to the evolving needs of the modern family. Key features in Noveno homes help to seamlessly integrate that need with tech solutions in nearly every aspect of our design. Data outlets and multi-media outlets with smurf tubes so you can run wires in the walls are design aspects in many rooms.

But it’s more than ensuring tech for entertainment and work purposes.

Our homes all have NEST 3rd Gen programmable thermostats, tankless water heaters, pre-wiring for rooftop solar and conduit and gang box for optional electrical vehicle charger circuits installed.

Modern, Minimalist Design

The COVID crisis has not only emphasized what is important in life but it also has stressed cutting out the unnecessary. Clean, simple forms using modern materials while also keeping in mind utilitarian use and environmental benefit is in high demand in today’s home design.

“Contemporary minimalism is not about the idealized absence of things, but about choosing things with a meaning, that matters to us and that can enhance our well-being, physically and mentally,” writes Elizabeth Rizzato, interior designer and founder of the design trend publication Italian Bark.

The trend toward modern, minimalist design is something Noveno homes embrace with a “less-is-more” approach to our contemporary expression of mid-century modern that is uniquely California.

More Design Trends We’re Keeping an Eye on Heading into the New Year:

Your bathroom is your oasis: The bathroom isn’t a one-use room anymore, either. Now, it’s the place to relax and disconnect from outside chaos made possible by conscious design choices.

Biophilic design: Indoor plants have become an important trend in interior design as we look more to maintain a connection with nature.

Blending Inside and Out: “In good design there’s a harmonious dialogue between the exterior environment and the interior space,” said Jeffrey Beers of Jeffrey Beers International in New York. Noveno homes stress that extension to truly take advantage of our unparalleled Central Coast landscape and climate. Check out our blog for more ideas for outdoor living spaces.

If you’re interested in more information on Noveno or any of our other projects, reach out to us. And to keep up to date on the latest happenings at Noveno, sign up for our newsletter.

Our homes are having to be pretty versatile these days, doubling as the office, classroom and restaurant, to name just a few quarantine-related adaptations we’ve all been forced to make. Needless to say, getting outside isn’t exactly as easy as it used to be.

But if you’re lucky enough to have an outdoor space in your home, there’s no better time than the present to make sure you’re enjoying it. To celebrate the completion of our latest multi-family property, Pacific Courtyards, here are some quarantine friendly ways to make your patio or balcony your own.

Green it Up

If you’ve got a green thumb or want to develop one, there are a number of creative ways to build a patio garden. A shipping container herb garden is a great way to save space and add some homegrown spice to your cooking. There are also countless other ways to get creative with a patio garden, from pots and planters to converting buckets or even an old desk or dresser.

Take the Office Outside

Feeling confined in your new home office? Consider adding a table workspace to your lounging area for a little fresh air motivation. And when the working day is over, your setup doubles as a comfy spot to enjoy a cold beverage or take in the sunset.

Let the Light In

Adding a few strands of patio party lights or any number of colored or hologram lighting options can add ambience to any outdoor space – especially useful as the nights get longer. Combine light strands to your garden or around your table for added effect.

Outdoor Hangout

Use any number of combinations of chairs, tables, rugs and loungers to create a unique outdoor hangout spot. The center of attention could be your fire pit for hanging with friends well into the night or a farmhouse table for dining al fresco. Grab a few more shipping pallets for an outdoor wet bar to complete the setting.

Or Add a Fire Pit

Whether it’s from the big box store or a DIY creation, a fire pit is perfect for making sure you can enjoy your patio year-round. Especially as the nights come earlier and get cooler, it doesn’t get much cozier than stargazing by the firelight. Most any hardware store will have plenty of options, or grab a few pavers or bricks to build your own.

Pacific Courtyards gets you started with fully finished patio areas over the podium garage with fire pits, planters and lounge seating. If you’re interested in more information on Pacific Courtyards or any of our other projects, reach out to us.

Pre-leasing is starting soon at Vintage at SLO, San Luis Obispo’s newest garden-style luxury apartment home community. Despite some recent detours due to the pandemic’s effect on material supplies and operations, Vintage at SLO’s professionals have found innovative ways to keep moving forward. Here’s a quick update.

The construction team recently celebrated the move from temporary power to permanent power connections for some buildings. The completion of stucco on the exteriors of several other buildings is bringing the Vintage at SLO vision to life.

Future summers are looking very refreshing, as the beach-entry pool has been excavated and is ready for concrete, which means the restorative spa will be making a splash soon, too. Other resort amenities, such as the modern clubhouse with lounge and fully-equipped fitness center, are on track to welcome residents in the near future.

Vintage at SLO offers contemporary apartment living for active lifestyles just two miles from downtown San Luis Obispo. Whether you’re out enjoying nearby trails and wineries or home relaxing while planning your next adventure, you’ll appreciate the convenience of San Luis Obispo’s next luxury living community.

To join our interest list and receive up-to-date information on Vintage at SLO’s progress, visit vintageatslo.com. We’d love to stay in touch on Facebook and Instagram as well or reach out to the Abbott | Reed Communities team.