Home GROWN

Tables d’hote



Saturnian metal rings gently float in space. Tiny black spheres rest at the bottom of triangular legs- A bottle of champagne chills inside a silver cone suspended above a graceful support system. Dallas furniture designer Scott Carroll, heavily influenced by the Bauhaus and art deco movements, makes geometric, mixed-media tables, beds, chairs, desks and champagne buckets. He crafts his handmade pieces in a warehouse off Ervay Street, in the Hill Co. building. Carroll, 31, has no trouble finding his way around the cavernous, wood-filled space-he worked for Carl Hill when he was in high school, making cabinets and framing houses, all out of the very same warehouse. After spending the last few years in California, Carroll recently returned to Dallas to launch his contemporary furniture business. His design point-of-view is decidedly user-friendly: “A chair may be beautiful, but if it doesn’t sit well, then it doesn’t work.” Carroll’s furniture is available at NUVO, 3900 Cedar Springs, or it can be ordered directly through the artist by calling 428-5120.

-Ellise Pierce

Horse

Dancing



Anyone who has seen Fantasia has been thrilled by the scenes of hippos leaping and whirling to Amilcare Ponchi-elli’s “Dance of the Hours.” But fewer people have been witness to the equally astounding and infinitely more graceful equestrian feats performed in dressage.

First introduced in the essays of the Greek philosopher Xenophon in 400 B.C., dressage is a method of riding that stresses balance between horse and rider, allowing for incredibly supple and light movements resembling equine ballet.

Andrea Curlook (above), a native Canadian who has devoted the last 10 years to the sport of dressage, moved to Dallas in June to meet the area’s strong demand for dressage instruction. Curlook trained with the Canadian Olympic team and has also owned and produced equestrian contenders for the last two Olympic games. Now firmly entrenched in Texas, she teaches at Summertree Stables and is based at the Las Colinas Equestrian Center, where they are constructing a dressage wing for her use. Curlook’s 45-tninute dressage lessons are S40 each: for information call 522-9404. Las Colinas Equestrian Center offers a variety of lessons; for more information, call 869-0600.

-Alice McClean