The straight goods on the best goods for your home

Too much information is the plight of our generation. It seems everyone is an expert.

"Insider tips and must-have sources" are promised so often that those words have lost their power.

And then someone says, "It's the restaurant that sushi chefs go to when they want sushi." That's when I listen. What better reference than the one from the one in the know?

So, to cut through all the "expert" advice out there, I offer you the sources and must-haves of the season, based on an informal survey of designers and editors: The designs the design editors want. The stores where the shopping editors shop. The colours the colourists use and the styles the stylemakers want.

FAVOURITE FURNITURE STORES IN VANCOUVER: The Cross (www.thecrossdesign.com), Liberty (www.libertyinside.com), Inform Interiors (www.informinteriors.com), Bravura (www.bravura-interiors.com), Koolhaus Interiors (www.koolhausdesign.com) and Peridot (www.peridot.ca), which is also in Calgary.

IN TORONTO: Elte (www.elte.com), L'Atelier, Hardware (www.hardwareinteriors.com), Klaus by Nienkamper (www.klausn.com), Angus & Company (www.angusandcompany.ca), Constantine Interiors, Quasi Modo Modern Furniture (www.quasimodomodern.com), South Hill Home (www.southhillhome.com), Studio b Home (studiobhome.com), DeBoer's (www.deboers.com).

IN MONTREAL: Celadon.

For home accessories Bacci at Home and 18 Karat (www.eighteenkarat.com/ homestore) in Vancouver; L'Atelier, Hollace Cluny (www.hollacecluny.ca), Teatro Verde (www.teatroverde.com), Studio Brillantine (www.studiobrillantine.com), Swipe (www.swipe.com), Angus & Company (www.angusandcompany.ca), and Absolutely Inc. in Toronto; Moss (www.mossonline.com), Barney's home floor (www. barneys.com), Crate & Barrel (www.crateandbarrel.com), Takashimaya (www. ny-takashimaya. com) and Anthropologie (www.anthropologie.com) in New York.

MUST-HAVE ITEM: Over the past year or two, these are the items stylists had to have: a burled wood bowl, a cowhide area rug, a horn tray, the famous clear plastic Louis Ghost Chair, an arc lamp, an organza shade chandelier, a chocolate brown vintage leather sofa, an ultra minimalist hatbox toilet, a glass lamp, and -- in some form or another -- wallpaper.

TOWELS: These are very personal picks. The towel by Restoration Hardware (www.restorationhardware.com) got high marks, as did towels by Ralph Lauren Home (rlhome.polo.com), Frette (www.frette.com), and those at Au Lit (www.aulitfinelinens.com) and Fluid Living (www.fluidliving.com) in Toronto and the House & Home towel at HBC stores.

DISHES: Kate Spade dishes in pinks and greens were a top pick and Jasper Conran's dinnerware at William Ashley China (www.williamashley.com) has a big following. Hotel-style white dishes from Crate & Barrel (www.crateandbarrel.com), Pottery Barn (www.potterybarn.com), Williams-Sonoma (www.williams-sonoma.com) and House & Home Caraval and Hotel Whiteware at HBC (www.hbc.ca) were the first choice among the stylists who set more tables than any other professionals.

PAINT COLOURS: Some shades come and go and there are literally thousands to choose from within the big name brands. The perennial favourites that our design editors want in their own homes are: Pointing, String, or Mouse's Back from Farrow & Ball (www.farrowandball.com); Blue Grass, Smokey Green, Cloud White or Decorators White from Benjamin Moore (www.benjaminmoore.ca), and Sico's (www.sico.ca) Guanaco in a cashmere latex finish.

MAGAZINES: What do the stylemakers read when they want inspiration? The tide has turned. The old guard may still be reading Architectural Digest but the new tastemakers are not. Besides House & Home in Canada, the two top sources of deco porn came from south of the border. The fashionable Elle Decor and the new upstart, Domino, were the most-read design magazines by people who edit design magazines. When you see those super glossy international titles on coffee tables in the waiting rooms of tony international interior decorators, you know that the only people reading them are the super rich who hire those international interior decorators...and their plastic surgeons of course. Not you and me

(prepared by Lynda Reeves/Vancouver Sun)