Today i was doing this

Today i bought this cupcake from a little girl in an orange dress for fifty cents.

Interior greenery

A green beginning of an Orange-tinted week.

I love this jungle-bathroom:

Scott Bromley's apartment - original source unknown

A green art wall:

Adam's downtown LA Loft by OLD BRAND NEW

Plant-stands:

By Fine Little Day

From Modern Findings

Hello Weekend

From amanda catherine designs on Etsy

Made of cork but not necessarily meant for thumbtacks

Bug collection by Ryosuke Fukusada + Rui Pereira
Spotted on Spoon & Tamago

Somewhere in the back of my mind there was the vague notion of once reading something about cork becoming a hard-to-come-by material. Something to do with wine bottles, tree-disease, pollution or the likes.

i must have misremembered because nowhere can i find any mention of cork oaks going extinct or any other reason why cork would disappear from our material-workbook. On the contrary, because the harvest of cork does not involve cutting down the actual tree it's considered an environmentally friendly material (thank you Wikipedia).

And since it's sustainable many designers are using the material for new products that have very little to do with wine-bottles or message-boards.

Rufo Cork drum by Studio Pedrita for Materia

Re-done appliances by Gaspard Tiné-Berès for Re-Do Studio

Viana Clog by Reality Studio via Pour Porter

Bote by BIG-GAME for Materia
photograph by Julien Chavaillaz

The ordinary done pretty: Diamond Lights by Eric Therner

photograph courtesy of Eric Therner

Diamond lights by Swedish designer Eric Therner // get it here // spotted here

The good china

Bloomingville Dinnerware S/S13

photograph courtesy of Bloomingville

For the last eight years like ever i have been using that very basic white stoneware dinner set from our Swedish friends (this one - either you have it, or one of your friends does).
At first it was fine: the plates are plain, they're white, they don't distract from the food. - But lately more and more knife-marks decorate the not-so-white-anymore plates and every single piece of the set is chipped.

Time for a more grown-up approach towards dinnerware i guess. A bit of inspiration...

Aqua dinnerware by Serax
Photograph via Photo-copy
spotted here

Styling and photography by Mirella Sahetapy
Spotted here

Color Tableware by Jeanine Eek Keizer
photograph courtesy of Piet Hein Eek

Marin Blue Dinnerware by Crate&Barrel
photograph courtesy of Crate&Barrel

Monday flowers

from designlovefest

i doubt these flowers remained fresh for more than ten minutes. Still a pretty sight though.

Friday smile

i think if i'd have a slide like this in my house, i would smile a lot.
Way to speed up the morning ritual!

Spotted on Dezeen.
Make sure you check out the article, the slide runs through several floors of this New York City skyhouse.

Art on walls

A few curated walls i came across recently:

TREES
Photograph by Annie Schlechter

MIX + SPACIOUS
Melbourne Home
by the Designfiles

POSTERS + GRID
Photograph by Line Klein for Alt Interior
spotted here

On my wish-list: Monogrammed mugs

T and i have mugs in all shapes and sizes, ranging from delicate porcelain cups to plump stoneware 'I love NY'-mugs.

We both have our favorites, and since this is a collection that was accumulated over years, each mug comes with its own story.

Don't get me wrong: i love my mugs, and i love their stories.

But... (you knew there was a 'but', right?)

...what i don't like is the way they make my cupboard look so extremely cluttered.

So out with the old, in with the new: from now on, the only new kind of mug that gets to live in my cupboard is the kind with a letter on it. 

One letter.

Bring on the monogram! 

(just found out that i should say 'initial' since a monogram is officially made from two or more letters. Thank you Wikipedia)

photograph courtesy of Playtype

Loving these mugs by Playtype -get them here-, but missing a handle.

Tickledpinkgoods on Etsy

I found a few mugs on Etsy, but -sadly- these ones were sold out. A few vintage ones are available (W here, B here, F here), but all in the United States, which makes shipping them way too expensive.

Design Mom posted a great DIY back in 2010:

Courtesy of Designmom

I honestly love this, but since it involves tracing lines on a very slippery and rounded surface, i don't believe my hand is steady enough to pull this off in a quality i'd be happy with.

Of course i could always have mugs printed by one of those online print-company's (vistaprint and the likes), but that just takes away the magic.

No, i guess i'll just have to browse the thrift-stores for vintage initial-mugs, or figure out an (even) easier way to make them myself.

Will keep you posted.

Ceramic love: Suzanne Sullivan

Photograph courtesy of Suzanne Sullivan / the Wide Prospect

No idea what i'd do with these spoons, but owning one (or several) would make me very happy.
They're by Brooklyn based designer Suzanne Sullivan.
More here.

Cyanotype Magic: Blueware tiles by GLITHERO

Let's start this new week with a little bit of old-fashioned alchemical magic:

photograph courtesy of Glithero 

These BLUEWARE TILES by English/Dutch design studio Glithero are created with an old photographic printing process called Cyanotype.

For a full story visit the Glithero website, i'll just share a few more lovely pics:

photograph courtesy of Glithero 

how about these lovely vases:

photograph courtesy of Glithero 

As it turns out Tim Simpson and Sarah van Gameren from Glithero are not the only artists to (re)discover the 19th century technique of Cyanotype (example here).
Google is full of cyan blue nature prints and ready to go paper kits are widely available online (although i have yet to discover a Dutch distributor).

I found instructions to make your own light-sensitive paper here on instructables, and there's a kit available at Amazon.

ps. Chemical names of the components are not always easily translated one-on-one: i found Dutch instructions on how to prepare the Cyanotype solution on this forum, and also this dutch tutorial which should be quite helpful.

Vintage printables

pear

Remember that Moon poster in my 'Circles on posters' round up a short while ago?
Well, i found it online, on a website called Vintageprintable.

deer skeleton

I stumbled upon the website while searching the net for old biological drawings that i needed for a project, and ended up spending hours browsing through the huge collection of available posters, illustrations and vintage photographs.

rocks

You can imagine i spent that same amount of time again when trying to find 'just a few' examples for this blog.

cowboy

So after spending hours and hours on this website, all that's left for me to do is to make up my mind which one of these images i'm going to have professionally printed and framed.

water volumes

I'm thinking the deer... or maybe the pear? 

I do like the rocks as well, and that cowboy would make cool nursery wall art. 

Maybe i should check back on the website, see if they have vintage drawings of cacti...

Completely random cool stuff spotted lately - white, wood, brass

For the table (even though i actually prefer to grind my salt and pepper):

photograph courtesy of Pigeon toe Ceramics

PEBBLE Salt & Pepper shakers by Pigeon toe Ceramics, spotted on Poppytalk

+++

For my wall (not so sure about magazines, but would love this for incoming mail):

photograph courtesy of Annaleenas Hem

MAGAZINE HOLDER DIY made of brass wire, from Annaleenas Hem

+++

For the little one (once he's not so little anymore):

WOODEN LEGO by Japanese company Mokulock - spotted on Swiss-Miss

+++

To go around my arm:

photograph courtesy of Fay Andrada

Brass OKA Bracelet by Fay Andrada (get it here) - spotted here

Cabinets to collect

found here

T and i see eye to eye on nearly everything when it comes to our interior, but there's one thing that annoys the hell out of him:
i like a lot of pretty things 'stylishly clustered together' - he thinks it's clutter.

Lovely clustered collection of glass vessels by stylist Lilli Diallo
spotted on Simply Lovely

Clutter!
What are you talking about?! That's a collection! It's Stylish! It's supposed to look like that.

It's not that he doesn't like -for example- Chinese vases, it's just that he likes One Chinese vase - whereas when it comes to pretty things i am of the opinion that if one thing is good, two things is even better (i'm not the most modernist person).

Anyway, we're going to have to find a way to deal with it, and i'm thinking the best solution might be to get a gorgeous display cabinet for me to play in, so the rest of the house is 'clutter'-free (except for the occasional countertop collection, of course, what else are countertops for?).

I found the cabinet above on a Spanish (i guess) blog dedicated to vintage furniture and Love love love it!

Spotted this beauty online recently (here), and traced it back to its original source: PINCH

Joyce cabinet by Pinch
photograph courtesy of Pinch

Also, this one by Dutch Designer Piet Hein Eek (remember this post?):

image by Piet Hein Eek
get it here

Ikea is presenting a new display cabinet during this month's furniture fair in Milan (which i -sadly- won't be visiting this year): Fabrikör

Fabrikör cabinet by Ikea
Image found here

I honestly can't wait for the Fabrikör to reach the stores.
Not sure about the price yet, but i'm guessing it'll be a lot more affordable than the other cabinets in this blog. Also, it's modest size makes it perfect for smaller-scale living.
No doubt about it: the Ikea Fabrikör will be on my wish-list.

Now, the other thing T and i can't agree on: String wall-systems: i love them - T thinks they would just become overwhelmed with clutter (honestly: he might have a point).
I guess i should choose my battles wisely and just give up on those in favor of a showcase cabinet (for now...).

Toy Stories by Gabriele Galimberti

A nice little look-book to start the week: TOY STORIES by Gabriele Galimberti

Maudy - Kalulushi, Zambia
photograph Gabriele Galimberti

Italian photographer Gabriele Galimberti travelled the world for 18 months to photograph children with their favorite toys.
His project, in which the photographs are accompanied by little stories about the children's lives, kind of resembles James Mollison's 'Where children sleep'-project (remember this?), and is equally touching.

Davide - La Valletta, Malta
photograph Gabriele Galimberti

Virginia - American Fork, Utah
photograph Gabriele Galimberti

Pavel - Kiev, Ukraine
photograph Gabriele Galimberti

Naya - Managua, Nicaragua
photograph Gabriele Galimberti

Visit Gabriele Galimberti's website for the full story.

 Spotted on Present & Correct.

Lovely

Calligraphy by Seb Lester
Spotted here

Spring cleaning @ Sunday Market this Weekend!

It's spring! ... well kinda...
Anyway, i decided to do a little spring cleaning - this weekend i'll be having a DRIFTWOOD COLLECTION SALE at the Sunday Market in Amsterdam.

click

Items are going to be sold for CRAZY PRICES as i seriously need to free up some space in my workshop for new work.

Best part: i'm not going out there alone this time, but team up with my friends Frederike Top and Wendy Klaver.

The weather is promising to be ok-ish, which is perfect for visiting a Sunday Market: leisurely strolling between stalls with all kinds of design and art, and sitting down for a nice cuppa in one of the nearby bars when your feet are getting too cold.

If you see a stall with lovely little text-lights, gorgeous ceramics and quirky jewelry, with three slightly frozen but still brightly smiling ladies behind it - don't look no further: that's us.

We'll be there from 12:00 till 18:00. 

click for more Sunday Market info.

Hope to see you there!