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September 9, 2008 By Paola

this is why I haven’t been blogging

I can’t believe how long it is since I’ve blogged. I’m not sure what happened, but we’ve just been trying to make the most of the summer here in Seattle and my blogging mojo just seemed to get left on a beach somewhere. And funnily enough this is a busy time of year for mirrormirror what with all the pre-Christmas ordering and PR to work on.

Thank you so much for all your kind and concerned comments and emails – I’m sorry I just abandoned you without a word – and I’m touched (and somewhat astonished) that people have been missing my somewhat random musings.

But anyway, just to get things back on track.

Things I’ve been doing over the last month in no particular order.

– Loafing about on beaches (including another trip to Cannon Beach, still the most photogenic place on earth)

– Travelling on ferries

– Eating Dancing Deer chocolate brownies (perfect for picnics).

– Watching the Olympics (we managed to get a live stream of the BBC’s coverage to make up for the godawful coverage provided by NBC. You have to feel sorry for Americans sometimes.)

– Getting really stuck into Project Runway. And Project Rungay. Leanne is my hot, hot favourite. I just wish I’d found my way to her Etsy store before she got famous.

– Finally watching Season One of the The Tudors and realising it is much better than I thought it would be. And what a lustbunny Charles Brandon is.

– Researching my family tree. And finding out that I come from a long line of Londoners and craftspeople.

– Making aubergine (eggplant) and pistachio salad over and over again. It is SO good.

– Eating pistachio icecream. I like pistachios.

– Getting into a new school routine. The Minx is finally now going to school four days a week, although they are much shorter days, with more commuting. But finally it feels like I have time to focus on stuff.

– Photographing new stuff for the shop.

Things I have NOT been doing.

– Following my eating plan

– Exercising

– Gardening

– House stuff

– Reading and commenting on other blogs (except for Project Rungay and er, PerezHilton). Sorry fellow bloggers.

Normal blog service will now be resumed…

Serendipity, Rings and Termites

August 5, 2008 By Paola 4 Comments

Writing a blog is a bit like throwing stones into a pond – you throw something out there, but are never quite sure what is going to come rippling back to you.

When I wrote about my new coffee table back in the Spring, what came rippling back was a lot of rude comments about my furniture placement 🙂 and a very nice email from MaryT enquiring whether my old coffee table was for sale.

So MaryT came round one afternoon with her husband DaveS and an envelope of used notes. It transpired that said MaryT is the temporary editor of the ever fabulous Shelterrific and we have since become friends, which is altogether the best reason for starting a blog.

DaveS is also hugely talented and Mary recently sent through photos of Dave’s beautiful resin rings, which showcase interesting found objects such as beach glass, shells or fossils, or, if you prefer, real gemstones which seem to hover over your finger. These rings are all unique and handmade – hand cast, hand coloured and hand polished – and I’m somewhat regretting that the ruby red one below has been sold.

Mary also writes a personal blog Straight From the Container which today featured horrific pictures of her termite infestation problem (houses shouldn’t be made of wood, it just ain’t natural), so please do all hurry along to Dave’s Etsy shop and buy lots of things, so they can afford to sort out the problem.

Spoonflower

July 17, 2008 By Paola 2 Comments

Oh I’m way behind other blogs on this one, but I’m very excited by the development of Spoonflower, ‘the website that allows anyone and everyone to print their own fabric’.

It’s still in beta, but basically you upload your own textile design (full instructions on the site) and they’ll print off a length of fabric in that design. They will also ship to the UK.

This is such a ‘duh! I wish I’d thought of that’ business idea. It’s obviously going to be huge and the potential to print on all sorts of different fabrics (currently they only offer mercerized cotton) and possibly even use it for things like wallpapers and rugs is enormous.

Not to mention that in future they’re hoping to allow people to buy other people’s designs through the site, which will be one in the eye to all the ‘only to the trade’ fabric designers. I think there are going to be some interesting copyright issues going forward though. In the meantime some beautiful fabrics are starting to crop up on Etsy.

I’ve never designed a fabric pattern in my life, but I have received an invitation to use the site (while it’s in beta it’s by invitation only, but they don’t seem to be too difficult to get hold of) and the temptation to bring out my latent Tricia Guild is enormous. After all, it surely it can’t have been that difficult to design the Marimekko Unikko poppies?

I just wish they were doing canvas or upholstery weight fabrics as I want to make CUSHIONS.

The Spoonflower guys are also writing a great blog about setting up and developing their own business. I’m particularly enjoying their little podcasts.

The Lab – Crush on Plush

June 25, 2008 By Paola Leave a Comment

Just a quick reminder that this month’s Lab is on tonight between 6pm and 8pm at Velocity’s showroom and is going to feature Kristen of Plush You and Schmancy, Hansi of Hansigurumi, and Moxie of Made by Moxie, talking about the rise of the plush movement and crafting in general.

I’m hoping very much to attend, though I’m currently mainlining echinacea and zinc in an attempt to stave off an increasingly spluttery cold. But if you’re in the Seattle area it should be a really fun evening as usual.

Gorgeous Ceramics – Kim Westad

March 10, 2008 By Paola 4 Comments

I came across Kim on Flickr recently and fell in love with her beautiful ceramics. I really like how she uses what look like cake-icing techniques to decorate her pieces with tiny slip dots in various patterns.

I had to treat myself to this for my breakfast cereal (NB to Husband -it’s OK, it was in the SALE). I do love how Etsy hides the prices after things have been sold.

If I were richer or had a shop that was actually making money, I would treat myself to these mugs – such fabulous colours.

Or this utterly gorgeous whirly dish for nibbles.

Check out Kim’s shop for more lusciousness. (Another NB to Husband – any chance of making my blog a bit wider?)

I’m a Lucky Girl – part deux

February 17, 2008 By Paola Leave a Comment

I also got this gorgeous little necklace from Hannah Made, which features a tiny photo of a collage made by Michelle Caplan for her Collage Lab project (I have to admit that the Husband needed to be gently led in this direction).

I just love how this is a collaboration between two different artists in very different media, but who have combined to make something so unusual and pretty. It’s currently hanging on my inspiration board just so I can look at it.

The postcards are from UK photographer Donna Compton, who takes the sort of flower photos that I aspire to take (found via Decor8) and the marble magnets in Amy Butler prints are from the Purple Pear.

Abigail Percy Earrings

January 22, 2008 By Paola 5 Comments

I’ve finally got round to photographing some new earrings from Abigail Percy. Both feature her signature leaves – sweet horse chestnut leaves above and aquilegia leaves below. I thought they looked great photographed with a couple of Karin Eriksson pieces as both artists like to play with outlines of leaves in their own different ways.

The sweet horse chestnut earrings are hand-pierced in sterling silver and I can’t imagine how much work goes into creating each one.

The deliberately mis-matched aquilegia leaves are gold plated and then beautifully textured with linen. That girl is quite ridiculously clever and is also writing a great guest blog this week over on Design*Sponge.

I’m so pleased with these pictures as they are the first I’ve taken with my new daylight light, which meant I could take them in comparatively dull light. A new age of mirrormirror photography is dawning. Why did I never use proper photography lighting before?

Colour Lovers

January 18, 2008 By Paola Leave a Comment

Funnily enough, after finishing the previous post, I popped over to Decor8 and Holly was talking about getting interiors inspiration from fashion photography.

Amongst other great ideas, she suggests creating a palette on Colour Lovers, which I had never come across before, but which is quite fab.

Unfortunately the palette I put together from the images below is waaaay too sickly sweet. I think the images themselves only work because of the minimalist lines, the planes and the edges – note how everything is kept very spare and clean, even the model’s sleek hair and pale skin. The fierce shoes (just loving those shoes) and bright, bright light help too.

I think you’d feel quite nauseous quite quickly from sugar overload if you translated this palette into an interior scheme.

Gorgeous Things for Kids

December 11, 2007 By Paola 5 Comments

Well, last week was an absolute nightmare.

Our hosting company managed to balls things up yet again. While trying to correct a small issue with the graphics rendition of the site, they managed to disable the whole back-end interface – which made it very difficult to even see orders, let alone add new things to the site or update the stock.

You can imagine how thrilled I was. Fortunately after a lot of stressed emailing back and forth the issue is now resolved.

The other reason why I haven’t been blogging much recently is that I’ve finally got round to adding a Kids section to the site.

I think it’s very important that kids get to experience good design from a young age in spite of all the garish Fisher Price nonsense that they are constantly surrounded with.

Interestingly the Minx loves all of the things I’ve bought for the site (of which quite a few have ended up in her room) and I’m hoping they’re the sort of things that she will treasure even more as she gets older.

So I’m trying to build up a collection of kid-friendly decorative objects, tableware and toys. At the moment the collection includes cushions and posters from Atelier LZC,

utterly gorgeous limited edition collages from Lorena Siminovich,

and a selection of contemporary ceramics featuring that ever-hip design icon Miffy, which come packed in covetable gift boxes.

I’ve got few more items to add over the next couple of weeks, but I’d love to grow the collection much more over the next year.

If you, or someone you know, makes fab products for babies and kids (not clothes for the moment, but everything but) then I’d love to hear from you. I’m looking for excellent quality and craftsmanship, visual appeal, and a refreshing lack of tweeness. Get in touch!

Colour games

October 27, 2007 By Paola 6 Comments

I love every sort of colour (and am a colour/word synaesthete, which sometimes makes life interesting) and so found these colour games from Livelygrey (via Hue Consulting) a very fascinating and enjoyable way to procrastinate, instead of writing yet another email about Christmas for our press list.