Gone skiing

Back in a week....

Mark Tuckey bedlinen

The Mark Tuckey offering just keeps getting bigger..and better. Right now I am digging the soft and textured bed linens work beautifully with their heavy timber bed frames.

IMAGES: Mark Tuckey

Concrete Wallpaper

Concrete wallpaper genius by Nordic design firm Concrete Wall.

Images: Concrete Wall

Jean-Christophe Aumas's Paris apartment

Designer Jean-Christophe Aumas has exercised beautiful control of colour in his Paris apartment in the 5th arondissement. Bold blocks of colour in simple but bold shapes set against traditional elements like worn parquetry floor. It feels frenchie and fifties all in one.
Images: Marie Claire Maison

Fleur Wood - Food Fashion Friends

Super sweet lady and talented fashion designer Fleur Wood launched her first book 'Food Fashion Friends' on Thursday night with drinks and some eats. It's a great little concept, it's a cookbook centered around different gatherings, picnic with friends at the beach, formal dinner party, kids birthdays etc - you get the drill. The pages are filled with great recipes, Fleur's fashion and some seriously inspiring dinner party shots. As a not-so-new Mum I am desperate to get back into hosting friends like we used to. Great inspiration indeed - so much so I all of a sudden feel the need for a cane peacock chair this summer.

All images: Fleur Wood

Zenith Interiors

Round chairs by Christophe Pillet available in white, antique iron, warm grey, pale grey and red. Choices, choices.

Re Trove armchairs and stools available in a variety of colours

Zenith Interiors are more than just their workstations - or so I've only just recently discovered. They also have great outdoor furniture, precisely what I've been looking for - colourful wire dining chairs. The outdoor furniture works equally well indoors, in fact I just used the Re Trove and Heaven pieces in a shoot this week, and they came up a treat. Designer of the Round Chair Patricia Urquiola sums it up perfectly "there is something that is often difficult to find in outdoor furniture, and it is precisely those things that I have tried to express in the collection: simplicity, timelessness and a touch of distant elegance'. Job done.

Diesel

How amazingly comfortable do these Diesel couches and chairs look - I could sink right in and not come out for days. Diesel have launched into the homewares arena with furniture, lighting and textiles. Amongst the expected Diesel in your face attention grabbing pieces with studs and dark leather, are these imaginative & floaty pieces -they feel like a fluffy doona and a cup of tea! Stylistically I really like the lighting in the moody shots, very dramatic and textural, also love the projected cloud image onto the wall.

IMAGES: Diesel

Now open

This weekends find was this 'Now Open' sign - now just got to find a use for it.

Fenton & Fenton rugs

Wow we wah, popped into Fenton & Fenton this week to say hi to Lucy and do some do some sourcing and was totally blown away by this rug. Hand-made in India this woollen rug is an impressive 4m x 3m - it's ah-mazing. Lucy will organise tailor-made rugs with the colour of your choice, at any size. Just allow 8-10 weeks for production. This particular orange stripe is on sale right now for $1800.

Colour me happy

I am having a ball playing with colour this week, I am working on a huge job that requires me to use a lot of colour, not naturally something I do - but i am totally into it. Taking cues from our stay at the Ace Hotel in Palm Springs - how amazing/crazy are these stripes?!

IMAGE: Claire Larritt-Evans.

While they were sleeping..

The mystery stylist has been and visited 2 clients this weekend - and there will be 2 happy clients tomorrow morning returning to work to see some great changes. First stop was B Brand Design - where on Friday night I went in and installed the final stages of their studio fit out. The Boskke Skyplanters lived up to my expectations - they hang from the roof in the kitchen to form a li

ttle indoor herb garden. Thanks to Gary from GC Landscaping for coming on board and doing the hard task of installing a 10kg ex-naval pulley system into a 4m high stairwell - the result was worth it Gaz! I installed 2 hardy Devils Ivy hanging from the pulley to bring some greenery to the mostly industrial space. Given the genius of the Skyplanters internal water reservoir the plants will only need to watered once a month, although given how much fun it is to hoist the pulley up and down, they might be get the attention they deserve.

The second stop this weekend was to A Shop Called Moth where I installed this months window display, no photos sorry so pop past the shop and have a peek.

Boskke Skyplanters

For a long time I've been waiting for the right job to use these Boskke Skyplanters, the opportunity came when I was asked by B Brand Design to fit out their Prahran studio. The finishing touches go in tomorrow night, including 6 of these amazing Kiwi designed up-side-down hanging pots. With an internal water resevoir the plants require little love and attention, hang artfully upside down, perfect for creepy crawly Devils Ivy. Which is a good thing, as I am installing 2 of these in a 4 meter high staircase hanging to an old navy metal pulley system.

Images: Boskke

Paper flowers - inspiration

I'm very happy to continue a working relationship with Jocey at A Shop Called Moth, she has comissioned me to create amazing store windows each month. My goal is to install beautiful, creative and ever changing displays. Whilst researching paper flowers (ie a mad google search for 'how the eek do I make them?') I came across these incredible flowers that were handmade for the Chanel 2009 Spring/Summer Haute Couture show. Apparently it took 4800 man hours to make and 4000 square meters - I'm going for a more ecologically friendly option and using old newspapers to make mine. Keep an eye out for a new window each month at Moth.

Before (during) and after

Some before (during) and after shots of A Shop Called Moth

This was the original conditional of the store

In goes new floors and walls

Stage one complete

Second Edition cafe & recycled books

New to Melbourne's cafe scene comes a bookstore with a conscious - Second Edition, a new concept store for the Brotherhood of St Laurence. The goal of the new space is to "to bring a great cup of coffee to Glenferrie Road, and one where the social conscience behind the product goes well beyond the Fairtrade beans. The profits from each cup of coffee and book sold go towards supporting disadvantaged children and families assisted by the Brotherhood". As well as this the store will provide retail and hospitality traineeships to young people in need.

The fit out of the cafe/store has been done by Melbourne firm DEA - it's warm with floor to ceiling wood panelling and a cafe design that wouldn't look out of place amongst its peers. It's as simple and unassuming as it needs to be, but there's an element of 'what, this is the Brotherhood of St Laurence??!" - it's that good. All the items for sale range from $2.50 - $80 for hard cover coffee table books. It's like the best and most interesting books, magazines and records have been sourced from op shops and put on display in one place, with categories like design, music, travel - I think this place really nails it.

Second Edition

215 Glenferrie Rd, Malvern.

9509 5241

Pave paradise.....

This is my favourite place to source props and furniture - it's a huge rambling old shed on the Mornington Penninsula - and I learnt on the weekend that it's going to be bulldozed and turned into a supermarket. It's so upsetting, I shed a little tear, no more weekends spent trawling through the chilly shed, dodging the pigeon poop, soon it will be a glittering shiny new supermarket full of pre-packaged crap! The only good news that until the doors shut there are incredible bargains to be had, but the sad news after chatting to many of my favourite stall holders they have an uncertain future - and no where else to trade. I will keep you posted of any new sites - as there's a few on the cards.

Here's some quick snaps of my finds from the weekend, great old workbench and cray pots, which will be reinterpreted as light shades.