Tag Archives: interiors

(A few of) My Girl Crushes

I should have posted this a few weeks ago for international women’s day. But I missed it. So I shall post it now and can tell you a little about just a few of the women I admire and whose work I follow. I could add some of my other girl crushes in the music world like Stevie Nicks, Lisa Stansfield, Julia Fordham, Georgia Middleman, Aretha Franklin …. the purpose of my blog was to share some of the beautiful things I come across and think about, and those women’s music, although beautiful, is not so easily captured in a blog.

Frida Kahlo, I love for so many reasons I don’t know where to begin. Her creative talent, her irreverence, her freedom of spirit and her resilience… and some of the other women I am highlighting this week share similar traits. I don’t know much about the personal lives of some like Cassandra Ellis but she has a passion for textiles, from what I can tell that is much like my own, but her knowledge and understanding of textiles is something I hope to one day have. Katherine Hooker makes clothing that is classic and timeless but individual and luxurious in the fabrics and style. I’m looking forward to having her make me something I will cherish. Sheila Bridges is a woman I have admired and followed for years now. I LOVE her style!! Her interiors are classic and timeless with the boring and predictable taken out. Her personal story is admirable and I hope to see her work for a long time to come. Tracy Reese – well I just love her clothes. Admittedly, most of the pieces I have owned have been from her ‘Plenty’ label, but she uses beautiful fabrics with an ethnic or global or anywhere appeal that is my kind of thing. Serena Crawford is the kind of interior designer I’d like to work for/with when I am a grown up! The portfolio on her website is full of the kind of Southern Hemisphere spaces and interiors that I grew up in and I long to recreate rooms like that for “northerners”. Large spaces that are elegant, mostly because they are luxurious in the simple textures and comfort, not because they are full of expensive pretentious stuff. It is the volume of the spaces and the life you imagine living in them that makes them aspirational. And the last lady, but definitely not the least, is Malene Birger. I fell in love with her clothing a while back and since then it seems she has cropped onto my radar more and more, and now I discover she does interiors. Her London apartment is monochromatic in a Scandinavian way we might expect, but her use of texture and world textile and globe trotter type finds makes her appeal broad and very NOW.

 

Below …. the woman…….&……..her work.

World fabrics and their place in my heart – I mean space.

My stash is on my mind a lot at the moment and I am eager to carve out some time to do something with it all. The pictures below are the sorts of textiles that make my heart beat a little bit faster… no all pretty fabrics do that. These ethnic, vibrant, exciting handmade, rich-in-history fabrics make my wanderlust and need for exploration come to the surface, and make my heart do a little jig. Not all my stash is like this but a lot of it is, and I would surround myself with things like this all the time, but I found some pictures online that show how you can incorporate some of these gems into your space in a meaningful way, without turning your home into a boho chick 1960’s lovechild’s den throwback. From Vietnamese sheets, to Indian threadwork and embroidered pieces to ikats, suzanis and african block prints, there is a place for all of them in a contemporary (and realistic) home. The interiors photographed below all have something special about them and as I wonder what I will do with my stash I think my biggest challenge is choosing between all the possibilities. For now I will continue to trawl through Pinterest,  explore Instagram and all the wonderful places the web allows us to visit from the comfort of our gadgets. It’s a bit like being an interiors peeping tom, and I’m afraid I can’t apologise.

From the ridiculous to the sublime….

So in my last post I was wondering what on earth is going to happen to the interiors of the White House once You-know-who and Melania get their hands on them… Well the results could be as ridiculous as the characters themselves. So in this post I wanted to share with you pictures of some of the gorgeous pieces I saw at a very indulgent day at the Decorative Antiques and Textile Fair at Battersea Park this week.

You can see even more pictures on Instagram alexandrahuntdallison

 

I am coveting the tables from Lee Wright antiques www.leewrightantiques.co.uk, the textiles Molly Hogg was showing mollyhoggdesign.co.uk and the brass crown vases from Sjostrom Antik     sjostromantik.se, amongst many others – here are links to a few:

fontainedecorative.com

noshrinkingviolet.com

katharinepole.com

mcharpentier.com

17-21.com

 

 

 

 

I know there are serious issues related to the new administration but….

What terrifies me is what they will do to the White House….

Before and after!!!!(??)

 

Too much velvet is never enough…

                                

    

  

     

    

I’m hoping this velvet trend continues for a while, both in interiors and fashion. You can never get too much of this gorgeous fabric, and the colours it is cropping up in – just magic!