My Flat in Progress: December & January

A couple of weeks before Christmas I made a big change: I moved across the country (to the seaside!) and bought a flat. Since then I've been busy with lots of DIY and new-home admin and cleaning... as well as buying what feels like half the contents of our local branch of B&Q! I'm incredibly lucky to have my parents helping me out, gifting me their time and expertise and giving me lifts to the shops, but there's still a lot to do between us.

As this is going to be such a big ongoing project in my life for a while, I thought it might be nice to do an occasional blog post about how my flat is progressing. I've been taking lots of photos of all the changes we're making and I thought it might be fun to share some of them - I hope you'll enjoy following along in the coming months.

Moving day: using a box as a makeshift table for our first cups of tea!

The first of what will no doubt be many bits of flatpack furniture from IKEA (I love IKEA).

I shared this pic a few days after I moved in because it made me laugh that I had hardly any furniture and no fridge or cooker but I did have a big pile of handmade blankets. Priorities. I'm moving all my boxes and the few bits of furniture I own gradually, so I can live out of part of the flat while decorating the other rooms.

In the first few weeks after moving in we did lots of cleaning and I bought what felt like all the things: everything from paintbrushes to curtains to an ironing board to sandpaper to a plug for the bathroom sink.

I won't bore you with the full list (it's a very, very long one!) but I also bought a new thermostat (wired in by my dad, what a star), a fridge/freezer (and a cooker! hurrah!), some super energy-efficient LED lightbulbs (which also look much nicer than those old long ones), and some moisture-absorbing thingummies to help prevent damp (weird looking but very effective).

Mostly though I have bought DIY equipment, which is starting to take over the place.

The flat has some lovely old features, like the doors...

... and some less lovely newer features! Yes, that is an iron mark on the carpet. Luckily it's a carpet I was planning on replacing anyway.

My mum has been gradually painting the living room white - she is a whizz with a paintbrush and is happy to paint pretty much anything as long as you keep her well-supplied with cups of tea. We're cheating a bit by painting over the wallpaper in the living room instead of stripping it but after several coats it looks pretty good.

It's amazing how much lighter and bigger the room looks replacing the light grey with brilliant white. It all looks very bare at the moment but this is a blank canvas for all my colourful stuff, not the beginnings of a new minimalist lifestyle. I'm quite excited about the possibilities of those alcoves!

We've also started prepping to decorate the spare room: filling and sanding the walls and replacing the wall vent.

We've made lots of little changes too, including: updating the light fittings and adding simple white shades; putting up a new white curtain rail, some thick curtains and some sheer voiles in the bedroom; giving the radiator in the living room a fresh coat of paint (and cleaning inside and behind it too - those things trap so much dust!); and moving one of the bathroom mirrors to a wall with better light.

Oh, and I'm not going to show you a photo of my new loo seat but: I got a new loo seat! I never thought buying a loo seat would make me happy, but it totally did! We also put up a shower rail in the bathroom, bought a new shower curtain which turned out to not be entirely waterproof (not great), took down an old cabinet, and painted over the lilac bathroom walls with more white paint.

Not bad for a month and a half, right?

My Childhood Sylvanian Families Collection

More treasures from our attic clear-out: Sylvanian Families!

I definitely collected Sylvanian Families more than I really played with them as a kid.

My sisters and I each had one family - mine were the grey rabbits. My parents used cardboard boxes to build us an apartment block style dolls house, with one vertical row of boxes each which we could decorate as different rooms.

We used carpet and wallpaper off-cuts and mixed our store-bought furniture (all lovingly, carefully chosen after much deliberation and on a limited pocket money budget) with homemade things.

I just loved looking at all the teeny pieces. A bookcase with tiny books! A bath with a teeny cork in the plughole! A sink with a tiny bar of soap! A sewing machine with little scissors and reels of thread.

Drawers that really opened! Charming old fashioned furniture like a dressing table and a rocking chair and a fancy rotary phone!

It was such a joy opening up a box and finding all these things... especially as I'd also kept some of the handmade furniture and accessories we'd made. I'll blog about those soon, they definitely deserve their own post.

In the meantime, check out my posts about other rediscovered childhood collections:

My shell collection...

... my badge collection...

 

... my sticker collection...
 

... and my eraser collection.

You might also enjoy reading about puzzles and games from my childhood, more childhood treasures, Fuzzy-Felt Fairytales and beloved kids books.

Book Review: The Origami Home

Have you ever tried origami? I loved making origami flowers when I was a teen, and really enjoyed the origami making workshop I attended at the Handmade Fair a couple of years ago so I was delighted when the lovely folks at Jacqui Small sent me a copy of The Origami Home to review.

Jacqui Small publish really beautiful creative books - like Sewing Made Simple, Quilt Love and Made by Yourself. Whenever you see one of their books you just know it's gonna be a lovely object... and The Origami Home is no exception!

It's a gorgeously chunky hardback featuring 30+ miniature pieces of furniture to make from paper.

The book also includes 55 sheets of specially printed papers in fabric and wallpaper designs from the likes of Little Greene and Mini Moderns so you can perfectly recreate the projects in the book.

 

The origami patterns are organised by room, so you can make little room sets to display on a bookshelf (so cute!).

 

There's an introductory section that covers the folding process and the symbols you'll encounter throughout the book.

 

Each chapter begins with a photo of the finished room set, then one by one it takes you through the steps you need to make each piece of furniture. There's a living room, modern-retro dining room, workspace, bathroom, terrace and more.

The step by step diagrams are illustrated with the same patterns as the paper used to make the piece. Although it's helpful to clearly see which is the decorated and which the plain side of the paper when folding, I have to admit that I found the addition of the pattern on top of the fold lines, arrows, etc. shown on the diagram rather distracting.

I'd definitely recommend starting with some of the designs that have been made from plain paper - and thus have less visually cluttered illustrations - so you can really clearly see the instructions while you're getting to grips with the techniques.

The Origami Home would be a great addition to your bookshelf if you have a passion for all things interiors-related, or if you're just interested in origami and want to try making something different to the usual animals and flowers.

The inclusion of the paper pack also makes this an ideal book to give as a gift as you can get crafting straight away!

The Origami Home by Mark Bolitho (chair of the British Origami Society) is published by Jacqui Small. RRP £20. It's available from Amazon, the Book Depository and many other bookshops.

Please note: I was sent a free review copy of this book. The Amazon links in this post are affiliate links.

The Amazingness that was London Craft Week: Part Two

The first ever London Craft Week, held in early May this year, was utterly wonderful. So much making! So many skilled crafts people! So many beautiful creations! So much inspiration!

I spent two days zipping round London trying to visit as many of the events as I could and had a total blast (but kinda wore myself out in the process and had to give the weekend's events a miss while I put my feet up. Oops!).

I blogged about the first morning in part one... but what did I see after lunch?

First on my list to visit was the Rolls-Royce showroom at Berkeley Square. I have to admit that I know next to nothing about cars but it was really interesting to see the different leathers and woods customers can choose from and to be able to peek inside the cars themselves.

Next I headed to Mulberry, where I chatted to one of their craftsmen about the techniques that go into making a Mulberry bag and how he got started working for the company. Mulberry were also - rather excitingly - hosting a craft workshop in the store, offering people the chance to make their own personalised bracelet. This was a huge amount of fun...

... and it was delightfully surreal to have a table of people hammering away in the middle of the otherwise serene Bond Street store!

Everyone chose slightly different things to add to their bracelets - names, special places, silly phrases, anniversary dates. I ummed and ahhed over what to choose for mine, eventually deciding to make a black bracelet for my mum (which she loved, hurrah!).

 

After I'd finished my bracelet and oohed over all the lovely things on display in the store, I headed to Kathryn Sargent Bespoke Tailoring.

It was rather thrilling to be able to visit a tailor's workshop as it really isn't a space I would normally ever visit. It was wonderful to be able to see the work in progress, to see and feel some fabric samples and to chat to Kathryn and her team about her business and the art of hand tailoring.

Hand embroiderers Hawthorne & Heaney were also demonstrating their monogram service in the studio - I was quite in awe of such perfect, precise embroidery!

 

My next stop was Drake's, where (among other things) you can buy a handmade tie or order your own bespoke tie... and where the techniques of the tie-making process were being demonstrated.

Ties are something I'd never really given much thought to before (as a woman, I don't tend to wear one - and haven't since I was about 8 and ties were part of my school uniform). Drake's website has lots of tips for the stylish gentleman aiming for "relaxed elegance" - it's all about details and, of course, your tie is an important part of that!

Continuing with the tailoring theme, I then headed to Norton & Sons on Savile Row. Norton & Sons "have been tailors to the royal households of Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Italy, Prussia, Spain, Portugal and the United Kingdom, and to three US Presidents." The tailors of Savile Row are so famous, it was amazing to be able to visit one of them (instead of just nosily peering in the windows as I've done before!)

I met the owner (Patrick Grant of Great British Sewing Bee fame) then chatted to the tailors in the workshop.

I cannot even begin to say how awesome this was! Being allowed into this working space, to chat to the tailors and ask them about their work: just wonderful. It was fascinating to hear how the tailors had got started in their profession, to see them at work and to hear details of their working life: the process of making a suit, working with different fabrics, fittings and alterations, and so on.

 

It was so fascinating, in fact, that I and another girl who was visiting Norton & Sons ended up being quite late to our next planned stop: a demonstration of cordwaining in the window of Gieves & Hawkes.

A cordwainer is someone who makes shoes from new leather (this is different to a cobbler, apparently, who mostly repairs shoes or makes them from old leather).

Bespoke shoemakers James Ducker and Deborah Carré of Carréducker were demonstrating some of the 200+ steps involved in crafting a pair of hand-sewn shoes, using only hand-held tools.

James discovered his passion for shoemaking totally by chance, and now works with Deborah making bespoke shoes and running shoemaking courses in London and New York. Their talk was highly entertaining and really interesting - they demonstrated different tools and techniques and explained how much time and skill goes into making shoes by hand (short version: a lot).

 

As the day was drawing to a close, I squeezed in a visit to Dashing Tweeds - just over the road from Gieves & Hawkes.

Here Kirsty, who designs all Dashing Tweeds' weaves in house, was showcasing their textiles and the steps involved in designing and weaving tweeds. It was lovely to see the little looms set up surrounded by the finished garments that get made from the final tweed designs, and to chat to Kirsty about her designs and the challenges of "thinking in three dimensions" to make something two-dimensional.

 

On my way home, I took a small detour and popped in to The New Craftsmen - a shop selling a whole assortment of luxury British craft, from hand-woven throws to hand block-printed wallpaper to hand-made ceramic lamp bases to hand-crafted knives.

They were showcasing the work created as part of Made of Mayfair, where makers took inspiration from the history, architecture and craft of Mayfair. It was great to see this collection after chatting to one of the makers that morning.

Such a busy day! And there was still more crafty goodness to come... which I'll blog about in part three, sometime soon :)

P.S. You can read part one of my visit to London Craft Week here.

More Awesome Colouring Books for Grown-Ups

Colouring books are not just for kids anymore!

Back in the summer I read an article about how colouring books were becoming popular as "art therapy", reducing stress through the magic of colouring in. I found lots of cool colouring books, treated myself to some (and some pens and pencils to colour them in, of course!) and have since enjoyed many relaxing hours of colouring-in.

I have found that colouring is a great way to let your brain unwind at the end of a long stressful day (or a busy week rushing to meet deadlines), and a wonderful way to pass the time when you're not feeling well (just add a DVD box set, lots of cups of tea, some blankets and a cat!). Switching off and focusing on slowly filling in the lines with colour can be very absorbing and almost meditative.

There are so many interesting-looking colouring books out there my wish list is getting rather long and I am definitely not going to run out of things to colour any time soon. So I thought I'd share some of the titles I've spotted over the past few months, in case you guys fancy doing a bit of colouring yourselves :)

(Please note: the Amazon links in this post are affiliate links - click on the text links to find the titles on Amazon UK and the images to find them on Amazon USA, where available)

First up, Millie Marotta's Animal Kingdom which I spotted at the Knitting & Stitching show last month (there was much ooohing). This book is so lovely and filled with all kinds of different animals to colour and embellish.

When looking for fun colouring books I was delighted to discover "Just Add Color", a new range of books featuring designers/illustrators like Lisa Congdon & Jenn Ski whose work I adore. The Just Add Color series includes Botanicals, Geometric Patterns, Mid-Century Modern Mania, Mid-Century Modern Patterns among other titles.

Buying colouring books featuring the work of designers/illustrators you love is a great way to enjoy their designs without having to make space in your home for another print or mug, etc. And although this is a post about colouring books for grown-ups, they're also a nice way to share great design with your kids.

These large colouring books featuring the work of Alexander Girard and Patrick Hruby are perfect for sharing with your kids as the larger scale illustrations are great for colouring in with crayons and each page is perforated so you can tear it out and display it once you've coloured it in - or share the book between a group of people who want to colour together.

I've bought the Patrick Hruby book, along with one of the Charley Harper colouring books I mentioned in my previous colouring-book post (which is from the same range). They are pretty gorgeous, and I love how the back covers show you the original colourways of the featured designs so you can follow those if you want to or choose your own colours.

Talking of Charley Harper... 

US-based publisher Pomegranate make a fab range of stuff featuring his designs (I've bought lots of their puzzles for my mum over the past few Christmases!) .... which includes notecards to colour. 

I also spotted some Frank Lloyd Wright colouring cards - I love the idea of colouring those stylish, modernist houses with bright crayons! Again, these would be a great way to share design you love with your kids but they'd also be a fab gift to send to a friend as they can use the crayons included to start colouring straight away. You can see the full range here.

Pomegranate also have a fantastic range of colouring books, which includes Railroad Posters of Scotland, Alphonse Mucha, Gustav Klimt, William Morris , Kew Gardens: Art for London Transport... and many more titles.

I've bought their William Morris colouring book & it's great, lots of classic patterns to colour (one per sheet of paper) with the orginal colourways included for reference. I've not coloured any yet but I'm quite looking forward to seeing how different the patterns look in bright modern colour combos.

On my colouring-book browsing "travels" I've spotted a few more colouring cards - postcards of a couple of the titles I featured in the previous round-up. I love the idea of colouring cards as they're useful as well as fun to colour, as you can send a bit of happy post to a friend when you've finished colouring.

You can buy a book of Secret Garden Postcards featuring designs from the book of the same name...

... or a pack of Tattoo postcards (based on this book), which also includes a couple of sheets of tattoo stickers (yay for stickers!).

I am a total scaredy-cat when it comes to stuff like piercings and tattoos but I love the idea of tattoos to colour in. Similarly, although I don't own any trainers/sneakers and know next to nothing about the famous brands and designs I love the look of the sneaker colouring book. This takes you through the history of trainer/sneaker design, with 100 different designs to colour. 

 

Also awesome-looking: these funny colouring books by Theo Nicole Lorenze. You can choose between Unicorns are Jerks: a coloring book exposing the cold, hard, sparkly truth or Dinosaurs with Jobs. I do love dinosaurs but I'm leaning towards the unicorn book, simply because the idea of dirtbag unicorns makes me laugh.

The unicorn colouring book would also make a fun gift paired with some glitter pens! 

In my original blog post about colouring books I featured lots of French colouring books, as France is where the colouring-to-reduce-stress trend kicked off.

Looking at some of the newly released French titles I spotted this wonderful-looking Spirograph-style activity book: Art-thérapie: rosaces: Créations anti-stress. Colouring and Spirograph patterns sounds like an excellent combo to me! (I spent soooo many happy hours making those patterns as a kid).  

I've also spotted lots of English reprints of the French books, including Art Therapy: Stained Glass. I bought the French version of this book and it is completely wonderful!

All the stained glass windows featured are real windows from churches, cathedrals and museum collections around the world. They date from the 1200s to the 1900s so there's a wide variety of styles to colour and the French version (and I'm guessing the English one would be the same?) has an index at the back telling you where each window is from. 

The only problem with this book is that I'm a teeny bit scared to actually colour it in because it's all so beautiful (#colouringbookproblems).

If you're a stained glass fan you will also love the Stained Glass Coloring Book range from Dover. I mentioned Dover's colouring books briefly in my last post, but they have a HUGE range of titles covering almost every interest you might have. I especially love their Stained Glass range which has pictures printed on transparent paper so you can stick the pages up in your windows when you've finished colouring.

I'm planning on buying this William Morris collection which features 16 of his designs for stained glass, wallpaper and textiles.

Also pretty high up my colouring wish list is this fab book of designs by printmaker Edward Bawden. His distinctive lino prints should make this a really interesting book to colour!

Most of the designer/illustrator books featured in this post are colouring books that a publisher has put together of someone's work, adapting their prints, paintings, illustrations, etc to the demands of the colouring book form.

This Andy Warhol colouring book is different: it's an actual colouring book he designed as a Christmas gift for his clients kids when he was working as an illustrator in the early 60s. Fun!

I have to admit that though I love colouring books with gorgeous illustrations, my very favourite thing to colour is geometric and/or repeating patterns.

I find them extra relaxing as you can follow the repeat, so there are fewer decisions for my sleepy brain to make, and super low-pressure as there's no beautiful drawing to "ruin" if you colour it in badly / use terrible colour choices (I know, I know, I have some colouring issues, shhh).

I especially adored Galt's Pattern Pads when I was a kid - I found an old one in a box recently and have been having a ton of fun colouring the remaining pages. They sadly don't seem to make the pads anymore but there is a Galt Pattern Book available and it seems to be in the same style as before, with little practice sections so you can try out your colours before starting the main pattern.

 

I love the look of the repeat patterns in Angie Grace's range of pattern books. There are about a dozen different books available, with titles like Snazzy, Flowers, Nifty, Spiffy, Ink Doilies, Peppy, and Doodles. Don't they look pretty?

 

This geometric series from Altair Design also looks like a lot of fun. There's a range of pattern pads and postcards to colour-in too.

Last time I wrote about colouring books, someone recommended the Pictura range which I was delighted to discover as they're quite enchanting. These books are not really books at all but fold-out pictures featuring wonderful illustrations to colour.

There's a whole range of subjects and illustrations styles to choose from, including A Stroll in London, Enchanted Forest, Draconis, A Hedgerow Year, Traffic, Midsummer Night's Dream, A Medieval Town and (my favourite) Aurelian. 

It's well worth a visit to Pictura's website to see the full illustrations - click here to see Aurelian in all its glory. I would for sure be a bit scared colouring that in but it would be a lovely long project to get absorbed in and hugely satisfying to finish and display on your wall.

Pictura also sell books of posters to colour, under the title Pictura Prints, including Botanicals and Travelogue.

Last but by no means least... a burst of super cuteness found on Etsy!

 

The Colour Your Heart Out colouring books by Kristy Boisvert each contain 12 illustrations of adorable woodland animals, topped with sweet, positive sentiments like "This is your moment", "You are loved", "We'll get through this together" and "You'll make mistakes and that's ok".

These are definitely suitable for kids but they'd also be great to colour at the end of a stressful day and would make a lovely gift for a friend going through a tough time. You can also Colour Your Canadian Heart Out, buy the original set of illustrations as printable colouring pages or buy a set of cute greetings cards to colour and send to your friends.

Want even more colouring books after all those? Check out my previous post!

Have you discovered the joys of colouring in? Have you tried any of the books I've featured, or bought any other nice colouring books that you'd like to recommend? Let me know in the comments :)