Donna Wilson

I have just two words for these pillows by Donna Wilson: FUN and FABULOUS.

Donna Wilson makes a ton of cute things including blankets, ceramics, and softies (Charlie the tall monkey and Cyril the squirrel fox are great!) and more.

She also recently created a maze using thousands of strands of yarn! Now that's a place I'd happily get lost in.

(via Shayo)

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More than the Sum of its Parts

Totally digging the "This & That" feature on Oh Joy!, where Joy pairs a fashion piece with a matching item of decor.

I really like how Joy takes note of the small details in life, and celebrates them.

I love discovering connections between things, and seeing how seemingly random elements are related - whether or not this is intentional. What's more, the act of placing objects side-by-side, like Joy does, really makes them act as a foils to one another, highlighting their best qualities. In the same way that the people closest to you - friends, family, loves - pull out the best in you.

Check out more pairings tagged with "This & That" on the Oh Joy! blog.

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make your livingroom more interesting

Here's a quick DIY tip for making your livingroom more interesting.

Build a fort.

All you need are a few couch pillows, chairs, blankets...



Amir Fallah (who's the co-founder and Creative Director of the magazine Beautiful/Decay) has taken an excellent series of photos of livingroom forts - which he helped build.

The Fort series consist of collaborative forts created with male friends in their home. Each fort was built in under two hours. All materials for the forts were found on location and no aspect of the fort was preplanned.

Check out all the photos here.


(via)

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designer homes and designers' homes

And to talk more about designer homes - or rather designers' homes (thank you, apostrophe) in the sense of "homes that designers live in"...

Apartment Therapy San Francisco posted a look into the utterly lovely home of mutli-talented Jill Pilotte - illustrator, floral designer and small business owner.



I love the colour palette: white, green (mmm, i always love the green!), light and medium wood (yes, I know "wood" is not officially a "colour"), a little charcoal, and some punches of deep orange.

I also love the fuzzy felted plant pot holders she has all over the place!

And most of all, heavens to betsy, that work area. Check out that rainbowdelic selection of threads! And the cute paint detailing on the wall behind that! Way to live, girl.

Go here for more photos.

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homes, not houses

I've said it before, but I adore Design Sponge's sneak peeks into artists' homes. If the houses on all those renovation reality shows were like this... well, I guess I'd end up watching a lot more TV, but it'd be much more inspiring. (HGTV and TLC, are you listening?)

Here are a few of my recent faves:

Alyson Fox's home (here are her drawings): I love the wood/red/white/charcoal colour palette.



Amy Ruppel (here's her artwork): really nice work space and burst of artwork on the wall. The deer head and antlers creep me out a little.



Oijoy's home (here's her photography): wow, where did they get that crazyamazing cabinet? (But again with the dead animal parts on the walls... Hmm.)



Three Potato Four (here's their shop): awesome kids' area; makes me want to bust out the crayons and a huge roll of brown paper.



Trish Grantham's home (here are her paintings): love the explosion of small artworks, the retro furniture against that wall colour... and that's a darn sweet typewriter, too!



Sneak a peek at all Design Sponge's sneak peeks here.

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make your own patterns in a click

The other day, I mentioned a company that prints custom wallpaper. If your needs are more virtual - you have a website to decorate rather than a living room - then there's help for you, too.

London's Victoria & Albert Museum has a fun online game where you can customize your own textile patterns. The choices are all quite grandiose, but if damask and chintz are up your alley (hmm, that'd be a really colourful alley...) then you'll get a kick out of this. (via)

If your tastes are a little more modern, try Colourlovers' pattern maker. This tool is much more flexible, as you have tons of pattern-bases to choose from (contributed by the community on an ongoing basis), and can adjust up to five different colours. You can use the patterns you customize on your desktop, website, profile page, etc, or add it to the Colourlovers' community library. Read more about the tool here or to start playing with it, go here.

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julie morstad wallpaper

Hot damn. Julie Morstad wallpaper!



Julie Morstad is one my fave artists. I first saw her beautiful, eerie fairy tale drawings at the Atelier Gallery in Vancouver. Her picture book, When You Were Small, which was written by Sara O’Leary, is a brilliant concept, beautifully executed. Drawn & Quarterly recently published her mini-comic, Milk Teeth, which you can catch a sneak peek of in this PDF. And now you can have her work all over your walls.

Turns out the company printing her wallpaper, Rollout - like Julie - is based in Vancouver. Way to go, Canada! Most of the fancy wallpaper companies I read about on design blogs are American or British - it's nice to see Canucks in the game, especially when they're highlighting contemporary Canadian artists and illustrators.

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matte stephens placemats

I am in love. Look at these placemats! (Matte Stephens!)


Available at Modern Twist, along with these little guys and this pyjama hider (!). I like the squirrel pattern on the lil' ones.

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wallpaper for typography geeks

Another case of the explosion aesthetic that I love, check out this amazing letterpress block wallhanging. Interior designer Andy Beers installed 150 (!!!) letters on his office wall, using just some double-sided foam tape.

Get the whole story on DesignSponge (and - surprise bonus! - get a sneak peek into Andy's fun and beautiful home.)

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rainbow remix

I once heard about a friend of a friend (etc?) whose job it was to predict and talk about colour trends. As in, companies would consult with her about what colours to make their new line of clothing, cookware, luxury condos, whatever.

Sounds like one of the best jobs ever, right?

If you just said "Right!" or "Hell ya!" in your head (or out loud), then before you rush off to google "how to become a colour consultant" (ahem), check out these sites for the similarly colour-mad...

Wear Palettes uses photos from the ever-great style-spotting Sartorialist and extrapolates the colours used in the outfits. It's kinda like showing which brightly-coloured lego blocks were used to make up that totally rad castle you built.



Kris's Color Stripes is another blog with that also uses colour bars. The blog's not entirely about colour, but Kris keeps a colour diary that highlights the beautiful palettes found in photographs. Separating the colours like this really makes you notice the beautiful parts that make up the whole as well as how they interact with each other.



COLOURlovers is a community site that brings together, um, colour lovers, to talk about colours and palettes. It's a great resource to check out colour trends and just to get inspired.

All these sites are ripe with inspiration if you're planning on a little home makeover, or even just to help you get dressed with a lil' more sass in the morning.

Think of them as the next generation of those paint swatches you pick up at the hardware store.

Also related: Big Huge Labs' Palette Generator.

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wintery and warm

As I head out to do the last of my Christmas shopping (yeeks!) in the rain (double yeeks!) I will leave you here, all warm and cozy, with a beautiful drawing of how winter should be: full of snow, warm scarves... and owls... :)

This lovely piece is by Geninne, an artist that I came across on Flickr.

Snowy Owl by Geninne

And this is the studio where she works...



Wow. I love all those colours and the wood. Check out this flickr set of the cabin she lives in, and also these photos of her cabin studio. Prepare yourself for extreme jealousy.

Um, when can I move in?

You can keep up with Geninne on Flickr, on her art blog blog, and on Etsy.

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the explosion aesthetic

I love the explosion aesthetic.

What does that mean? It's what I'd like to do when I eventually move into a place where I can put as many nails in the walls as I want, without worrying about landlords and damage deposits.

To be more precise: it's arranging tons of great artwork on a wall, randomly yet organically.

Here are a couple of examples of what I mean:

Anders Nilsen (creator of the Big Questions comics, and one of my illustration crushes) made this installation of 1" buttons in the bedroom of a very lucky eight year old kid.



Go here for more photos and close-ups.

Artist Lisa Congdon did a similar thing in her kitchen with plates.



Who knew hanging plates on the walls could be so stylish?

There are tons of examples of framed artwork being hung this way (but of course, I can't find any links right now). Both Martha and Lifehacker have tips on how to accomplish this feat without going completely mad.

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shiny shiny

Through a series of links, I quasi-randomly came across this photo of flickr user Liquid Stereo's living room. It was so awesome, I had to share. Shiny shiny floors, huge huge windows, fun fun colour accents... I never even thought of moving to Minnesota till now... ;)

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the random awesomes

I haven't been updating the blogtoo much recently, so, to catch up, here are a few random awesomes that've recently caught my eye...

Purple squid stamps on M Patrizio's Flickr.



A cute lil' TV set... inside an apple!. This also belongs to M Patrizio.



A found alphabet ... made out of the sky, as seen through the gaps between buildings (via information aesthetics).



Fun peacock wallpaper by Ferm Living (via Decor8).



GORGEOUS calligraphy by Besty Dunlap (via d*s).



Roadsworth's Tour de France installation on Wooster Collective.



Oh. Yes.

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fishy finds

I was catching up a some blogs, and came across quite a few fishy finds...

Love Forever is working on a plush red snapper. He's not red, but he's awful cute.

Dermond Peterson has a whole collection of sea-inspired linens. (via)



Jessica Polka crochets some gorgeous sea creatres. I love how she presents them in a scientific way, with labels. Here's a pattern to crochet a baby octopus, and you can buy other patterns on her etsy shop. (I have to learn how to crochet already!) (via)




And last but certainly not least... Coe and Waito are two Toronto-based ceramic artists who make the MOST exquisite ceramic jellyfish. Their work was on display at Magic Pony earlier this Spring. Stunning! (via)

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orla kiely I love you

I am in love with these chairs that are on display at Orla Kiely’s flagship store in London. And the things that are available at the online store! Gah. I'm on the verge of pining away to virtually nothing. [via]

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pretty

This is a lovely poster, available at I Am Still Alive.

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interior design for designers

These days I'm really into Design*Sponge's sneak peeks into the homes of artists and designers.

I love it because you get to see how these creative people choose to surround themselves. How do their environments match up with the work they create? Does the place you live in inspire what you create, or vice versa? Or both?

Plus, it's better than walking around the neighbourhood in the evening, staring into people's windows! (Ha! I'm kidding. Ok, I'm not. Ok, I am. Not. Um.)

One of my faves is Alyson Fox's home. (Here's her home and her artwork.)



It was hard to choose from all the homes, but among my faves were Lisa Congdon's place (here's her site) - I love the greens, oranges and white colour combo - and Sarajo Frieden's beautiful tree mural (and here's her site).



This is great inspiration for how to live. Down with bland homes!

Explore all the D*S sneak peeks here.

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bringing the rainbow inside

It's a rainy Sunday out there - and by 'rainy', I mean monsoon - so I'm getting caught up on projects around the house.

Of course, it's always more fun to do the non-essential projects first... So I rearranged my bookshelf by colour. I've posted before about people who have done this - see here and here - and I figured it was time to try it out for myself.

Here's what my bookshelf looked liked before. Quite messy and drab.



And here's what it looks like now. Much prettier, don't you think?





Arranging my books by colour has definitely cheered up my living room. And now whenever I feel like reading something green, I'll know just where to look.

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i can't remember the title, but i know it had a red cover

Chicago-based letterpress diva, Orange Beautiful, recently blogged about this amazing face-out bookshelf, and I couldn't help but repost the image here. It's the work/live space of artist Dale Chihuly.

This shelving method is perfect for you if:

a) You are the kind of person who wanders into a bookstore, looking for a book, but you can't quite remember the title and you can't quote remember who wrote it... but you remember there was something red on the cover... maybe a strawberry... or a tomato... or a balloon... or something... or maybe it was more orange than red... or maybe pink... Well, now the problem's solved, cause you can see all the covers at a glance. "Oh, the red book? There it is!"

b) You have a huge collection of oversized art books. It looks like Dale's removed the book jackets, leaving just the cloth. Interesting move - it definitely makes it look less like a bookstore and more like an art show. (Did you know that in most chain bookstores, the books that are displayed face-out or on tables are there because publishers paid a fee to the store? It's not that the bookstore actually thinks they're better or anything. Just something to keep in mind.)

c) You have a spiral staircase and a multi-level library in your home. (I wish!)

Also check out Orange Beautiful's elegant and smile-icious letterpress cards.

P.S. If bookshelves are your thing, also check out the rainbow organizational system.

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