Archive for 2012
“What’s this about?” I hear you wonder. Fret not, I Am Not An Animal is not a rant about my recent experience on the London Underground, it is the title of a totally awesome poem that my little niece Madeleine wrote for a national youth poetry competition in the category “Being human”. And she won, though she is just five years old.
The little poem that she made (and that her mum typed up) put a huge smile on my face – it’s such a fun, free spirited response to a serious topic, I wanted to share it with anyone who has 2 minutes to spare. Here goes:
(images from top to bottom: animal alphabet, chalky the memo board, wallpaper monkey, hanno the gorilla, fox wall sticker)
The woodland trend for kids rooms has been going strong for a while and I still can’t get enough. Imagine my joy when I laid eyes on these animal wall stickers from Dutch company KEK Amsterdam. I think I squealed. These cute Forest Friends are photo realistic, which makes a nice contrast and stops rooms from becoming overly sweet. Spot the raccoon below!
But now for the best bit! Gorgeous shop Hus & Hem, who are the first to stock KEK wall stickers in the UK, have generously donated a chipmunk wall sticker for me to give away!
All you have to do is leave a comment on my blog and tell me why you would like to adopt this little fellow. I’ll pick a winner in two weeks’ time (competition closes 19 March midnight) and announce the winner on this blog and by email. Good luck!
In case you haven’t heard about Hus & Hem before, do go and check it out. Owners Louise and Jill have put together a seriously drool-worthy collection of Scandinavian design, including some of my very favourites for children’s rooms, such as Rie Elise Larsen’s paper lampshades, Ingela Arrhenius’ gorgeous prints, and Betty Svensson’s retro floral fabric. Enjoy!
PS: If you’d like to place a link to this competition on your blog, you’re very welcome, and liking Room to Bloom on Facebook is always much appreciated : )
(images: kek amsterdam, collage from kek amsterdam branch sticker and chipmunk plus bread and jam dress)
I popped into Little Liberty yesterday, the brand new children’s department at Liberty’s. The emphasis is on children’s wear with lots of covetable labels such as Iloveorgeous and Paul Smith, and a smaller selection of toys and decorative pieces for children’s rooms. Here is an impression of my visit and a selection of my favourite buys.
Look out for these lovely pieces:
1. miho birdhouse 2. anne-claire petit mushroom pouffe 3. miho deer trophy 4. froy & dind tin 5. white rabbit lamp 6. anne-claire petit notebook pouffe 7. kids on roof casa cabana
(images: room to bloom, product images from respective brands)
It feels defintely spring-like and perhaps that’s why yellow has been catching my eye. I love the combination with dark moody blues.
1. mimi’lou bird wall border 2. sal de coco pau crib 3. donna wilson cloud rain cushion 4. muuto unfold pendant 5. eleanor home pandulera pendant 6. pappelina max rug 7. etsy almost sunday family tree print 8. serener hooks 9. toast tin trunks 10. noodoll giant cloud cushion 11. anne-claire petit crocheted lemon cushion 12. tissue rosette 13. daisy fan 14. mrs booth alphabet print
(image: room to bloom)
Giant wall rulers are becoming a bit of a trend in children’s interiors – and now that I’ve seen Rob Ryan’s Ruler for measuring the growth of human beings, I’m going to have to jump right on that bandwagon. It’s a beaut!
Rob designed the ruler for contemporary furniture shop and supplier of other design loveliness SCP. It features his characteristic paper cut design together with a poem, screen printed by hand on birch plywood. If you move house you can take the ruler with you, rather than having to leave your recordings behind on a doorpost or wall. So if you look after this lovely piece of design, you can hand it down to your kids when they start having their own family. Pretty cool, right?
I love the poem’s sentiment too – here it is (taken from Rob’s blog):
“The village grew into a town and the town grew into a whole city. The tree grew up to the sky and the river grew as it flowed down towards the sea and the flowers they grew until they covered the whole field and from inside the depths of our hearts you grew as well. Every single day a tiny unnoticeable bit more and more of you, and all of the long days and all of the short days will add up to yet more of you until there is no more growing to be grown and the last mark on this ruler will have been made.
But yet still inside you there will never be a shortage to the amount of love your heart can grow and day by day and year by yet you can grow in your heart still more care and more sympathy and more trust and more kindness until it finally blossoms and its flowers cover the entire world.”
(images: SCP)
I’ve touched on it in my Bubble London highlights post already, but now Olive Loves Alfie Colour, the new paint range from London based children’s store Olive Loves Alfie is available from the Olive Loves Alfie website. The range was conceived by store owner Ashlyn Gibson in collaboration with The Nursery Paint Company. It’s all super child-friendly stuff – 100% VOC free, made from soya beans and anti-bacterial (great for day nurseries as far as I’m concerned). Best of all are the colours – not your typical children’s pastels and primaries, but really zingy, fresh and thoroughly modern colours that will be loved by children and grown-ups alike. With names like Helter Skelter, Ghost Train, Trapeze and Showgirl, what’s not to love? I picture these colours as accent colours on doors, architraves, skirting or furniture. Nothing to stop you from using it on entire walls though.
I’d love to hear which colour from the 15 strong range is your favourite. On launch day at Bubble London, a clear favourite emerged. Can you guess which?
(images: olive loves alfie)
I have only just started blogging and am still trying to find my feet, but it’s nice to know that there’s a few people out there reading my posts and appreciating them (I love reading your comments!). So, when I found out this morning that my lovely fellow blogger Heather over at Canal Notes in Holland passed on the Liebster Blog award to me, my day was kind of made. How sweet! Thank you Heather.
The Liebster Blog award (which means ‘favourite’ or ‘beloved’ in German) is passed from blogger to blogger to spread the blog love and support smaller blogs. The award is given to blogs with less than 200 followers. The lucky winner is supposed to thank the award giver, choose five other blogs and let them know about the award, hoping that the Liebster Blog award will be passed on by the other winners. So, without further ado, here are five blogs I’d like to highlight:
I hope you’ll find a new favourite blog amongst these!
Ursula x
PS – if you like the letterpress card on the left, do check out US designers dutch door press and their stationary shop, which includes some lovely birth announcement cards. I love their folk art inspired work, the Dutch connection is coincidental – I think.
(images: dutch door press, liebster blog award)
Do you know that feeling when you come across something new and your heart just jumps? That’s what I felt when I walked past StrikAholic‘s stand on a recent visit to Home London. StrikAholic is a Danish company that offers a range of homewares such as cushions and blankets (‘strik’ meaning ‘knitwear’ in Danish), but what I fell in love with was the bedding on their fab washing line display – how fun is this?!
StrikAholic was founded by designer Dorte Niedziella, who loved knitting from a very young age. What I love about her designs is that they straddle the boundaries between grown-up and kid’s design. So, it didn’t come as a surprise when Dorte told me she tries to keep her childhood curiosity alive in everyday adult life. She is inspired by everyday things and gets lots of ideas when she’s together with her three children. They make her think of her own childhood and what she loved to do, and often her designs flow from this. I recognise myself in this as I often think back to my own childhood when designing a room. Dorte’s Visiontest cover was the result of many a visit to the doctor with her kids. The Paper Doll design goes back to one of her favourite pastimes as a child, playing with paper dolls with her sister. When her daughters started to take an interest in paper dolls too, and started drawing pretty dresses, Dorte thought they’d make a great design for a duvet cover.
My favourite design is Nordic Inspiration, shown on the far left on the washing line and below. It’s inspired by classic Scandinavian knitting patterns and only available in adult sizes, so it works if your child has a normal single bed. Some of the other reversible designs are available in junior sizes as well. All are produced to Danish standards, but different sizes can be made on request. Fingers crossed that StrikAholic‘s bedding will be available here soon, but in the mean time you can contact them directly, as they’ll ship to the UK.
(images: room to bloom, strikaholic)
There was one thing at Bubble London this week that popped up at display after display: vintage suitcases and trunks. Stacked on shelves, stools and on the floor, they were present in all shapes and sizes and from all eras. Many of these beauties looked well-loved and well-used, which to me is part of their appeal. Not only do they look great, they make excellent storage too – many of the exhibitors commented how handy they were to transport bits and pieces to the show.
Vintage suitcases and trunks make great storage for a child’s room. They form a cool contrast against a contemporay background and mix equally well with a retro inspired or shabby chic decor. So where to get hold of them?
1. Your parents’ or grandparents’ attic – they’re even better with a bit of history : ) The suitcases at Organic Zoo above belonged to the exhibitor’s well-travelled great grandparents and they’re often used in the brand’s photo shoots!
2. Ebay – search for ‘retro suitcase‘, ‘vintage trunk’, etc.
3. Charity shops on your local high street.
4. Flea markets and car boot sales – down here in London Alfies Antiques Market is worth a visit, or check locally (for me it’s Haynes Lane Market in Crystal Palace).
5. Vintage shops – I personally enjoy the hunt for hidden treasure, but if you don’t and are willing to pay a little more for fully restored items, then try specialist shops such as London Vintage Luggage (online + an amazing store at Stables Market in Camden), or retro furniture shops such as The Old Cinema or Crystal Palace Antiques Warehouse.
What’s your favourite place to hunt for vintage treasure? Share it with us in the comments below!
(images: room to bloom)
I went to Bubble London on Monday, which is a bi-annual trade show for kids clothing, shoes and accessories mostly, with a sprinkling of children’s decor. It’s interesting to see how fashion and interiors influence each other, and I had a great time looking at the ‘moods’ created by different clothing brands. Some of these could easily be translated to children’s rooms – I will show you how in a later post.
Whereas the Kleine Fabriek trade show in the Netherlands a couple of weeks ago screamed colour at me, the mood at Bubble London seemed a little bit more subdued overall. Here are some of my personal highlights on the interiors side of things: 
Olive Loves Alfie launched their new VOC free, anti-bacterial paint range in collaboration with The Nursery Paint Company. Their display was awesome and the colours no less (no subdued-ness here!). More on this in a later post. Over at Cristina Rohde I found patterned storage boxes from Daisy Copenhagen in a range of blues, lilacs and pinks. I admired bedlinen at Lulu & Nat’s display, still loving one of their older designs shown here, the floral design. And tucked away at Minihaha, I fell in love with lace printed vintage furniture by Jo Gibbs.
(images: room to bloom)
