Edouard Martinet

Via this blog post I just discovered the magnificent art work by Edouard Martinet. This is some information from his website: “Edouard Martinet transforms everyday objects found in flea-markets and car boot sales into works of art. Working with a variety of refuse materials such as rusted kitchen pans, typewriter keys, car lights and other scrap metals, Edouard Martinet sculpts several types of animals and insects. His sculptures are made without the use of solder. He fits each component into place as if putting together a puzzle of random pieces and parts.”









I am stunned. And I really, really want the first beetle, or the grass hopper, in my home, they are so beautiful and kafkaesque perfectly weird.

All pictures belong to Edouard Martinet.

Ruth Marten

Yesterday I stumbled upon the brilliant artist Ruth Marten and fell in love with her work big time. Be sure to check out her website and see lots more of her complete genius! It will make you smile for a long time, I am still smiling since yesterday.







All pictures belong to Ruth Marten.

wear that book

I really love this combo of book and dress, excellent design and colours on both! Dress is from Modcloth and book from Penguin Classics series Great Ideas.



A slightly softer and more organic combination, exactly the same sources as above.

wear that cup

Fancy a cup of tea? So do I, and I would love it in this gorgeous cup from Ferm Living.



I would also love wearing this tea dress from Gorman while having that cuppa. Maybe I should take up backgammon, since I seem to be so drawn to this pattern at the moment. Triangles, what is it about them really?

up the walls

I’ve been admiring these beautiful wallpapers from Ferm Living. I wouldn’t mind a few of them in frames, since I do think a whole wall of them would take over a room completely. But I still love the designs and colours so much. This first one is Ribbed in turquoise/gold.



Feather in petrol/white. This one I want as a fabric in a dress!



Harlequin in dusty green. This one I wouldn’t mind in the kitchen though, I think it would look very nice in there. Very nice indeed. I wonder how long it would take to paint this design, we actually have a pretty small kitchen ... Hmmm, food for thought!



Fairy Flower in red with laquer. I guess this is the style that I am trying to move away from, but I had to show it anyway since it’s gorgeous.



Family Tree in petrol/white. I do really like this wallpaper too, but I especially love the chair!

book cover of the day

When thinking of what I want to read next I got the notion to look up what Maile Meloy has done recently. Turns out she’s releasing a new book on my birthday! It’s her first book for young readers, and I’m not sure it will be completely to my taste (russian spies and potions ...), but I’m really liking the cover. What I would most like Meloy to write is another book about the Santerre family, that she’s written about in Liars and Saints and A Family Daughter. I loved both of them a lot! Not to mention her utterly brilliant short stories in Half in Love especially, some of which I still think of, years and years after I read them.

awesomeness from asos

Found some really beautiful vintage looking dresses from Asos, a few of them quite reasonably priced as well. First one is my absolute favorite, Midi Dress in Check Print for £50.



Dress in Pineapple Print £45. Damn cute this one!



River Island Paris 50s Prom Dress £ 44.99. Unfortunately out of stock.



Midi Dress in Stripe Print £50. Not really my personal choice of colour, but striking just the same!



Whistles Waffle Tessa Shift Dress £95. A bit pricier, but the perfect everyday dress if you ask me.



Whistles Penny Print Dress £175. A LOT pricier, but oh so beautiful, and hey: it rhymes with my first name!

Teema by Iittala

I have been a huge fan of Finnish design company Iittala since way back, but I mostly have glassware from them. Now I am seriously lusting over the china series Teema, designed by Kaj Franck in 1952. This is what they say about it: “Teema is the classic expression of essential design thinking, with each object derived from the basic forms: circle, square or rectangle. As Kaj Franck put it, Colour is the only decoration needed.” I would love this colour combo of terracotta, pearl grey and turquoise. Simply gorgeous.

wear that book

Time for a couple of more book-dress-combos. First one is a dress from Ruche and book from Penguin Classics. I wonder if Nietzsche would approve?



Second combo would be very trendy at the moment, from what I understand it, seeing pink and orange print combinations everywhere right now. Dress from Modcloth and another Penguin book. I just realised I am wearing a pink and orange dress today, so I guess I’m not entirely trendless! But it was made in the 50’s and purchased last summer, so not with this current trend in mind ...

Anyways, hope everyone’s enjoying their weekends so far!

the magic of Malin Ahlin

I was very fortunate to recently discover the brilliant young Swedish illustrator Malin Ahlin, and was immediately smitten by her pictures. So much so that I wrote her asking if she sells prints, which a lot of people also did at the same time. She decided to do just that, and in not too long I will be a very happy owner of these first two pieces, that make me smile every time I see them. Her blog is in Swedish, but check it out to see more samples of her beautiful work. I am convinced that she will become a household name in Swedish children’s book publishing in a near future, which I might in fact have something to do with.















Malin Ahlin says on her blog that she is “a little bit like a giraffe, tall, with my head in the clouds”, and that Tove Jansson and Edward Gorey are two of her biggest inspirations. In my book you cannot have better inspirations, which you can see traces of for sure, but she definitely has her own specific, and brilliant, style.

I am in awe.

All pictures belong to Malin Ahlin.

let there be light

If Ikea had this wonderfully bright and colourful lamp with their affordable Ikea price, I would get it in a heartbeat for the kitchen. Now they don’t, unfortunately, and I’m not even gonna say how much it costs, because frankly I think it’s a bit ridiculous. Lovely lamp though!



In general I’m not at all a fan of ceiling lamps, and I find most of them quite ugly. These ones I could live with though, I particularly like them three and three like this.



Our budget doesn’t really allow designer lamps at this time though, so I shall look elsewhere for something similar but cheaper. Or something else entirely.

curly cover

A Swedish publisher has been inspired by Penguin Classics and other overseas publishers, and are re-designing classics for reprints (although this is certainly not the first publisher, nor the first time this happens in Sweden, I must add). I encourage the idea of course, but the first four covers are not completely my cup of tea, with the exception of this purple curly one that I quite fancy. They are illustrated by a London-based Swedish illustrator called Petra Börner, and you can look at the other covers here. Maybe you don’t agree with me at all, and like the others too?

stag party

These beautiful mdf stag heads, from Stockholms Modern Museum’s gift shop, probably represent the style I am trying to steer away from now, but I can at least admire them online, can’t I?



They are so great, I can’t help but smile when I see them! Reasonably priced at 320 kronor I think, but I guess that doesn’t really matter since I’m not getting one.



Just the one would look pretty awesome on our dark red bedroom wall though … And I could hang necklaces on the horns, and scarves around it’s neck, so it would actually be quite useful. And obviously pretty. Above all it would look very pretty on that red wall. (My “old me” is trying to convince my “new me”, in case you’re wondering what I’m going on about.)

(Stay tuned to find out who’s winning, it will be EPIC, you will have to see it to believe it! Okay, I’ve been watching a few too many episodes of Hell’s Kitchen lately …)