particularly pretty penguins pt. 7

I know I’m kind of repeating myself here, but in honour of World Aids Day, which happens to be today, I can’t help but show off some new specially designed Penguin RED covers. And no, I’m still not being sponsored by Penguin Classics, but I’d very much like to be. I thought I’d present the brilliant designers this time too, starting with the Silas Marner cover above.

Designer: Jenny Grigg

What else do you associate with the colour red?

”Roses are red, red rag to a bull, passion, anger, heat, warmth, PMS 485 from my time as a magazine art director. My favourite red is ’chinese lacquer red’.”

Designer: Jonny Hannah

What else do you associate with the colour red?

”My favourite 50’s flannel shirt. Hammer horrors. A colour I can’t screenprint without. Robert Burns’ poems.”

Sorry, no info about the designer for this cover. It’s still awesome, so kudos to whoever made it!

Designer: Caseroom Press: Barrie Tullett & Philippa Wood

What else do you associate with the colour red?

”I always think back to Chip Kidds’ comment about his design for the book Disclosure (based on a quote by Ivan Chermayeff), ’When in doubt, make it red. If you’re still in doubt, make it big and red.’”

When you buy these beautiful books (that are of course also an excellent selection of classics everyone should read at some point in their lives), 50% of the profit will be donated to the Global Fund to help eliminate Aids in Africa. As a rather special treat you can also download three of the covers in high resolution FOR FREE, to print out on your own and maybe use as the most beautiful christmas decorations ever. You can find them here, where you will also find more information about the previously published editions and some of their designers. Knock yourselves out with great design!

particularly pretty penguins pt. 6

They say we're having the coldest winter in 100 years. Great, that's a record I would have preferred not to break, ever. Who decided it was time for that? Last winter wasn't exactly a walk in the sun either, so I do think we'd deserve a break this year. And just like the fans sold out in the stores this summer, when we to everyone's surprise had a heatwave, the heating fans will likely sell out too. In order to not worry about that right at this minute, I'll look in awe at some more Penguin Classics, from the Great Ideas series.



















I truly cannot get enough of these, every time I look at them I get happy. Graphic prozac. Can't wait for my holiday leave, when I'll hopefully take a lot of time to catch up on some reading, which is well overdue. What I'm feeling most for at the moment though is actually re-reading a book I read a few years ago, and that I keep thinking about so often. It deserves a post on it's own, so I'll get back on that.

tales of rust

Since this summer I've been a follower and admirer of Artemis Russells blog Tales of a junkaholic. Amongst other things she's a jewellery designer, and runs the line Rust with her husband. Today they launched a bunch of new pieces, and I almost started to cry when I saw this little carousel necklace. It's so perfect and precious and peculiar and pretty! To say I adore it wouldn't even begin to describe how I feel. I don't know what it is about carousels and me, I just love them, I always have. Apparently the horses even go around!



They call this necklace lace, but I would call it filigree. You say potato, I say potato. Nevermind, when it's this gorgeous. I do believe I tend to love their jewellery more because they make such amazing displays for them. They're like little stories. And I love reading.



I also love animals. And I don't have a locket. I think I should own a locket, with a sweetheart picture of my husband in it. Shouldn't I? This particular locket is vintage as well, excellent!



Being a calligrapher, this quill necklace is a given. There are also quill earrings, very beautiful as well, but I prefer the necklace. Oh, I wish I wish I wish I could get them all!

pretty in panic: waking up

When I started this blog I thought I would write about music as well as everything else I wanted to share. Turned out I haven't really, but in order to hopefully kickstart something in myself I've decided to share this with you now. Then we'll see what the future holds.



Late spring 2006 I was in a band called Dexter's Moon, when I for various reasons decided I wanted to continue making music some other way. A few months later I launched my own musical project called Pretty in Panic, named partly after a song by My Latest Novel (a band that's inspired me immensely) and partly after one of my all time favorite movies Pretty in Pink by John Hughes (Molly Ringwald being the first vintage style icon in my life). I recorded a few songs with my good friend Mikael (aka Juni Järvi), asked my brother to make a pretty websitesister-in-law to take some promo pictures, and didn't really have a clear plan of anything. I still don't, but now I'm thinking I should step out of my hibernating existance and make some new songs over the holidays. Because there's nothing like winter and snow to inspire songwriting, and maybe one day I will release a full album of cold songs.

PS. The Pretty in Panic website hasn't been updated in about 3 years, but I still really like it's design. The cute animals are pictures from a Chinese block puzzle I bought in Copenhagen many years ago. and my

i heart red

It seems I'm getting into the holiday spirit after all. Well it's not that I'm really opposed to christmas or anything, and to say that I'm against the whole consumerism of it I'd be the biggest hypocrite of the year. Obviously I love consuming! And I completely love buying gifts, taking good time to figure out what each and everyone would appreciate and hopefully need, then spending a good amount of time and effort wrapping them beautifully too. When I'm getting around to it, I'll show you what I mean and how I spend my winter evenings before christmas. The adorable squirrel and heart design is a print from the Swedish Pharmacy last year, I just completely fell in love with it.



Another thing I appreciate about this time of year is the amount of red you can find everywhere. Red is my signature colour after all (in my mind at least). I love to wear it, and I love to surround myself with it. The result is that my home is always pretty much prepared for christmas all year round, very convenient. This is a Salvation Army find from this summer, a very pretty wrap around cardigan for a mere 45 kronor, surprisingly warm as well. I'm a big fan of this kind of knitwear, it's perfect to top off a dress with.



I guess what I really dislike about christmas is the stress in other people, panickly shopping shopping shopping and crowding crowding crowding everywhere you try to go. But there are ways of avoiding that too of course, as best you can: 1) begin early (i.e. September ideally), 2) make lists, 3) browse the internet for inspiration, order what you can from there, 4) avoid malls if possible, or be there when the shops open so you can finish early, 5) don't be hungry! Hunger is the worst shopping companion. Okay, maybe this wasn't the most clever advice anyone's ever come up with, but it's still good advice. This year my plan is to get as many vintage gifts as possible, so that I can combine my two favorite shopping experiences, which is my own gift to myself I guess. The cute red little sweater is also a vintage find from this summer at the Salvation Army, for 50 kronor.

candid candles

There isn't really that much you can do about the darkness this time of year, just stay inside as much as possible and surround yourself with pretty lights. I have yet to get this electric candlestick from storage, I don't want to be the first in the neighbourhood to get it up. But as soon as someone lights one I'll be sure to follow. The candlestick (not sure about the proper English word for it) is a vintage find from last year. I found it in a charity shop for 200 kronor, which is a good price for a working 60's teak electric candlestick, and I just love the design. I've never wanted one of these before, cos I've never found one that I liked the design of, so I was quite pleased finding this. Next Sunday is the first in Advent, and by then all windows in Sweden will be packed with different kinds of lights.



We went to an Indian christmas market today, at my favorite theatre (Södra teatern). It's a part of the current Indian festival, that I haven't experienced that much from so far. Hosting 5 stalls in total I would say that calling it a market maybe was a bit misleading, and some of the prices were quite shocking. Knowing what lovely punjabis and scarves I can get in Durban, I wasn't gonna spend 1.200 kronor (about the same in rand) on just a punjabi top! I wanted to ask the sales guy if he was joking, but I didn't. We bought some Indian snacks instead, and went back home.

I now need to try on and try to decide on what to wear for an award party I'm going for tomorrow night. It's nothing too fancy really, but always nice to get a bit more dressed up when given the opportunity.

goodbye golden leaves

Just the other weekend these colours could be found everywhere, now it's pretty much all gone. Not to be found again for another year or so. Fortunately the greens will be back long before that though, and we do have a lot of fur and pine trees staying green the whole year. Right now this depressing lack of colour makes me seriously wonder what I'm doing this side of the globe, when we've got a place in Durban where the sun is shining and warming and the trees are blossoming. Oh, well, I can always dream of a white christmas and get that wish fulfilled up here ... White is not a colour though, white is even more a lack of colour. So I do my best to keep warm in colourful clothes, it's what you have to do.













I'm gonna go see a few movies at the film festival here in Stockholm, when it starts this weekend, that's also a nice way to escape the dreary weather for a bit. There was a time when I would take a week's leave during the festival and just see movies the whole days, which can be both wonderful and sometimes a bit depressing since everwhere else seemed to be better.

I've said it before though, and will most likely say it again, and again, and again: being two is the best way to keep warm. Being three is even better, and the second person doesn't have to be a spouse, it might just as well be a friend, or a cat even, but preferably a rather big cat, or a bunch of them. I wonder what our South African cats would think about snow?