FASHION: Northcote Road

Photography, Helen Marsden; Styling, Kellie Daggett / www.kelliedaggett.com

SOUTH LONDONERS have known about the super-stylish and parent-friendly shopping area that is Northcote Road, Battersea (SW11), for some time.

On a sunny day the street and surrounds (dubbed ‘Nappy Valley’) will be packed with dining families, extremely well-heeled & yummy mummies, and well-behaved and well-dressed kids sauntering in and out of the likes of the Gourmet Burger Kitchen, Cath Kidston, Petit Bateau, the antiques market, or ASPACE interiors boutique.

Stylist Kellie Daggett is a regular to the area, and her favourite stores include Iris boutique (97 Northcote Road; www.irisfashion.co.uk), Living Vintage (113D Northcote Road), and for style on a budget, the impressive Fara Charity Shop just off the street for amazing vintage, designer bargains. See our stockists information for more Northcote Road shopping inspiration…

PICTURE CREDITS: Going Shopping (left). Saskia wears dress, £25, Noa Noa at Living Vintage. Grosgrain hair bow, small, £3.99, Trotters. Petal print mini bag, £6, Cath Kidston. Cluster necklace, £38, Cath Kidston. Butterfly hair clips, £4, Cath Kidston. Click on all the images below for full credits.

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Posted 23 April 2012 in Textiles

FASHION: Pop Brights

KIDS’ FASHION is leading the rest of us this season with pop brights and happy, saturated colour in great swathes. If you needed persuading to let go of the black this summer, here are a few good reasons…

*Photography: Helen Marsden (www.helenmarsdenphotography.com) ; Styling: Francesca Bartoli (www.francescabartoli.com); Hair & Make-Up: Christina Corway (www.christinacorway.com)

Stockists: Boden: www.boden.co.uk; Caramel: www.caramel-shop.co.uk; Cos: www.cosstores.com; Elias & Grace: www.eliasandgrace.com; i love gorgeous: www.ilovegorgeous.co.uk; Vitra: www.vitra.com; VV Rouleaux: www.vvrouleaux.com

Left: Lilac long-sleeved T-shirt, £12, Cos. Yellow skirt, £51, i love gorgeous. Gold pumps, £28, Boden. Junior Panton chair, £130, Vitra. For all other stockists details click on each image below.

Papaya and yellow

Green dress

Cornflower dress

Pink bonnet

Yellow and gold

Posted 23 March 2012 in Textiles

SHOP FOCUS: Dalani

by Jenny Dalton

WE’RE A bit crazy about pouffes in our household. Perfect for foot-a-resting after another tiring day, or child-a-sitting when colouring in / snacking at the coffee table, so we understandably got a bit excited about these from TS Homeware at Dalani.

If Dalani doesn’t sound familiar, it’s a new flash-sales interiors-themed webstore started by an ex-Elle Decoration editor, and frequently offers brilliant, brilliant sales by the likes of Arper, Conran, Jamie Oliver, Dualit and Allegra Hicks.

The pouffe sale which sees reductions from £99.95 - £129.95 down to £69 - £89 begins next Thursday (15th March) for almost a week… So best sign up now..

*www.dalani.co.uk

Posted 9 March 2012 in Design + Decoration, Textiles

NEW TALENT: Corby Tindersticks

WE’VE FALLEN hard for the work from creative duo Carly Gledhill and Nick Mitchell, otherwise known as Corby Tindersticks. Corby, you should know, is a character [pictured left] created by children’s illustration graduate, Carly, who working with her architect partner Nick promises northern-influenced, brilliantly quirky, kid-friendly offerings from soft toys to T-shirts … After stocking up on their hand-embellished felt posters for the LittleBig shop, they gave us an insight into their new work..

LittleBig: Agyness Dean recently said that what the North has that the South doesn’t is a sense of humour… How much does being from the North and northern humour infect what you do?

Carly Gledhill: We don’t take ourselves too seriously, I can empathise with Agyness Dean’s comments as there is something quite special about northern culture, but I think humour is universal and we hope this translates through our products. We are hugely influenced by northern eccentrics, in particular the late Frank Sidebottom, whose all encapsulating world was both touching and funny. Sometimes we do have to stop ourselves using Northernisms - for example we had to drop Corby’s flat cap and whippet so customers worldwide would understand!

LittleBig: Where did the lovely, quirky Corby Tindersticks name come from?

Nick: Corby came from a doodle of a little boy character Carly drew whilst studying for an MA in children’s book illustration. He has taken over most drawings since and became our firm favourite invention. He was sewn into a 3D character and he’s been all over the world with us! I’m not really sure where the name Corby came from - I think it was partly from liking the word and also influenced by Alan Partridge’s obsession with the Corby trouser press! Tindersticks was really an accident, when we were trying to think of a good surname for Corby to make the company’s name I heard the word on BBC 6 music and it just stuck! Read the rest of this article

Posted 5 March 2012 in Designer Profiles, Textiles

BATHTIME: Soap-a-licious

by Jenny Dalton

EVERY NOW AND AGAIN bathtime loses its appeal. And then out come the big guns - or rather little guns - in the form of new colour changing plastic ducks (or Hot Wheels cars!), or a new PlayMobil water park.

Another sure fire way to get them wanting to clean themselves again are the Yorkshire Soap Company’s good-enough-to-eat soaps. Shaped like delicious slices of cake or wee little cup cakes with sparkly icing on top, they’ve become a kind of cult hit in our house (and are so incredibly convincing thanks to the layers of ‘butter cream’, ‘jam’ and ‘biscuit base’, they have even had a couple of bites taken out of them by an over-enthusiastic wee one, as well as a big one who just wanted to see what the fuss was about).

Hand-made in Hebden Bridge, West Yorkshire, over the top of a super-cute ‘cake’ store, the soaps are exquisitely put together in the kind of packaging you’d expect from the best cake shop in the world, and feature the likes of real rose buds on the top of a slice.

They don’t just look good. I’m not usually a soap person, but these are super-gentle, don’t seem to dry out the skin, and smell heavenly too, filled as they are with the best essential oils… The tricky bit is choosing which slice to try…

*Yorkshire Soap Company, www.theyorkshiresoapcompany.co.uk. £5 a slice.