TRENDS: Bubble Review

By Jo Middleton

LITTLEBIG VERY selflessly spent the day last Sunday going all the way to Bubble London to check out the latest trends for kids for Autumn and Winter. We traipsed around all day looking at gorgeous dresses, cooing over tiny shoes, and gasping with delight at hand-sewn cushion covers. The things we do for you…

The whole show was fantastic, and we’ll be bringing you more in-depth features on some of the individual brands over the course of the next few months, but in the meantime we wanted to whet your appetites with a few of our favourites.

Following the success of the Muffin Pouffe, a luxurious leather cushioned stool with a playful elegance [pictured left], Matteo Bianchi has been baking mini muffins! Yes that’s right, they’re stools that look like muffins - what’s not to love? You can create your own unique design by selecting your muffin ‘ingredients’ from a range of beautifully handcrafted solid wooden bases, buttons, and soft leathers and fabrics. So gorgeous you won’t know whether to sit on it or eat it. www.muffinpouffe.co.uk Read the rest of this article

Posted 2 February 2012 in Products, Textiles

FASHION: Woolly Thinking

Photographer: Helen Marsden Stylist: Shani Beadle.

THESE LAST FEW COLD, cold winters seem to have coincided with a return to hand-knitting and a new-found appreciation of the knitted stitch. Claire-anne O’Brien, ace knit upholsterer and designer (see her Knitted Stool in the gallery below), however, believes it never went away.

“I don’t think knitting has ever really died, it’s just now even more accessible helped by knitting clubs and blogs. I am currently setting up a network of handknitters around the country to help me knit my designs and there has been no shortage of knitters!”

Read the rest of this article

Posted 22 December 2011 in Textiles

STUFF: Things we really should have designed but didn’t

YOU KNOW IT. ALL those things you’ve bought for your wee one and all along you’re thinking “I invented this. I just didn’t manufacture it.”

Like the black out blinds with suction cups from The Gro Store (my homemade version was blackout fabric and map pins). The new ‘lead’ Scoot ‘n’ Pull for scooters below (my homemade version? child hanging onto my jacket tails). The Koodi Stroller Sun and Sleep Shade cover (well it’s an extension of the sweater perched atop your child’s buggy, isn’t it?).

Here are a few of our favourites we wished we’d designed. Because they’re all just really good….

1. Totseat. In my mother’s day this was a scarf tied around your tummy, tied around your chair. These days it’s the Totseat, a considerably safer portable fabric version, designed by Rachel Jones of Edinburgh-based Totseat, that fastens securely around any chair, and has won numerous accolades. £24 from www.totseat.com. Enter LITTLEBIG at checkout for a 15% discount. Read the rest of this article

Posted 5 September 2011 in Products

Exclusive Discount - SPORTING WALLPAPER: Turner Pocock Cazelet

WITH THOUGHTS TURNING to summer and sport and outdoor play, we’re loving the unusual sporting themes of the Tennis and Cricket wallpapers from Turner Pocock Cazelet, the new-ish collaboration between Turner Pocock, the London-based interior design company founded by Bunny Turner and Emma Pocock, and artist Catherine Cazelet.

Cazelet’s illustrations form the basis of the graphic motifs featured in the company’s growing TPC collection that were developed as a reaction to clients’ desires for wallpapers that were striking without being scary and that were sophisticated enough to appeal to adults and well as kids. With motifs spread between the initial two collections featuring wild animals and English sports - i.e. hand-drawn polar bears, ibises, galloping zebras and cricket bats - who could possibly resist?

What’s more, all of Turner Pocock Cazelet’s papers are made and printed in the UK at the Anstey Wallpaper company in Read the rest of this article

Posted 18 April 2011 in Decor

GIVEAWAY: Livingly mobiles by Anni and Bent Knudsen

by Jenny Dalton

FOLLOWING MY LITTLE profile of the newly reissued mobiles of Danish paper designers Anni and Bent Knudsen here at How To Spend It, Livingly - the company behind the Knudsen collection renaissance - have kindly offered two of their mobiles as a giveaway.

Bent Knudsen created his first mobile in 1938, aged just 14. He then trained as a silversmith working for the Georg Jensen company (then known as Hans Hansen), before marrying his wife Anni and together becoming makers of hand-crafted paper mobiles that achieved worldwide fame. The company’s mid-20th-century designs were bought by Livingly in 2008, and we’re very glad they’re back.

The Anni and Bent Knudsen collection can be seen here: www.livingly.dk

We have an elephant and storks mobile to give away (both pictured). Just email us your details (name, address, email address), and specify if you would like to win the Elephant or Storck mobile. Add in if you are happy to join our occasional mailing list: mail@littlebigmagazine.com Winners will be picked on 14 April 2011 and notified by email. PLEASE NOTE THIS COMPETITION IS NOW CLOSED.