SHOPPING: Members-Only Sale Shops

IF THERE’S a shopping trend that will come to define 2012, it must be that of the members-only, pop-up sale shop - online, flash sale stores that are increasingly competitive, beautifully-designed and full of things you actually want to buy.

Like Orla Kiely bedlinen (a recent LittleBig editor steal via Achica), Falcon Enamelware (on LLUSTRE this week), and gorgeous Agatha Ruiz de la Prada tees on Half-Pint Chic. The idea is you can grab yourself a bargain but with greater security (and the usual retail protections) than chancing eBay and the like.

Here is a run-down of our current favourites:

1. Dalani Home & Living - www.dalani.co.uk. Selling the likes of Alessi, Richardson Sheffield knives, bedding plus great artwork suitable for children’s rooms, Dalani has recently taken on the ex-decorating editor of Elle Decoration UK, Emilio Pimentel-Reid, as their new creative and editorial director, so expect interesting things from this shopping / editorial site. Read the rest of this article

Posted 25 April 2012 in Shop Watch

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

CROCKERY: A Life

by Jenny Dalton

WHEN I WAS studying Ancient Greek civilisation at University, all those tiny fragments of ceramic pot that academics got really excited about just seemed dull, dull, dull. It wasn’t until much more recently I realised just how much your collection of ceramics - even your everyday cereal bowls and side plates - says about you and your life.

Clearing out my cupboards after breaking so many bowls and plates this last year or two that all I have left are odds and ends, I noted how each one tells a story or defines part of my life: the Habitat cheapy, coloured bowls that I took to Uni (all mismatching colours, as I preferred at the time). The handmade blue salad bowl, made by a potter just outside Paphos, Cyprus, where my parents used to live and where I’ve spent many, many holidays. The inherited Denby pottery that rarely breaks and seems to go on and on (design classics, indeed). The odd Kelloggs freebies (practically antiques! the kids love them); and small plastic bowls (from Mini Moderns) that the kids don’t really need anymore but we all use for ice-cream…

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Posted 29 February 2012 in Eating / Drinking, Lifestyle + Interiors

GLAMPING: Jollydays, North Yorkshire

Words & Prodution: Claire Bingham; Pictures: GAP Interiors/Chris Tubbs

WITH THE realisation that the simplest things can be glamorous, upscaled camping has become the current ultimate outdoor experience. Rekindling a love affair with the great outdoors with her luxury-tented accommodation in the vale of York [see left and below in the gallery], Carolyn van Outersterp shows Claire Bingham how to have the perfect family camping holiday - even in the snow!

The family: Carolyn and husband and their four children Galatea (14) Midori (13), Angel (6) and Alto (8) live in an 18th century listed farmhouse a couple of minutes drive away from the woodland.

Claire Bingham: How did Jollydays come about?
Carolyn van Outersterp: For a long time it has been our dream. For all the years whilst we were running our business CVO Firevault [an upmarket fireplace company] in London it was something we always wanted to do. What directly influenced the decision was a trip to a friend’s wedding in Uganda where we all camped on the snowy slopes of Mount Kenya. That was when the idea really got lodged in my brain. I thought, if they can do it here…

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Posted 12 December 2011 in Lifestyle + Interiors, Travel

REAL-LIFE LONDON: Easton, Quin & Ivy’s rooms

Photographs: Light Locations & Courtney Adamo.

WHEN Courtney Adamo - one of the bloggers behind Babyccino Kids - bought and renovated her home in north London last year, making the interior perfect was the last thing on her mind. Luckily for Courtney, she had a host of friends willing to give away furniture to help her complete the project. The result is beautiful and calm - although Courtney claims, “my husband and I always say that seeing photos of our house makes us realise how boring it is!!! It needs serious help in the design department, but after renovating the whole thing last year, we’re taking a break from spending.”

Courtney isn’t so critical of her kids’ rooms, even though they too have mostly happened rather than being planned. For example, she says two-year-old Ivy’s room, pictured above and below right, is “a bit of a hodge-podge of random things that ended up in there when we were moving in. We placed that Ercol chair in her room for lack of a better place at the time, but I liked it so much in there we never moved it. Same goes for the lamp in the corner, the storage boxes at the foot of her bed, and some of the art on the fireplace mantle.” Read the rest of this article

Posted 31 October 2011 in Real Life Interiors