Design

November 27th, 2009

Back in the groove



Almost.

There are four piles of fabric. My sewing room is organised.

Tomorrow I’m going to look at linen. For curtains. And tonight I’ll start pinning Astrid’s new quilt.

Today I placed my first order from Purl in a very long time, with not a care about import duty or English postal taxes. I got queen quilt batting, and nani iro oilcloth. How could I not get nani iro oilcloth?

5 Comments »

July 31st, 2009

why

Have I never looked here before?

1 Comment »

April 6th, 2009

copying just isn’t cool



Oilily have made themselves look rather silly. Did they really think nobody would notice?

www.rosapomar.com

7 Comments »

April 1st, 2009

a headache that lasts a week



is a bit of an arse if you ask me.

Especially when it’s combined with something über–exciting and brilliant.
Maybe that’s just life. Brilliant and shit all at the same time.

Image something I worked up about ten years ago one Sunday afternoon at my friend Leonie’s in Lewisham

8 Comments »

February 22nd, 2009

dusty plum





Dusty plum. Not only for the colour, but for the texture. This cashmere is wonderfully dry. I’ve never come across dry yarn before but really it’s the only way to describe it. Chalky almost. It’s the only time the Knitting Goddess has ever managed a solid and we were the fortunate recipients. But it’s a solid that changes in the light. One moment deepest darkest plum, but a shift in light – and Astrid’s wearing a different colour altogether.

This is the fourth in my raglan series. It’s taken all winter to make. In between knitting projects. To replace the Pear Tree one mummy felted only two weeks after making it. Don’t put Pear Tree in the machine no matter how gentle the cycle.

The Pattern is based on the raglan from The Baby Knits Book – I’ve just upped the measurements to fit Astrid – and made everything much longer – even when to scale.

The past couple of weeks I’ve also baked more cakes. It’s all Astrid will eat right now along with pasta tuna and pesto. And cornflakes. I realised about myself that I go through phases of things in intense bursts. I do the same thing but adapt it – like the cake – same base but a different one every week – summer fruits and coconut – raspberry, poppy seed and sunflower seed – blueberry, walnut and dark chocolate.

Then there’s my Robe Rouge wardrobe. I’ve so far made seven dresses and three pairs of pyjama pants – all from one of three patterns – none in the same fabrics so they all look quite different. Astrid’s wardrobe of smock tops and trousers– same two patterns every time.

Ditto the raglan phase. Which I am now well and truly over.
Until someone needs a new jumper.

13 Comments »

February 18th, 2009

The family annuals

A job I finally did while we waited for Edith to arrive – a time when I had a couple of spare days on my hands – the two blurb books I’ve had sitting in the to-be-done pile – one for over a year now – our family annuals.

We chose landscape softcover with premium paper – and for those of you in the UK keen to avoid any postal taxes they’re shipped from the Netherlands, so you’re safe! Each is 120 pages and we thought pretty good at £17.95 each. What we think of that when we’re back in NZ remains to be seen.

These shall most certainly be an annual event – so much fun to put together – and really tremendous books.



from the 2007 book :















from the 2008 book :

















A friend sent me an email asking whether I had any design tips for making a blurb book to which I replied, well of course I do :)

I like to keep things consistent and simple. I made most spreads one full image on the right and one large image with white space on the left. Some I did use more photos, but I made sure to use only simple layouts – no fancy collage stuff or lots of different sized images – things like three by three small boxes and also pages with two images the same size were good. Nice even stuff. No mess.

There’s no text apart from an introduction / overview of the year at the beginning with a full page image opposite. I have used helvetica as the typeface (or swiss 721) – regular and bold – arial would suffice if one didn’t have either or those, and i’ve used lower case throughout. I think the body copy was 9.5 and the headings 11 points in size.

My design style is to keep everything as simple as possible and let the photographs do the talking. No need for colour, crazy fonts or any fancy design at all. So really, not much designing to do at all.

Note – the photos make the book look square but we got standard landscape shape.

25 Comments »

November 24th, 2008

The Alchemists

Such magic has been around me this week. Knitting time. Time to meditate. Winding time. Time for calm. Time for patience. A time to begin, slowly slowly, to transform what resides in the mind. There is simply no arguing with, nor hurrying along, tangled silk.



A green, forest path, an enchanted forest, an emerald forest, with paths of lichen and moss, willowy branches laden with crystalline leaves, rustling ever so gently as they sparkle on by. This magical silken forest will become a cardigan to drape the shoulders of a soon to be born daughter.



A favourite flower, the wild purple lupin, is the colour for Astrid. Hand dyed with natural dyes, a fine merino in dusty purple. The purple that sits at the edge of the sky waiting to become night. The purple before darkness. The purple before sunrise. A mysterious purple, a shifting purple, one of nature’s secrets. The bearer of the night. The bringer of the dawn.



And something for their mother, cashmere wrist warmers for winter, in the colours of deepest forest berry, colours for being stored away by winter squirrels. Colours for family from far away to gather, colours of mulled wine on Christmas eve, colours of baked fruit pie with vanilla ice cream, with cinnamon and spices. Richest deepest plum for winter warmth.

Somewhere I’ve read, maybe a few places I’ve read – one of the secrets of the Alchemists was that the turning of base metal into gold was a metaphor for the transforming of the mind, of turning the contents of the mind into ‘gold’. Imagine an empty mind, a still, quiet vessel  – containing but a pool of marvellous colours, shifting and changing. A deep pool of tranquil peace. A deep pool of serenity and beauty.

As I’ve walked over the Heath this past week I’ve been thinking about the dyers of these yarns and the beauty of the colours they create. That’s what’s been in my mind this week. A little bit of alchemy perhaps.

10 Comments »

September 23rd, 2008

I can’t stop thinking about these



from trippen

I think a weekend in Berlin is called for so I can go and try them on.

4 Comments »

June 24th, 2008

Yoo-ii shop update

I’ve been checking on a daily basis and can now report Yoo-ii has updated her shop.



Waterlilies – design by Yoo-ii • letterpress printing by lynn russell | satsuma press

There are three limited edition prints available – two gocco prints and one letterpress collaboration. I love Yoo-ii’s unique geometric and abstract style of illustration.

Here

3 Comments »

June 11th, 2008

Little collections

Before we left I organised a few house warming gifts to self to ensure we had some personal touches to make the house feel like home when we arrived.



Having white walls and high ceilings means I’m more in love with our new home than I think I’ve ever been with a house I’ve been living in. And coming from IKEA-free New Zealand means it’s always doubly exciting to move to Europe and go crazy at IKEA. Twice!



And while we’re on the subject of inbound post – my Superbuzzy order worth $47.00 had a customs charge of £12.22 (£4.22 tax and £8 handling fee). Add on $15.90 for postage and that makes for one heck of an expensive 2.5 yards of fabric. Lucky then that I bought a lifetime’s supply of fabric last year because I don’t think I’ll be ordering any more in a hurry.

15 Comments »

Previous Entries