White gray and black

It is not very often I make a post about something I have seen on other blogs but this time I just had to mail Molo Design to ask if I could use their pictures.  Because after seeing the post about these Laterns at Contemporist I just had to show you these little beauties as they are so me!  Looking at the pictures I see my favorite colours in a row.. White Grey and Black. I just love the shape of them and how they are presented...

Hobo Lantern and felt bag... from Molo Design
hobo lantern is a portable luminary inspired by the urban nightlife of Zona Tortona during Milan’s Design Week.  This portable bag of light is a piece of pragmatic poetry that can be used as a functional shoulder bag or purely as a lantern. Perfect for drawing extra visibility to pedestrians and cyclists on city streets with car traffic or a romantic walk in the moonlight. 

At home you can choose to plug hobo into a regular power outlet or use the portable battery pack included. The form of hobo lantern originated with hobo felt bag which is made from natural felted wool and available in natural heathered grey or black. The geometrical form of  hobo felt bag + hobo lantern is composed of two squares that transition from the elliptical base to meet in a straight line at the bag’s opening.

Thank you Mathew-Arthur At Molo for text and images.
Visit the Molo website

A mini Moooi world

Last week I popped into Marcel Wanders Moooi Gallery to have a look at the new collection...   'Wandering' through the building always makes me happy and very calm... it is such an almost serene white world with beautiful furniture and unexpected objects... I had the chance to take home my own collection and build it in a shoe box or like here on my studio table...

The Moooi Panorama ....

From the 12th to the 17th of April Moooi is proud to present a panoramic overview on its new products at the showroom in Milan for the 50th Edition of Il Salone del Mobile. 

In via Tortona 37 the new creations of Marcel Wanders, Stefano Giovannoni, Studio Job, Rooms, Sjoerd Vroonland, Bertjan Pot and Moooi Works will be revealed in combination with products extensions by Marcel Wanders.
Website.... www.moooi.com

My home in IKEA Family Live magazine

My bedroom

Remember last September I wrote about the IKEA Family Live team doing a photo shoot at my home. They came across some pictures of my studio and bedroom and approached me with the question if I was interested in a photo shoot for their Family Live Magazine. My first reaction was... I do not have that particular IKEA home you are looking for, but they asked me to sent some pictures of my home anyway... 

So there I stood in the middle of my living room making a shot of each of the four walls... that will scare them off I thought. But surprisingly they were enthusiastic and not much later my house was taken over for three days by a super friendly team from London. 


I wrote some blogs about these days for their website and you can read them on the IKEA Family Live website soon. Meanwhile enjoy the pictures.

my livingroom

Spring 2011 issue of IKEA Family Live Magazine

 my studio

The magazine will be in your mailbox if you are in one of the 23 countries IKEA send out the magazine... If you are not an IKEA family member you can see the Spring 2011 issue here in English... or in French  Ma maison dans IKEA Family Live magazine ici en Francais .......Of hier in het Nederlands.

Vorig jaar September schreef ik al eens over het team van IKEA Family Live die een foto reprtage in mijn huis kwam maken. Na foto's te heben gezien van mijn slaap en werk kamer benaderden zij mij met de vraag of ik interesse had in een reportage in het IKEA Family blad. MIjn eerste reaktie was dat ik helemaal niet zo een typisch IKEA huis had, maar ze vroegen mij toch wat foto's op te sturen.

Dus daar stond ik, midden in elke kamer alle vier de muren op de foto vast te leggen, compleet niet opgeruimd of ook maar enigzins verder bij nagedacht.... dat schrikt hen vast wel af dacht ik! Maar vreemd genoeg dus niet en niet al te lange tijd daarna werd mijn huis overgenomen door een super leuk team van vijf, uit Londen overgekomen stylist, fotograaf en art directors e.d.

Voor de IKEA Family Live website heb ik nog een aantal blogs geschreven die je daar binnenkort kunt lezen. Mocht je geen IKEA family lid zijn dan kun je het blad..  hier online bekijken.

Update May 2011:

More pictures, blogs and things that I collected from the IKEA Family Live site on this page.... Behind the scenes with IKEA Family Live

Meer foto's, blogs en dingen die ik van de IKEA Family Live site heb afgehaald vind je hier op deze aparte blog page Behind the scenes with Ikea Family Live

All pictures made by Jake Curtis for IKEA Family Live

A canal house photo location

 

I recently came across this Victorian house....  It is nearly stripped down to be transformed in a new and clean apartment. Photographers and stylists love to use this kind of locations for a photo shoot and I love to see advertisements with furniture, some beautiful fabrics or fashion photographed in a house like this. Looking at the pictures I had to think of some photos I made about two years ago in a canal house down town.

Dutch houses used to have small corridors and the staircases in many of the old (canal) houses downtown makes many first time visitors wonder if their feet will fit on the steps of the staircase and how they can come down again from such a small and straight staircase without hitting their head.

The building itself, build in 1690, is an old warehouse and the place was rather spooky... Not because it was build on an old cemetery from the middle ages but because in the basement it was dark and dirty and there were even some dead pigeons stuck between the windows and a wall. I did love the windows at the back, the colors of the floorboards and the cleaned walls on the floor where I made the pictures. And how about that beautiful gray of the doors.....  It could easily be a great location for a photo shoot don't you think?

Picture 1 + 2 source unknown

All other pictures by me

Little black books

One can never have enough little notebooks... I love the little pile of agenda's and notebooks on my desk. And especially love -apparently we Dutch all do- the little black Moleskine books. I have several moleskine notebooks and planners and the thing I like most about them is that they all come with an elastic band so you can stuff lots of cards, notes and pictures in between them.

There are some special notebooks for the main city's too.... I have one from Paris where I write places or shops I want to visit in. The little brown books I bought in Paris at the Muji store the little one has such a great shape and hundreds of little pages.

And do you remember my Whats that in your studio post with those graphic cards from Therese Sennerholt. There now is a new set of 3 notebooks available in the webshop / Op de foto boven de nieuwe set van 3 notebooks van Therese Sennerholt.

And if you are looking for something really different and handmade you should have a look at the work of my friend and Praha based artist Kucin! His work was recently mentioned in the Financial times and he makes unique pieces of diary's, sketchbooks, photobooks and lots of different notebooks.... read his blog and visit his site at deafmessanger.com / Voor unieke handgemaakte notebookes en agenda's bezoek je de site van mijn vriend en in Praag wonende artiest Kucin!

Ik ben gek op dat stapeltje kleine zwarte boekjes en agenda's op mijn bureau. Vooral  de kleine zwarte Moleskine boekjes heb ik in allerlei soorten en maten. Het elastieken bandje om de agenda's vind ik geweldig, je kunt er van alles tussen proppen en in bewaren. Er zijn ook verschillende notebooks van de grote steden... Ik heb er een van Parijs en schrijf er adressen in van dingen die ik wil bezoeken of niet wil vergeten.  De bruine boekjes op onderstaande foto kocht ik in Parijs in de Muji store, 

Where design meets nature.

 

I don't know how it is chez vous / at your place....  but in my kitchen the towels are most of the time just sticked between the handles of the drawers. That if they are not lying on the counter top!... Of course we try to show ourselves at our best here on our blogs.... But I might as well tell you my kitchen can be quit a mess... I love to cook and preferable for many people and many different plates at the same time... I use many pans and like to serve that what I make in cute white bowls or if cooking Japanese on black plates with little black cups for soy sauce and things. I adore eggplants, mushrooms, asparagus, lots of garlic.. and tons of pasta in all kinda forms.

I recently got these new tea towels and as I think they are mega cute I thought they deserved better. So here are two ideas to hang your kitchen towels in style ;) They are from Danish brand 'By  Nord'  and besides the deer and wolf print there is also a moose style one. If you want them too, you can order them right here at Mikkili webshop.

  

Ik weet niet hoe het bij jullie is maar in mijn keuken hangen de theedoeken meestal  tussen de handgrepen van de lades gepropt... als ze al niet ergens op het aanrecht liggen tijdens t koken... Natuurlijk proberen we hier op onze blogs ons allemaal van onze beste kant te laten zien, maar ik ben niet bang om toe te geven dat mijn keuken af en toe als ontploft kan lijken.  

Ik ben gek op koken en maak t liefst veel verschillende gerechtjes en hoe meer mensen hoe meer vreugd. Ik gebruik veel pannen en vind t leuk om alles in witte kommen op tafel te zetten, of als ik Japans kook op mooie zwarte borden met kleine zwarte kommetjes voor soja saus en zo. Je mag me altijd uitnodigen voor aubergines, paddestoelen, asperges, heel veel knoflook en alle pasta die je maar bedenken kunt. 

Een tijdje geleden heb ik deze theedoeken gekocht, ik vind ze echt super mooi en ik vond dat ze wel een beter plekje verdienden. Hier zijn twee natuurlijke alternatieven om je theedoeken in stijl op te hangen! De handdoeken zijn van het Deense merk 'By Nord'  en naast de wolf en herten print is er ook nog een in Eland style. Je kunt ze bestellen bij de Nederlandse webwinkel  Mikkili

Towels and many more items to be found at Mikkili  

Sun Sea and Family....

It has been a while but I am back again and it is great to see over 150 people participated in the Piet Hein Eek give away. Congratulations to Gro, Heidi and Freekje who all won a roll of scrapwoodwallpaper of their choice. 

Last three weeks I spent at the beautiful island of Curacao and enjoyed lots of sun, sea and palm tree beaches ... Nothing better then your feet in the sand and a sunset with your family at the Caribbean.

Het duurde even maar daar ben ik weer....  Geweldig om te zien dat er meer dan 150 berichtjes zijn achter gelaten in de 'Piet Hein Eek post. Gefeliciteerd Gro, Heidi and Freekje jullie hebben alle drie een rol sloophoutbehang naar keuze gewonnen.

De laatste drie weken was ik op het mooie eiland Curacao en heb genoten van heel veel zon, zee en witte palmstranden. Niets mooiers dan met je voeten in het zand, samen met familie een prachtige zonsondergang in de Caribbean beleven.