Indigo blues

We were so pleased with this shoot styled by Gabby Deeming and photographed by Bill Batten for the February issue of House and Garden. It is called 'The Simple Things', and takes its cue from Japanese aesthetic - lots of beautiful indigo blues and natural woods.

The image above shows the Sfera tall chair in our Rowridge fabric, and the one below shows the Storm Blue blanket (laid black and white side up) and the Pontefract cushions, with panels of the Caradon and Rowridge fabrics on the wall.

New Colours for the New Year

Here is a found composition to kick off 2015.

Giovanni Battista Moroni

Went the other day to the Moroni exhibition at the Royal Academy. I was very drawn to the intimacy of the smaller portraits. My favourites were the ones with simplest clothes and settings - where there was nothing to distract you from the direct gaze of the subject. This one, with a monk just turning and catching your eye was really beautiful.

I also really loved sense of calm and contemplation in the portrait above. The faces are so honest and immediate.

And the one of the man with the red beard made me smile - he would not look out of place on Broadway Market on a Saturday morning. 

Orange and Grey

It is always really interesting seeing how our upholstery fabrics are used. Over the past few months we have had a run on the Belmont and Totley fabrics from our Aerial range - both designs are in the hot orange with black and white marl. 

Here are a few of the projects:

Above is a pair of Ercol Windsor chairs in the Belmont fabric used on the A side. They are by 'Be Seated' in Edinburgh. I really like the dark frames and the little pop of the orange side in the buttons. 

This pair of chairs, re-upholstered in the Totley A-side and the Bilsdale A-side are original CC41 utility chairs. I love the playful curve of the arms - it is so interesting how the parameters governing the use of materials in the utility scheme led to some really thoughtful, clean, pared-back design.

The dark-wood Ercol two-seater below was re-upholstered in the Totley by Mick Sheridan. I really like the hot orange against the dark wood and the single large seat cushion.

And finally the pair of 'Mabel' Danish midcentury chairs below by Pelikan . One chair is covered in the A-side side of the Belmont fabric and its pair in the B-side.

The detailing on the arms is wonderful - and it is such a nice example of the scope of the fabric for reversibility.

Things which caught my eye this weekend

Shipping and Packing

We do all of our packing and shipping from here in the studio. After each blanket or cushion is sewn, checked and labelled it is ready to ship.

We use good sturdy cardboard boxes to ship as the blankets are sent all over the world and they need to arrive ship-shape. At busy times of the year we have many shipments going out each week  - so that is a lot of cardboard and a couple of kilometres of parcel tape!

For our internet orders we pack each piece in brown paper from Paperback Papers - a London based employee-owned cooperative specializing in recycled paper and board. We really like our embossed day-glo stickers which make a lovely contrast to the brown paper. It's very much the Julie Andrews / Sound of Music approach to packing.

In the Press

We were very pleased to have our Signal blanket included in Matthew Morris's Wallpaper feature 'Learning Curve' this month...

... and equally delighted have it included in the Icon magazine's 'British Design Report' for 2014

... very pleased too to be featured in the second edition of Modern Rustics with a nice piece by Caroline Atkins.