Habitat

I am always asking myself, Habitat vs. Heal’s vs. Oliver Bonas, which is the overall best shop for design? It’s a tough decision, and I try not to be too biased towards the company I work for! Habitat is well-known for being the shop which changed the way people saw their houses, being set up in 1964 by Terence Conran to bring affordable, modern design into post-war homes. With such a huge history behind it, I’m so glad the company seems to be flourishing again these days and hasn’t fully disappeared from our high streets. As Habitat is now owned by Sainsbury’s (who also own Argos), there’s now mini stores located in several Sainsbury’s and Argos stores around the country. So their designs are thankfully easier to get hold of now! However, visiting their Tottenham Court Road flagship store and Heal’s next to it is one of my favourite things to do when I’m in London. I also recently came across the beautifully modern Finchley Road store, which is definitely worth a visit – I got too overwhelmed because there were so many things I wanted!

Their fun new collection features, in true Habitat style, the use of vibrant colours, beautiful mid-century inspired furniture, abstract ceramic vases and mugs, geometric printed rugs, modernist lighting and I’ve noticed the trend of illustrated facial features and expressions being used on a lot of their products. Here’s some of my favourite items right now (I do not hold the copyright to any of these images, see more at habitat.co.uk):

Christmas Cards

Remember when everyone used to give each other Christmas cards? What happened to that? Is it only the older generation now who are keeping the tradition alive? I personally love choosing or designing, writing, giving and receiving them. For the past two years I was creating and selling handmade collaged cards at Christmas but this year I decided I wanted to do something inspired by all the photos I’ve taken over the years – or more specifically, photos of my cats. I love my cats. I decided to create illustrations of my wonderful current two, Tilly and Mischa, and Jasper, who was a huge part of the family and passed away 6 years ago.

You’ll be able to spot glimpses of my pattern designs within the background of each design. The set of 3 cards are available here, or you can pick them up from Berylune in Leamington Spa, Etsy Made Local Christmas Fair at Brewdog, Leicester (2nd December) or Realms of Rummage Christmas Fair at The Cookie, Leicester (10th December). Perfect for all your feline loving friends and family!

Dusen Dusen

Dusen Dusen are one of those companies who are just doing everything right. Slightly similar to Atelier Bingo in style but with a focus on clothing and homeware, they’re known for their bold prints, a fun use of colour and simple, modernist silhouettes. The company was founded by Ellen Van Dusen and is based in Brooklyn, NY (what a dream). With the use of contrasting shapes, scale, movement and colour within their print designs, it’s easy to see how much of an influence fine art has had. The company was originally just fashion-based and then Dusen Dusen Home was introduced in 2015 – new collections are brought out each season. There’s even a funky collection of classic shirts for men, in collaboration with Ddugoff. I’d love to get my hands on one of their beautiful bedding sets for my future house (see perfect example below)!

Visit dusendusen.com for their shop and more inspiring looks (I do not hold the copyright to any of these images).

Prints update

Woops, I meant to update this months ago and then suddenly it became October! It’s been a busy 6 months of working part-time (Oliver Bonas, which is still dreamy), designing and making as much as I can, doing two internships, putting PDF and physical portfolios together, applying for design jobs, taking part in art fairs, trying to keep up a social life and…hanging out with my cats. As well as interning with Frugi, Skinnydip London and Mirjam Rouden in 2016, this year I got the opportunities to work within the design departments at both George at Asda and Oliver Bonas; all very different, all very inspiring.

Within my print design work, I’ve started creating a small sketchbook of quick spontaneous line drawings, allowing myself more freedom than normal. I am also not allowing myself to use a ruler! This is an exercise to get me out of my comfort zone of doing geometric, structural designs. I tend to take inspiration from different styles, movements, artists or photographs I’ve taken of architecture, so coming up with shapes off the top of my head has been more of a challenge – definitely something I’ve gotten out of the habit of doing! Some recent finished design examples:

Camille Walala

I remember coming across Camille Walala through Instagram a few years ago, just after I’d discovered The Memphis Group, and every project she’s created has completely wowed me ever since. Scrolling through her posts always fills me with so much inspiration and enthusiasm to keep up my design work. The influence of 1980s postmodernist design (specifically Nathalie du Pasquier) is very apparent, whilst I can also see the bold colours of Mondrian’s paintings and African textile designs have made an impact on her work.

A graduate in Textile Design, Camille shows just how versatile the degree can be – she seems to have gone down every route possible with her designs. Her popularity has risen from the many outdoor mural paintings she’s created on buildings around the world, but her designs have since been used for clothing, accessories, phone covers, homeware, etc. I recently got excited to find one of her rugs in Heal’s department store in London. I hope to one day have my designs used across a whole array of items like this!

Visit Camille’s Instagram and camillewalala.com for more of her wonderful work (I do not hold the copyright to any of these images).

March update

In my last post I made a list of things I wanted to achieve this year – I’ve been working hard at sticking to it! I’ve done two market stalls over the past two months and I have two more coming up next week. It’s always hard to know what your audience will be like and whether or not the day will be worth it. My last art fair, ‘Realms of Rummage’ at The Cookie in Leicester was a really positive experience for me, full of lovely people taking an interest in my work, and yet my previous stall in Stourbridge had not been anywhere near as successful. Anything could happen and it’s always a good learning experience.

From my last stall, I learnt that pink was the most popular colour within my hand-painted earrings. I have taken this on board and will be stocking up on my pink designs! I also trialled out my newly-made necklaces for the first time and these seemed to be a success. I’ll be doing more and more designs as soon as possible.

Other newly-made products are my printed birthday cards and coasters. I’m excited to have designed cards digitally for the first time and I’m planning to create a whole collection for different occasions which will hopefully be sold in independent design shops. Recent work examples:

2017 so far

One month into 2017 already. It’s been two years since I was working on my final project at university – that’s insane. I always use the turn of a new year as a good excuse to set myself work goals and push myself even more.

Things to achieve…

• New pattern designs
• Start creating necklaces
• Bigger range of printed products
• Start selling to design/independent shops
• Do more art/craft fairs and markets
• Increase sales on Etsy
• Increase followers on Instagram
• Start blogging more often!

Over the past month, I’ve made sure to start designing patterns again – it had been so long! My current inspiration is coming from many photographs I took during two internships in London. For one, I was working on an old industrial estate near Wembley Stadium and I found so many interesting parts of buildings to photograph on a daily basis. I’ve also been enjoying creating new earring designs, which will eventually all be added to Etsy. Here’s a few things I’ve done so far:

Department Store prints

I was recently approached and given the opportunity to start selling my work through People of Print’s curated online store, Department Store. Seeing as I’m such a big fan of the company, I obviously jumped at the chance. You can also find me listed on People of Print’s online directory page.

I thought this would be the perfect time for me to have some art prints created, which I’d been wanting to do for so long now. I picked 10 of my favourite designs which I thought would translate well into A4 prints to be framed for walls. Within the 10 designs, they have been organised into 3 collections which would work well placed next to each other.

Prints are available here at £10.00 each.

 

Oliver Bonas

Two months of not even getting through to the interview stage for just about every part-time job I applied for, I finally managed to get an interview at Oliver Bonas, Birmingham, and it was the best interview process I’ve ever had. They were genuinely interested in me and my life (and my design work). It just goes to show, I’m not completely useless, I was just applying to all the wrong places. So, I’m now working at my favourite store – my dream company to design for!

If you don’t know anything about Oliver Bonas, you should. I only just discovered them this summer but they’ve been massively expanding as a company over the past few years. As they have their own in-house design team, there’s a big focus on forward-thinking design and their products are all unique to the store. There’s a definite style to their name, setting them apart from other high-street stores. Geometric shapes are a common recurring theme amongst all their products, ranging from fashion to furniture. I can also see Scandinavian and mid-century modern design influences within their ranges (which of course suits me well).

Their jewellery is what stands out to me the most; I was amazed to find somewhere on the high-street that sells such similar pieces to my own! Here’s some of my favourite and most inspiring current items at the store (I do not hold the copyright to any of these images, see more at oliverbonas.com):

 

Work update

My recent designs have had no particular theme (due to current lack of inspiration) so I’ve been updating my ongoing collections. I’ve been enjoying creating designs purely from my imagination, whilst of course keeping in mind colour and shape ideas from some of my regular sources of influence: architecture, postmodernism and the 1960s. Composition-wise, I’ve been enjoying creating large, bold motifs. I haven’t been very happy with my colour choices recently; there needs to be more of a balance using paler shades with the consistently bright colours. My next goal is to revise my colour work and improve my palettes!

(‘100 Years of Color’ by Katie Greenwood is a really beautiful book I recommend for anyone stuck for colour ideas)!