Block Shop

While living in India studying Mughal miniature painting, Lily Stockman encountered The Chhipa's, a family of master printers based in Bagru. Enlisting the help of her sister Hopie, a Harvard business graduate, together they founded Block Shop. The company make beautiful hand printed scarves inspired by the minimalist aesthetic of the North American desert. Their textiles are printed one at a time with carved wooden blocks and natural vegetable dyes using the same techniques that the Chhipa family have used for 350 years.

www.blockshoptextiles.com

Sparkles In Trees

This is a picture of our cat, sprawled across the lawn in the summer. He was called Sparkles In Trees. It's a silly name but it suited him. He was the best cat. He died this weekend and we will miss him so much.

Ghosts

This is a bunch of fun little guys. These ceramic Ghosts are hand thrown, earthenware cones and come in a variety of different pastel and speckled glaze finishes. They look at their mysterious best clustered together, in unassuming groups around the home. Danish designer Anders Arhoj and ceramicist Louise Gaarmann make the Ghosts, based on the ideas behind the Japanese Shinto religion, which believes that everything in nature has a soul - from a mountain rock to a plant or a pebble on the beach. Inspired by this concept, the couple decided to make a series of simple ceramic figures and breathe life into them with a pair of cartoon eyes.

www.arhoj.com

Happy New Year!

I love New Year and always make a tonne of resolutions. I hardly ever keep them but that's not really the point - it's the making of them that I enjoy. This year, along with all my regulars like eat less, cook more, spend less, walk every day and do my hair at the very least, occasionally, I've decided that I'd like to take more photos. To help me along the way, I'll be posting a picture a day on Instagram. Feel free to follow me @futurustic. I'll also be posting lots more photos here on the blog in my regular A Few Photos posts. I hope you'll enjoy looking at them. Here's to a healthy, happy and productive 2013!

Ho Ho Ho!

Merry Christmas everyone! I hope you all have an extremely fun-filled holiday and look forward to seeing you back here in the new year... Rebecca x

p.s. These pretty crackers are from www.liberty.co.uk

A Few Photos...

Everybody is busy getting ready for Christmas right now; last minute present buying, wrapping and menu planning. We are staying at home this Christmas and having a few friends over for lunch - it should be fun! Here's a look at our decorations.

1. We made these crepe paper and tissue garlands to string along the ceiling beams. 2. A Christmas tree didn't seem very toddler-proof so we hung our decorations on twigs instead. 3. Fairy lights and a walrus. 4. Hand-painted sticks with wooly hats on. 5. My favourite old-fashioned concertina garlands.

Art Dolls: Sarah Strachan

Sarah Strachan's dolls bring a smile to my face. Each doll is hand-made, completely unique and extremely stylish! Sarah studied sculpture and before having a family made creatures for Jim Henson’s creature shop in London. Now she lives in Devon making art dolls which are heirloom pieces to be treasured forever. Each doll takes hours to make, their limbs are wired so they are posable, their faces and sometimes even their clothes are hand-painted. I love their little outfits, which Sarah makes using vintage fabric and designer scraps. She also takes commissions – So if you have a favourite outfit, piece of fabric or style idea that you would like to be turned into a doll then you can contact Sarah and have your very own mini-me made.

www.sarahstrachan.com

House Tour: Sue & Graeme

This is definitely one of my favourite house tours so far. It belongs to my friend Sue Huey (my co-writer on New Shoes) and her fiancee Graeme Fraser. Sue, Graeme and their two kids Iris and Harper, live in the heart of central Brighton in a Victorian townhouse. Standing just a few yards from the city's main shopping street, their home exudes charm, mixing antiques and curios with contemporary pieces. I love all the prints and embroideries grouped decoratively throughout the house while the tall ceilings and large windows make me wish I didn't live in a cottage! The living room is my favourite, with a beautiful Nouveau tiled fireplace and a mix of eclectic furniture. I also love the kids' bedroom. They share a room at the front of the house which is decked out with personalized bunting, crocheted blankets and cute furniture. To see the full tour which I posted on Apartment Therapy, please click here.

A Few Photos...

1. A Liberty print suitcase for a special somebody's Christmas present. 2. Making paper decorations. 3. Seven weeks old. 4. Stacking logs and listening to ukulele everyday.

Also, Futurustic is featured in this month's issue of Everything In My House magazine.

The New Craftsmen

The New Craftsmen is an agency dedicated to promoting the work of British artisans who create high-end products which tell an interesting story. This includes furniture by Gareth Neal, textiles by Ptolemy Mann and rare sheepskins from the Isle of Auskerry. The sheepskins are from a tiny, remote island in Scotland's Orkney archipelago, where the makers and their flock of North Ronaldsay sheep are the only residents. There are only three flocks of this rare breed left in Orkney and they are most notable for their unusual and unique caramel, silver, chocolate and slate colourings, as well as their diet of seaweed. The skins are softened with rainwater and washed in huge sinks which were originally used for lighthouse keepers's laundry before being dried in a mangle and hung on driftwood frames. Only a limited number are produced each year and they are now available via The New Craftsmen. For this week only, the agency has a pop up shop in Mayfair, London, and plans for the future include a possible permanent physical space as well as an online shop.

www.thenewcraftsmen.com

These Three Things

Just a quick post to show you three of my favourite things in The Apartment right now.

1. Vintage Pennsylvanian quilt. 2. 1950's Swedish daybed. 3. 1950's French rattan chairs.

www.theapartment.dk

Inspiration: Susanna Bauer

These delicate crocheted leaves are by German artist Susanna Bauer, whose work combines stones, leaves and wood with traditional craft techniques. Her work is painstakingly intricate and encourages the viewer to study the natural forms just as much as her embellishment. Sometimes when an artist manipulates a natural object as the basis of their work, I can't help but think it would have been better left in its original state. In this case though, the complementary forms of the leaves and the sinuous thread combine to make something which truly exceeds the sum of its parts.

www.susannabauer.com

Update: Margaret Howell Home

Margaret Howell, one of my favourite clothing designers, has recently expanded her home products collection and launched a dedicated section in her webshop. The new collection includes suitably restrained ceramics by Nicola Tassie and some great textiles by Charlene Mullen and Eleanor Pritchard, all of which fit Margaret Howell's brand of understated simplicity perfectly. What I would really like to see though is an 'own brand' collection, as I love the Margaret Howell aesthetic and can see it transitioning effortlessly into homewares. Let's hope this expansion is a step in that direction.

www.margarethowell.co.uk

New Book: Whole Larder Love

Canadian Rohan Anderson is known for his blog Whole Larder Love, where he uses stunning photography to document his simple rural lifestyle. He lives close to the land; growing, hunting, fishing, and his new cookbook (also called Whole Larder Love) is not only a collection of down to earth, tasty recipes but is also as a guide for living a simple and sustainable life.

A Few Photos...

1. Foxy gifts for baby Freddie. 2. One month old already. 3. Cosy days in front of the fire. 4. Wren rocking dungarees AND a ponytail. 5. A handmade rabbit from Grandma. 6. Sad my favourite local shop has closed down but happy about the child's chair and skittle that I got from their closing down sale!

Panelled House

I recently stumbled across this house on Blissful Blog. I've seen it somewhere before and know that I have magazine tears of it in my overflowing filing cabinet. It's such a great house and I could never forget that kitchen. The panelling, the cooker, the fresh green paint, the simple furniture and the view out to the woods - it's just the kind of place I love.

www.tsao-mckown.com

Hooked Wool Drawings

I love a bit of textile art so these hooked wool drawings by Altoon Sultan are right up my street. These three pieces are part of a twenty-four part series in which linen is painted with egg tempera then stitched with hand-dyed wool. I find the contrast of the geometric forms on slubby linen combined with paint and embroidery intriguing. I particularly like the different layers of texture and the three-dimensional nature of the embroidery.

www.altoonsultan.com

Jess Brown Dolls

I am slightly obsessed with dolls at the moment as I want to buy Wren a doll for Christmas. It will be her first doll so I want it to be special. I've been looking into all the different options available - rag doll, vinyl doll, Waldorf doll, soft-bodied doll - the list is pretty long and confusing! One thing has become apparent though and that is that most dolls are weird, ugly creatures that I don't want in my home! This is certainly not the case with Jess Brown's beautiful rag dolls though. I love their wide starry-eyed gaze and heart-shaped mouth, their tea-stained bodies and their cashmere hair cropped close to their heads. Jess's dolls are handmade from scraps of high quality vintage fabric and if I was buying a doll for myself (not a one and a half year old) these are definitely what I would choose.

www.jessbrowndesign.com

House Tour: Isabel & Claire

Today I am delighted to link to a new house tour that I have just posted on Apartment Therapy. This colourful East London flat is the home of my good friends Claire and Isabel. Claire is a trends analyst and spends her time travelling the world searching for inspiring design. As a result, her home is filled with trinkets and souvenirs found on her adventures. Both girls have a penchant for textiles, ceramics and house plants, which brings an eclectic global feel to their 1950's ex-local authority flat. To see the full tour, please click here.

Inspiration: Flotsam

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Deutsche Guggenheim - "Gabriel Orozco: Asterisms", 2012

Living by the coast it's easy to become transfixed by all the objects that get washed up on the beach. Picking up bits of debris becomes strangely addictive and as a result, both my house and garden are littered with curiosities that have been gathered on various windy walks at the beach. For this reason I was interested to see images from Mexican artist, Gabriel Orozco's new show at the Guggenheim, New York. The exhibition called Astrerisms, takes beachcombing to a whole new level. 1,200 disparate, discarded objects harvested from the fringes of the Pacific Ocean are documented in a series of photographs and arranged as a giant rainbow blanket across the gallery floor.

www.guggenheim.org