#EMPTYRESTAURANTS BUT #PEOPLEOUTWALKING #GOWER

Mumbles, Wales, the Gower Peninsula yesterday afternoon, cafés, pubs and restaurants all closed. A lot of people out walking though in the nice spring weather, keeping the distance on our walk along the coast, from Mumbles via Bracelet Bay-, Rotherslade-, Langland- and Caswell beaches.

Our favourite Italian restaurant was of course totally abandoned, the outside not even used for picnics!

The Goarse are blooming and due to the nice weather spreading their lovely honey scent.

Langland Bay, mainly dog walkers but we saw one kite surfer doing nicely...

Today we went for a walk through our lovely Linda Vista Garden in Abergavenny. The Magnolia is opening and the weather were lovely. So quiet in our little town today. Most shops has closed, and very few inside the ones that are still open. But people was out walking in the garden and the volontering gardeners enjoyed their work...

Langland BAy in all its glory. Today they have closed big national parks like Snowdonia, Brecon Beacon and Sugarloaf due to people queuing to get up the mountains. I fear that Swedish Midsummer will be cancelled this year?

#CANALEWALK #BRECONANDMONMOUTHSHIRECANALE

After a day working at the Melville Centre of the Arts (volontary work with their website) I went for a long walk with my Nordic walking poles (first time in a year due to back problems with nerv pain). Lovely. Unusually there was a lot of people walking and I took it down to the current situation. Everyone was saying hi and smiling at you. Something good comes out of this as well... Last night the PM announced that all pubs, restaurants, cinemas, bars, gyms, leisure centres a to close as soon as they can to stop the virus...sad. We will go to the Gower today for a long walk and I will report back what we experienced from this. See you soon! 

#HEARTYDESERT AND #TULIPS

I am having a good friend over for dinner tonight (while you still can!) and decided to make a real dinner party to cheer us up. For desert, parfait in heartshaped ramekins.

What I have learnt after decades of being a freelance journalist and working from home is to make it nice around you. Fresh flowers, clean kitchen and clutter free. At the moment tulips are in season, my favorite flowers. Stay safe and more tomorrow. PS The big food store chains have today announced that they are going to open an hour earlier here in the UK for those who are vulnerable at their helpers. Please respect this!

#SPRINGTIME #SCARYTIME

Spring is here. White anenomies flowering in Abergavenny, my new hometown since a year... Not even the Corona virus can stop the spring. Seeing them made me feel like being home in Sweden when they are one of the most important spring signs (april-may). But in spite of the lovely spring we are living in scary times. With Brexit,  leaders like Boris Johnson and Trump  and now Corona...it puts things in new perspectives. Personally I have had some other crisis the last five years so I am trained... The last week, since the crisis has increased I have experienced concern from people close to me and more distant friends. You realize that what really matters are your friends and family and not greed, envy, jealousy etc. I have two close relatives were this has taken over and are now ruling their lives. So sad when instead of building fences and lock themselves in they/we should build bridges.

 Here in Abergavenny we are still not too affected. Shops and restaurants are still open. The streets are still pretty busy. The shops still have food even though pasta, tinned tomatoes and soups, long life milk and ....toilet paper are selling quick and these shelves are empty. There is no shortage in the UK, (yet) of food etc but we are worried and bulking makes you feel safe(r). We decided to stop going to the gym this week and our sons are both self isolated due to having in one case raised temperature, and in an other have had contact with a person who suspects having the virus. Both (with friends and family) are safe and well...
No school from this Friday here in the UK...I will report more tomorrow!

 

#CHELSEADESIGNWEEK2020

In spite of the current virus scare the Chelsea Design Week started for the press traditionally at Designers Guilds Flagship Store on Kings Road. London was calmer than usual but business as usual.

The new collection consists of botanical prints from the secret garden to geometric and shiny velvets in salmon pink.

Yellow is still a big colour in interior design as well as fashion. Mixed with blacks and warmet notes of brown and a fresh accent of crisp white. Designers Guild.

Greens and blues, a classic Tricia combination. Do not miss the current exhibition at the Fashion and Textile Museum about her 50 years of interior design.

A very Designers Guild flower arrangement. You do not need to many flowers, it is all about using your vases in the right way and mix greens with poetic flowers.

An unusual colour combination for William Yeoward. Elegant greys with bright yellows. Note the embroided cushions.

Oranges and indoor gardens on the wall. This time at Osborne and Little.

Tropical garden, Osborne and Little.

At into the jungle. Fantastic artist and textile designer Emma Shipley is mostly known for her brilliant big scarves in silk. Now she has cleverly designed a collection for Clark and Clark, Chelsea Harbour Design Centre. Not as many visitors this press day as usual. Everybody spaced themselves out and hand sanitizers were everywhere!

Sanderson best known for their floral textiles celebrated 160 years! CHDC.

With the inspiration from Seville, Cole & Son. CHDC.

At lighting company Porta Romana the message was upcycling! From rewiring to repaint and reshadeing.

Even more cautious designer Nina Campbell had gone bold on the wall with forestry ferns etc...more soon...

#INTERIORTRENDS FROM #FORMEX PART 1

It has been a sad February for the UK. A Brexit that should not have happened has happened. Disaster is a mild way of putting it.We are still not quite sure what is going to happen next. Boris thinks it will be a quick and smooth operation. Who is he kidding. It will be a long (years) and painful procedure and I doubt (mark my words) that leaving is the option. Never mind. In mid January I visited Stockholm (my hometown by the way) and Formex (interior- and gift fair of which I am the agent for in the UK. A nice and stimulating fair for interior workers. Like a lot of fairs these days, they are suffering from decreasing amount of exhibitors and visitors. All due to, the increasing Internet shopping, global warming and recycling trends, and the change in the way we shop. But as long as the fairs themselves and their exhibitors and visitors still have something to win from it, they will go on existing. Anyway, the trend forecast bureau Carlin (Paris) was invited to show how they see the future of shopping. They mixed islands of shopping with socialising (bit tables with growing decorations and where you could charge your phone or computer, work on your own or be with others. The colours, yellow and blue, they did not pick them for being the Swedish colours, funny enough. To me it looked like they just done a pop-up shop for Ikea! 

Ceannis, bag- and interior accessories, work out of Hong Kong. Pink dumplings (sweet) was served with pink champagne at their press preview. Pink a big colour for them this spring...surprisingly a lot of pink around and mostly paired with yellow, orange and red!

More pink, AfroArt, designed in Sweden but made in Africa and Asia. Afroart collaborates with local artisans to highlight the craftsmanship of the developing countries in Africa, Asia and Latin America. They are masters of stripes! From cushions to runners and baskets.

Efva Attling is a model, turned singer turned silversmith who puts her fingers in a lot of different areas. Now she has worked together with furniture company Crea, the H-colletion (Efva grew up in Högdalen, suburbia of Stockholm)and created a collection of sideboards, coffee tables, dining tables etc. She is everywhere!

The "H" collection in cooperation with Efva Attling by Crea.

Danish Stelton had freshened up their classical thermos in new spring colours. Very 1980s!

More pastels. In the 1990s I did a story about designed kitchen electrical utensils like mixers, kettles and toasters etc and funny enough just the other day (buying myself a new kettle) I was thinking about this story and why there are hardly any coloured pieces like this on the market today. And here they are! A limited edition for this spring by Danish RigTig. I love it! 

Mixer, RigTig.

Kettle, RigTig.

...and my favourite colour, yellow, as a typical Danish flat toaster! RigTig.

Lovely talented designer Vanja Djanaieff is celebrating her long career with an exhibition from 9 May at Marabouparken in Sweden. Her with her latest work, blankets by Klippan.

The shopping part of Carlins future shopping experience at the entrance hall at Formex. Ikea, look this way!

And finally, beautiful Christmas stars by Watt&Veke a design collaboration with the former owner Monika Lindström. I want all of them! More from Formex and Swedish design soon...

FROM #STYLEMAGAZINE TO #IKEACATALOGUE - REVIEWS

What has the Sunday Times Magazine and the Ikea Catalogue got in common. Well, they arrived at about the same time and I felt that they both needed to be reviewed. And why, well I have been working for over thirty years with Magazines this kind (weekly women's fashion and interior magazine Damernas Värld and VeckoRevyn and Elle and Elle Decoration, all in Sweden) and I worked with the Ikea Catalogues worldwide for over ten years. I think I know what I am talking about. Normally I love them both but this time I really felt I wanted to review them and give some feedback. I will start with the Ikea Catalogue. Well, is it a catalogue or a magazine, or an inspiration book for interiors made by Ikea? Well, it´s like they cannot make up their mind about this. As if there has been no editor in chief or an art director in charge of the whole issue. The  impression I get is that there has been to many chefs to spoil the broth. The idea of home stories by different families and with the same amount of different tastes and expressions are good. But they need to feel more authentic and mixed up with more "non Ikea products". In a magazine you would quite often add pages with similar products that has been inspired by the homes. In some way Ikea has tried to do that but has resulted in follow up pages that does not correspond with the homes. The catalogue also has stillife pages themed in colours. Having and being an expert on this kind of pages I find them very unprofessional and I also wonder what they are doing in the catalogue. Trying to add inspiration? When it comes to more product specific pages, again, why not let these pages flow, use the same home/background/colourway. I also find that the whole catalogue lack continuity, from style to colours and way of shooting. Where is the AD in charge...  

One of the homes lived in by this middle aged couple without names. I would have wanted to get to know them a little better.

The textile pages has room settings that do not come together, they could have been part of the same interior which would have made it look more homogeneous. And just to add to it - the layout is all over the place.

I do wonder what this stillife is doing in the catalogue. Appalling styling and what are they trying to tell you? Strong and bold colours and too much copy writing. There has and are so much knowledge and experience around, and in Ikea to know how you get the right flow. From stylists and interior designers that has been working with the big players in this field, both in the world of magazines and advertising. Why not let them have more influence. Perhaps a advisory group including specialists within these fields, from designers to editors and art directors.

Then we come to the "ad pages". Somebody came up with an idea of "Hand" ( The Adams Family) having a part here. Some ideas are better on the table than executed. This is one of them. Should have stayed on the table.

Another "Hand".

With Sunday Times Magazine it is another story. Kind of turning into a catalogue that could have been for Harrods or Harvey Nicols. Luxury gifts for Christmas. This year I thought was the year when the gift of the year is "nothing" or "vintage". Since I in my early career was employed by a big magazine group and know how important the ads are, there is a hidden agenda here. I remember being told on occasions during my time in the magazine world to pick products  to satisfy the big buyers of the ad pages. I spy with my little eye that that is what is going on here. They have tried to fit in a couple of pages of "affordable gift" but unfortunately it just looks like a way of getting rid of some bad conscience.

The week after the luxurious issue I was expecting something more adaptable to all of us but this time the theme was jewellery, expensive jewellery. I would have wanted to see gifts that you can make yourself, or the best second hand shops, and/or a story about why we should try to minimise our spending, etc, etc. I am not saying  that you cannot give somebody something luxurious for Christmas but two whole magazines with the same message? That is hidden advertising to me!