The Womens Room

We love: crochetdermy

 
I have been stalking eBay for weeks now, in the quest for a stags head. The teens are disgusted and think I have finally gone completely mad. The swan collection has taken over the mantelpiece and I fear taxidermy may be a step too far.
So I was delighted when I came across Shauna Richardson's crochetdermy, a unique combination of taxidermy and crochet. 

Shauna is one of the artists selected to take part in Artists taking the Lead, a country wide Arts Council event, which will take place in 2012. Her Lionheart project will feature 30 foot hight crochet lions in a huge taxidermy case and be situated in Nottingham town centre.

The crochetdermy is unfortunately only available on commission. 
Now where is that crochet hook?

We love: Christmas decorations

Teenage sons and I hung our Christmas decorations yesterday. Decorations are not surprisingly, my domain and I usually run the show, dictating colour schemes and general style. However, this year I felt a wee bit sidelined due to middle and youngest son expressing opinions, quite strong ones at that. My slapdash hanging of our new RE hanging paper bells and balls did not quite meet the standards of our new quality control monitor (middle teenageson). 'I can't live with the crookedness mum' he said as he redid all my stringing.

Youngest teenageson took over the tree and I was relegated to the kitchen for peripheral decorations...at this rate I shall be redundant in a year or two....I love our giant hangers tho', don't you? specially now they're straight.....

Readers kitchens: Adelle from H for Home

Who: Adelle & Justin, co-owners of online shop H is for Home – and ‘Fudge’ of course – our 4 year old Weimaraner. 

Where: Todmorden, a small town situated in the Pennines – on the Lancashire/Yorkshire border. The house was built around 1800. It’s two back-to-back stone millworkers’ cottages, that were knocked together 30 or 40 years ago. 

What do you do in your kitchen and who with? When we bought the house, there was a small kitchen to the rear of the property. We moved it to a larger room, creating a kitchen/diner in a more central position – with glazed doors out to the garden.

Along one wall we have modern free-standing units, fridge and stove. In addition to these units we have various pieces of antique kitchen furniture – butchers blocks, plate racks, wall shelves – and an old beech bakers table which is the real hub of the space. It provides an extra food preparation surface for bread and pastry – but this is also where we eat meals, sit and chat, drink cups of tea after long walks, work on our website and write blogs. Sometimes it gets used for staging and photographing website stock - and packaging up sales. Around it sits a set of 1950s Swedish beech & ply chairs, along with an antique bench along one side. This provides plenty of seating for friends and family who might visit. Fudge is not forgotten and has a comfy bed where he can curl up in front of the fire. 

The fire keeps the room nice & cosy - and also provides a good place to dry clothes. We have an old ceiling-mounted drying rack on pulleys where wet walking gear or freshly washed clothes can hang on rainy days.  

How would you describe your style? It’s a mixture of rustic country and mid century modern really. We love the colour, texture and history of antique wood and iron. We’re equally fond of vintage ceramics and cookware dating from the 50s to the 70s – names such as Rorstrand, Figgjo Flint, Cathrineholm, Dansk Designs and Le Creuset to name but a few. 

What is your favourite and most useful item? We get a lot of use out of a vintage orange Kenwood mixer – it’s very robust, it was built to last and still looks and works great.

 

Simple pleasures: curated shelves

It seems that not everyone spends ages curating their shelves, which seems strange to us! Isn't it just a given that the things around your house need to be arranged into complimentary groups, either by theme and/or colour? 

I recently realised that maybe other people don't do this, when my daughter and friends were sitting on our sofa watching TV and I was coming in and out of the room with various different coloured pots, putting them on the mantelpiece, standing back and surveying them, then swapping and arranging. "What are you doing?' asked her friend. 'Arranging things on the mantelpiece,' said I, and was met with a confused look, 'Why', she replied, 'cos she's weird', replied my daughter!! Hopefully she'll also be weird one day too, because I think arranging things on shelves is one of life's greatest pleasures.

Readers kitchens: Ms Marmitelover

Who: Ms Marmitelover 

Where: Kilburn 

What do you do in your kitchen and who with? I cook for The Underground Restaurant, a restaurant I started in my living room. I am one of the pioneers and leading lights of this movement. 

How would you describe your style? Shabby chic, Francophile, vintage, feminine. 

What is you favourite and most useful object? My Aga, the most money I have spent on anything other than my mortgage. But it's worth it.

Check out Ms Marmitelovers blogs, The English Can Cook and Travels with my Teenager. Book a table at the Underground Restaurant through wegotickets.com or go to her Facebook page.

We love: birds for Christmas

We came across this amazing window display in Bahasa on Columbia Road recently, and loved their original take on decorating for Christmas. The tiny plastic birds are covered in real feathers and make a bold statement when grouped together, perched on twigs. 

We then became a little bird obsessed and started to notice them everywhere and now have quite a collection going on (as well as swans, ducks and cockerels, but thats another post altogether!) The best we have found are from Plumo and Cox and Cox and have been fans of the tweeting birds from Caravan for a while (but hurry, they are selling out and they can't get anymore).  

 And of course check out the gorgeous Anthropologie.

We love: make do and mend at 40 Winks

We spent a really enjoyable evening last week with Bea and Clarie, the women behind Make Do and Mend. They invited journalists and bloggers along to the amazing 40 Winks Hotel to sample some crafts and launch their creative workshops. 

We started the evening with a tour of the amazing 2 bedroomed hotel owned by interior designer David Carter. Set in Stepney East London, the four storey Queen Anne townhouse is an eclectic mix of old and new and exudes an air of elegant luxury. Used as a location house for many years, David recently opened his two spare bedrooms to paying guests and encourages anyone in the creative and fashion industries to use it as a base when staying in London. We would love to use it as a base while living in london and would happily have moved in. Guests are required to remove their shoes and don a pair of fluffy slippers at the door, which made us feel instantly at home.

After a good look round (we felt like we were on Come Dine With Me!!), we tried out some cup cake decorating and corsage making. Claire and Bea explained that the workshops are available to groups of women to host either in their own homes, or in venues like 40 Winks. They will provide all the materials and tutition in the crafts of your choice. So far, they have proved popular for Hen parties, birthdays, office parties and simply just as a nice thing to do with a few friends. They are especially popular with women with high powered jobs as a refreshing alternative to their daily lives.

We came away very proud of our amazing cup cakes and full of resolve to make them at home. Melen, the Make do and Mend cake decorating expert, told us Cakecraftshop.co.uk is the best place to buy all the essential decorating equipment.

We love: The Fabulous Michelle

I was sent this totally fabulous and very over-the-top bag from Kay in New York this week, who called it the 'our lady of Obama bag' which I thought was very funny. Ignoring the kitchness, it is actually a fabulously designed bag, with lovely cheerful colours, terrific detail (note the different print on the side panals and the base, and the 'we love her' inside pocket), it's waterproof , tough and it's all made from recycled grain sacks. 

The bag comes from BLUEQ.com which is full of lots of great printed gifts, although I don't think they can be sent to the UK yet. It's worth looking at the site just to cheer yourself up, as some of the printed ditties are very witty in a kitch-fab way.

Michelle looks rather good in her red dress and satin heels and pearls, although I am a little alarmed at seeing the White House attached to a parachute....is there something we should know?

By the way Happy Thanksgiving to all our American readers, sorry we forgot on Thursday but have a lovely weekend! (and thanks again Kay!)

We love: flower arranging

As you know we love Columbia Road flower market and love to have fresh flowers in our house. So this Sunday we were delighted to discover artist/flower arranger Rebecca Louise Law, exhibiting at one of our favourite  cafes on Columbia Road, The Flea Pit.

Rebecca's work is a million miles away from the floral art that we grew up with and much as we love a hand tied bunch of flowers, it was inspiring to see flowers used in such a unique way. Displayed alongside everyday objects, in unexpected places, this is floral art, but not as we know it!  We particularly love the simple bunches in teapots.

Rebecca will be running Christmas wreath workshops on Sunday the 29th Nov, 6th Dec and 13th Dec between 10am and 1.30pm. Courses cost £60, start with croissants and coffee, followed by a tour of the flower market where everyone chooses their favourite flowers, which they then turn into their very own Christmas wreath. She also runs seasonal courses, which include drawing and painting classes, how to create hand tied bouquets and flower arrangements in glass bowels. 

We were disappointed to have missed out on one of our favourite florists Rebel Rebel flower school at East London restaurant Bistrotheque recently, so are definitely going to be singing up for one of Rebecca's courses.

Shopping with experts: alternative Christmas shopping

This year we have two rules regarding Christmas shopping; we are only going to buy really interesting, original presents and we are not going to be shopping on the high street. This doesn't entirely rule out our favourite departments stores and supermarkets, as we will be shopping online. 

Is it just us or does the thought of entering a shopping centre or trailing along Oxford Street, fill you with horror? We either want a pleasant, unique, shopping experience, preferably without hoards of people, or to buy online, in the privacy of our own home; ideally by an open fire, sipping a Baileys. 
So over the next few weeks, in the run up to Christmas, we'll keep you informed of the best in online shopping and alternative shopping events, starting with what's up and coming in London's East End. 

One of our favourite London Shopping streets, Columbia Road, will be holding their late night shopping evenings again this year. Every Wednesday in december, the sixty independent shops and galleries will be open from 5pm until 9pm. There are vintage shops, garden and antique shops, food and flower shops and a whole host of unique designer clothing and homeware, as well as lots of great pubs, cafes and restaurants to retire to at the end of the evening.

The East London Design Show is another annual event, which brings together the best of the UK's independent product, interior and jewellery designers. Running from the 3rd until the 6th of december at Shoreditch Town Hall, the show is a great place to pick up some truly original presents. 

One of last years most successful mother and daughter christmas shopping trips was to the Bust magazine Craftacular Fair. Featuring over 60 crafters selling handmade accessories, clothing, jewellery and cards, teen daughter picked up some great, inexpensive individual gifts for her friends (and I managed to secretly buy her some too) One of the most unique and friendly events we have visited, we will definitely be going again this year.

More coming soon, but please let us know if there are any other events you think we should know about. 

Readers Kitchens: Carol from Stoke Newington

Who: Design director, Carol 

Where: Stoke Newington, North London

What do you do in your kitchen and who with? I watch my husband cook and play table tennis with my two children. I love the fact it's big enough to put up a full size table tennis table. We also spend a lot of time around the kitchen table, doing homework and having discussions about our respective days. 

How would you describe your style? An eclectic combination of found objects from my trips around the world and practical kitchen equipment. I am an avid collector and spend a lot of time at car boot sales and vintage markets.

What is you favourite and most useful object? I love all my cake stands, which I have collected over time from various car boot sales. My daughter is a passionate baker of cakes and they always look even better when displayed on a cake stand. My most useful object has to be my husband; without his fabulous cooking we would all starve!!

Hanging out with the girls at Tobias and the Angel

 
A selection of the Christmas fairies from Tobias and the Angel

A few years ago I spent a rediculous amount of money on a hand made Christmas fairy to hang on our tree. I got it from Tobias and The Angel in Barnes, Anyone who has been to Angel Hughes's shop during her Christmas build up will know just what an exciting experience it can be for first time visitors. Every year the shop closes for three days in order to transform itself into a Christmas wonderland, full of covetable gifts, heavenly smelling hyacinth bowls and a wonderful selection of hand made decorations for the Annual Christmas Show.

The first time I tried to buy a Christmas fairy, some years ago now, I was too late, they had sold out in under three hours, Angel had only made a few and was (I think) taken aback at the speed with which they sold, considering the price. The next year I was better prepared and so was Angel, she had made more of them and I was there at bang on opening time, although she only makes 18 or so each year, each one comes with a birth date tag. 

Since then our fairy has 'hung out' very beautifully, earning her keep, turning an ordinary tree into a Christmas spectacular. She is exquistely made, by Angel and her British based sewing team and has lovely hair, a hand drawn face and rather fetching knickers that she flashes from under her copious lace edged net petticoats if it's a tall-tree year. She wields a fierce looking star wand as she directs the holiday festivities from her elevated perch.

Since the first of the Christmas Shows, Angel has added whole selection of girls to the fairy Christmas portfolio, there are blondes, brunettes, red heads, crazy-wild looking ones and neatly prim and proper ones. There are now also angels in the range as well as an assortment of lovely tree and home decorations  You can order online, although why you'd want to do that rather than turning up on November 18th (from 11.30 till 9.00pm on the first day) is beyond me, as the shop is wonderful, I'd quite like to move in.

The Annual Christmas Show, which also includes The Dining Room Shop and Knots Elementals beauty products, will take place from November 18th until Christmas, at 62 White Hart Lane, SW13 OPZ.
 
ps, you want to know how much the fairies are? I can't possibly admit to it on the blog as middleagedad may read it and pass out, so maybe take a look at Angel's website.  

We Love: Halloween decorating

All images from Martha Stewart

We love decorating the house for Halloween almost as much as we do for Christmas. There's a little bit of competition in our community to see who has the most elaborately decorated house and I am always up for a style challenge! Having spent several Halloweens in canada and America, we have to admit that we know nothing compared to our North American friends when it comes to spooky crafts. So every year, our first port of call for Halloween ideas is the Queen of craft and all round domestic goddess Martha Stewart. The magazine and website are full of inspiring ideas for food, drinks, house decorating, pumpkin carving and Halloween outfits, most of which you can make yourself. We also found some Halloween food ideas ideas on Twitter from US website parenting.com. Its amazing what you can make with some black card, green food colouring, some knobbly squash and a few pumpkins. 

Simple pleasures: nice words

Stayed at the fabulous Ace Hotel in the Garment District while in New York last week and would thoroughly recommend it. Very funky, industrial chic vibe with a dollop of vintage American 50s styling thrown in. Great service and the rooms range from comfortably small and cheap to very lux apartment sized loft spaces.

There's a lot of wit around too, with clever words being used on walls and in communal spaces to inform and make you smile. My favourite was the clothes hanger that said 'You look good in that", it seemed such a simple way to make you smile in the morning, I'm writing it on all of my wooden hangers....

 

Martha moments: Pumpkins

Dean & Delucca display of giant pumpkins in SoHo New York

It's clearly a very US orientated week this week, what with our New New Yorker posts on what it's like to live in the big apple and the arrival in London of our very favourite American store Anthropologie. And now The Women's Room is actually reporting from New York (half term break) and totally loving what they do with pumpkins.

Pumpkins are everywhere here, on doorsteps, in windows, on display in shops, restaurants and anywhere there's a spare bit of sidewalk, as they say here. We've been offered pumpkin beer, frozen yoghurt (an acquired taste), pumpkin cookies as well as plain old pumpkin pie. Martha Stewart, our much loved ex jailbird queen of all things domestic is busy carving them up on her TV show. They are such beautiful vegetables, brightly coloured and very robust, we think we should use them more in the UK and follow our American friends' lead on making the most of them.

Pumpkins feature large in the Halloween festivities here and then extend their interest into Thanksgving in November, so it's just as well they are long lived as a vegetable. We think they are fab and are determined to grow some interesting ones next year, for display rather than eating though. We're still not convinced they taste that good, anyone got a tasty recipe?

Doorstep display

Crosby Street hotel display

The Women's Room review of: Frieze (part two)

So, for us, the two highlights of Frieze were only slightly connected with art. Firstly, the food at this fancy fair is a cut above normal exhibitions, we stopped for a cake at Gail's artisan bakery and were overwhelmed with choice, apparently she does wonderful bread at her stores in Clapham, Notting Hill, St John's Wood and Battersea. Lovely, interesting and terribly fattening cakes revived our flagging interest in the canvasses half way through our art trawl..

Our second highlight was something we could actually afford to buy. In a collaboration with Bill Amberg, the Royal Parks charity has made shopping bags out of its old deck chairs, not any old deck chair fabric either, these are the designer deck chair slings (the technical name for the fabric seat) that were produced over the last three years as part of the Deck Chair Dreams initiative. 

Artists such as Tracey Emin, Rachel Howard, Marc Quinn and a lovely one by Catherine Yass, designed chair fabric that has been in use throughout the parks for the last few summers. Now they've done their time, they've been replaced by new works and the old designs have been cleaned up and turned into jolly bags, with nice strong leather handles (courtesy of Mr Amberg and his skilled Somerset craftsmen). 

The bags are limited editions, each chair sling only makes one bag and can be bought from the Deck Chair Dreams website. At £55 these would make rather lovely London-flavoured presents for Christmas, particularly for home sick Londoners currently abroad or anyone who's a fan of the eight Royal Parks, which the proceeds help to support,

Deckchair bags made from fabric recycled from the Royal Park deckchairs 

Readers kitchens: Dinah from Hammersmith

Who: journalist Dinah Hall

Where: Hammersmith

What do you do in your kitchen and who with? I cook with Nigel Slater and feed his heterosexual look-alike, my husband, whose cooking skills sadly bear no resemblance whatsoever to my culinary hero. When our four children are at home they spend a lot of time looking optimistically in the fridge and willing delicious things to come out of it, despite having emptied it two hours previously. My kitchen is probably too accessible – its design, dominating the entire open plan living area, makes cooking in to a spectator sport.

How would you describe your style? In theory my style is minimal, in practice messy. Not a good combination. In order for it to work, you need a cleaner and an anal-retentive husband. Fortunately I have both. I think the ugliest six words in the English language are “tidy up as you go along”. My husband uses them a lot.

What is you favourite and most useful object? My favourite item is a bobbly glass jug. I vocally admired it when interviewing a shop owner years ago for a Christmas shopping piece, and she immediately handed it over. It took about two seconds for me to wrangle with my journalistic sword of truth and shield of honesty, before succumbing to base desire. I should be in prison. But in my defence, everyone who came to the house for dinner since – all four of them – went straight out and bought one. One friend gave it as a wedding present and was really pissed off when the bride – on getting divorced six months later – returned all the wedding presents bar that.

If I wanted to be really pretentious – which I do – I would say that the humble wooden spoon is my most useful item. How could you make scrambled eggs without one?

Readers Kitchens: Louise from Kensal Rise

Who: Trend Forecaster, Louise

Where: Kensal Rise

What do you do in your kitchen and who with? Although I have a large sitting room, the kitchen seems to be the only place where I hang out with my friends and family - not only do I love cooking, but I find the kitchen the most comforting room in the house. In summer it is light and airy, but even cosier in the winter and at night. I have a total of 10 lights (not very green!) none over 40 watts to set any mood.

Describe your style? I find colour and pattern very appealing and this will always be the basis for my style. The kitchen design originated solely from the wanting of the Yellow Arne Jacobsen tap I found. I would say it is very global as many of my possessions are bought on trips abroad. But the overriding theme is welcoming and cosy, but not in a 'country' way. Actually it is anything I like, even if it doesn't go together!

 What is your favourite and most useful item? My Le Creuset screwpull corkscrew....genius. Also my Brittania 6 ring, double oven cooker, great for any size of dinner party.

Modern dillema: to tumble dry or not?

We've been having an ongoing debate here at the Womens Room about one of the more important things in life. To tumble dry or not? I am dead against them and love to peg out and Amanda is in two minds. Having three boys with dirty sports kits, sometimes she doesn't have an option. 

Making the choice not to have a tumble dryer means washing all over the house in the colder months and unless you live in a huge house, it can take over. As more and more people choose to dry their clothes the old fashioned way, whats the alternative to washing dripping from every radiator? Well, we have done a little research and come up with the Womens Room guide to the most stylish drying accessories.

We like traditional wooden airers and think they are much more stylish than the modern plastic ones. H is for Home have a fold out airer at £38 and an overhead pulley for £35. Re-Found Objects have a concertina overhead affair for £12.50 (stylish towels not supplied) 

We also love the rustic pegs available from H is for Home, which are a little expensive at £10, but look great.

Days Gone by also have a good selection of untreated wood traditional style airers ranging from £42 - £58.

Of course good old John Lewis have an excellent selection of very practical (if a little hideous to look at) elaborate airers, as do Lakeland.
Happy drying.

We Love: The Front Room

You know how fascinated we are here at the Womens Room with interior style. We love everything from the most stylish to the most eccentric, the only we thing we don't like is boring. There is nothing more disappointing than visiting someones house and finding they have no individual style. 
We particularly love the style of some of our older West Indian neighbours. Their eclectic, bright and often multi patterned style is often reminiscent of their culture and a hybrid of West Indian and English taste. 

Michael McMillan curated an exhibition at the Geffrye Museum in East London some years ago, featuring West Indian front rooms and their social significance. He has now turned the project into a book which is out at the end of September. This unique study of different migrant groups, examines how these rooms reflect some of the isolation, aspiration and displacement the owners felt and how certain objects became symbolic to them. The images are poignant and nostalgic and we love the mixture of print, pattern and colour.

Take a look at the website for some images that may well transport you back to you own childhood!!

And while we are on the subject, if you like this book you may well like Living Normally too! Not so much a visual inspiration, but defiantly heartwarming and makes you realise that maybe style doesn't matter so much after all!