Currently working on our next product line for the upcoming Christmas season. I’m a little late on my schedule but hope I can pull this through in time for Christmas.
Art / Design / DIY / Make / Shop — 1 comment — Posted by: Nerissa
Art / Design
10/12/11
Design Sponge at Home
The other weekend, we went to the Design Sponge book launch party held at Anthropologie and met the lovely and talented Grace Bonney. I’m so honoured to have my book signed by her and to have finally met her in person after years of continued inspiration. I also have to say that I am completely flattered of her nice write up on our totes over at Design Sponge – so amazingly sweet. You can read it here. Thanks Grace for including Vancouver to your book tour. Come back soon! xo, Nerissa
10/07/11
Sale Ending Soon
Back To School Sale is only on until October 16! Come and get your Eye of The Storm for only $26 (regularly $36). Hope everyone is enjoying Fall so far. Big love, Nerissa.
10/01/11
Luna’s Little Fun Factory
As Luna grows, our space grows with her too. We’ve changed our studio space numerous times to continually adapt to our ever changing lifestyle. Before Luna came to our life, our studio space was mainly used to work. When Luna came, we had to share the space with her and had to move furniture around to make room for her to crawl around. Now that she’s a little toddler and is more mobile, we’ve changed the space again to adapt to her needs and created a little fun art/play factory for her.
Luna loves doodling and being read to. So she now has a little art table, a reading rug, storage for her toys and a place to feature all her art work. We also created a family picture board where we’ll continually add photos of our family. She loves looking at it and screams out “mommy’ & “daddy” as she points to our photos. Luna loves spending time in here and every time she walks in, she goes straight to her artwork hanging from the ceiling and screams out “nice!”.
I always find it important to create different spaces in the house based on the activities that we would do in them. Luna knows that this is her space and it’s a place where she can freely explore, discover & play.
10/01/11
Missing Goat Jams
A few months back, I had a pleasure working with story producer/stylist/farmer Heather Cameron of Missing Goat Farms. I met Heather during the Anthology Magazine photoshoot last year as she was the stylist for the day. Heather makes these delicious organic jams and I was thrilled when she asked me to design her jam labels. It was so fun working with Heather as she is so passionate in what she does and she is just such a lovely & sweet lady. You can find her jams at Walrus, Edible Canada, Butter Baked Goods, Urban Fare to just name a few. You can also get it from her cute little shop which she calls ‘The Shabby Shack‘ when it’s open in the summer (she makes homemade blueberry pies too!). Give these jams a try, I promise, you will love them!
05/21/11
Nuit Blanche 2008 : Paris
Javier Tellez, “Letter On The Blind For the Use of Those Who See,” Saint Estache Cathedral. Projected Video.
Felicie D’Estienne D’Orves & Frederic Nogray, “Monolithe et Massage,” Saint Roch Cathedral. Installation and Concert.
Jeremy Blake, “Station to Station”, Englise St.-Paul-St.-Louis. Multichannel Video.
One year, we decided to take a vacation to Paris to check out Nuit Blanche. Nuit Blanche is an all-night arts festival where public spaces including churches and civic buildings serve as unlikely settings for installations and performances. We tried to see as much as we could but it’s impossible to see all the venues. But with jetlag, it wasn’t hard to stay up all night.
Nuit Blanche happens in major cities like St Petersburg, Rome, Tel Aviv, Berlin, Paris, Madrid, Toronto to just name a few. We chose Paris because… well, we love Paris. It was such a fun night and also nice to see so many people out in the streets enjoying all the art & hearing music everywhere.
We’ve been to Paris a couple times and absolutely LOVE everything about the city. We always like staying in the Marais and for this trip, we stayed at Hotel Jeanne d’Arc and was lucky enough to be given their one and only 2 bedroom suite at no extra charge. Lucky us! A wonderful hotel situated in the heart of the Marais. It’s also really close to the most amazing falafels we’ve ever tasted in the heart of the Jewish neighbourhood called, L’As du Falafel. Amazing, believe me! You also can’t go to Paris without stoping by Laduree to fill up one of their georgous boxes with macarons.
Aaahhh… Paris. So beautiful, romantic & inspiring. A perfect combination for a city. Also worth noting, Nuit Blanche is coming to Vancouver for the first time in 2012. Yeah!
05/15/11
The Adventures of Mr. Bearbear
This weekend, we were at the Mayfair, a yearly fundraising event for our nephews’ school. There were rides, food vendors, old-time carnival games, live music and a thrift market. At the market, we found some cute wooden toys for Luna including this vintage wooden bear for one dollar. He’s a noble little creature who says his name is Mr. Bearbear. This is his story.
Mr. Bearbear lives high up in the forest trees. On a bright spring day, he felt a calming breeze full of Seawind & Willows billowing by, beckoning him towards the beach and seashore.
At the beach, Mr. Bearbear did what all bears do. He nestled into the warm sand staring out at the waves and boats.
He sat on a log and quietly smiled at the gulls that flew by. “Now this is living,” thought Mr. Bearbear.
Suddenly, without warning, a Polka-Dotted Giant picked up Mr. Bearbear.
The Polka-Dotted Giant threw Mr. Bearbear to and fro. Mr. Bearbear wasn’t hurt but he was all twisted and tangled up. The Polka-Dotted Giant did not have a gentle touch. She only knew of joy, love and excitement.
After seeing Mr. Bearbear twisted up, the Polka-Dotted Giant realized Mr. Bearbear was too delicate a creature for this kind of Giant-sized rough play. She put Mr. Bearbear down letting him sit gently in the sand.
And the two of them lived happily ever after.
05/09/11
Tulips, Signs of Spring
You know it’s Spring when the tulips in the garden are in full bloom. Our tulips pop up whenever the temperature warms a little. They’re the easiest perennial flowers to grow. Plant some bulbs in the fall and watch them bloom come Spring-time. Actually, we didn’t plant ours. They were planted before we moved into our house and gave us a pleasant surprise when they sprouted up three Springs ago. We’ve never watered them, fertilized them or helped them along in anyway. The bulbs in the ground pack all the nutrients and the Spring rains give them plenty of water. They just take care of themselves, year after year. This year, I like the classic yellow ones because they’re an exact match with Eye of the Storm.
05/01/11
Jellyfish
We spent yesterday morning at the Vancouver Aquarium. At $21 per person and $10 parking it’s not the cheapest thing to do but worth the price of admission to see Luna’s amazed expressions. The dolphin show and Dora & Diego in 4-D are the major attractions but my favs will always be the jellyfish. I snapped these grainy pics with my iPhone using CrossProcess with default Photoshop sharpening applied for extra grit. Such beautiful, delicate creatures. I could look at them all day.
04/05/11
Dreaming of Marrakesh
We’ve been busy! The New Domestic Store will open in April. Our first line of products are large screen printed graphic totes made from 12oz. heavy-weight recycled cotton canvas. Each bag is printed with a bonus diagonal pattern on the back (so you get two looks with one bag). We are launching with four designs to start with. The one shown is called “Dreaming of Marrakesh”. More products are coming in the Summer.
02/12/11
Illuminate Yaletown
Last night even in the pouring rain, we made it to Illuminate Yaletown 2011. Pictured above is: “Kinetic Floating Pixels” by Shaun Mavronicolas & Miles Thorogood, “Sound Clouds” by Alex Beim & Daito Manabe, and “Factory” by Mark Ashby, Hans Christian Berger, Alex Grunenfelder, & Phil Johnston. Unfortunately, I can’t ID the last installation because I don’t remember where that was. The light festival is on til tonight.
12/12/10
Apartamento Magazine
Apartamento Magazine is “an everyday life interiors magazine” from Spain. I first heard of this magazine via Sight Unseen which published an excerpt from Apartamento #04 showcasing a collection of objects, designer & artist, Geoff McFetridge created for his daughter. It’s an inspiring story in which Geoff writes: “There’s nothing I like better than to build things for my 6-year-old daughter Frances. As an artist and designer, I spend much of my time making things, or helping other people make things. In making these things for her, I feel like I’m putting these skills to good use.” Sight Unseen published the article in its entirety but I liked the story so much that I wanted a hard copy and ordered a copy of Apartamento Magazine.
The first thing I noticed is the format, at 6.75″ x 9.5″ on uncoated paper, looks decidedly more like an independent arts journal than an interior design magazine. The photography and writing is documentarian in nature somewhat akin to The Selby. Generally shelter magazines showcase a “pretty” aesthetic even if the editorial direction is marketed as relaxed and casual. In Apartamento #04, however, you get sneak peeks with unmade beds, snapshots of style-less Beijing apartments and a tour of Sonic Youth’s Kim Gordon & Thurston Moore’s pack-ratty home, making The Selby look like Better Homes & Gardens in comparison.
Apartmento #04 also includes a 32 page kids-oriented supplement called “Kinder” which features a coloring book by Andy Rementer, an interview with kids-design legend Enzo Mari and a story about Jordi Ferreiro’s “Impossible Furniture Workshop”.
Much has been written about the collapse of the print publishing industry with the shelter magazine genre hit especially hard. Fan favorites like “Domino” and “Blueprint” have vanished into the ether. In the aftermath, though, we’re seeing independent voices filling in the void with strong creative direction, niche audiences, fresh graphic design and more experimental sensibilities.
You could say printed magazines are like vinyl records now: collectible, tangible, warm and only for the aficionado. If so, mags like Apartamento, Anthology and Spaces are the indie stars of the shelter genre. Rawk on!
