Time for a Giveaway!

Well it's been a very exciting couple of days at Cartolina. Lots of great response to our new 100% recycled notebooks over at poppytalk and design*sponge. Thanks to Grace and Jan for starting the notebook rush! These little beauties are simple, pocket sized(4" by 6") books with blank pages and pretty covers. They sell as singles, with the bands around them, for $4 each or $12 for a mixed bundle of 3. We are releasing these at the New York International Gift Fair in 2 weeks from now. The notebooks are not going to be widely available until the end of the month so we thought it would be fun to end a great week by having a giveaway :-)

So all you have to do is check out the nine notebooks above and tell me your top 3 favourite designs - list them in order of preference. This will be a great way for us to anticipate the best sellers and plan our next printing schedule! Let's leave it open until Wednesday and then we'll pick a couple of random winners, and perhaps a couple of runners up depending how many entries we get. Top winners will get a full set of our little notebooks :-)

Window Shopping | Farmhouse Wares

Found myself on this lovely website yesterday with a great selection of vintage inspired housewares and decorative items. Here are some things that caught my eye including a wonderful, folding, wooden desk caddy - I love that!

I think this caddy would make a fantastic display fixture - don't you?

*Stop Press | Notebook Giveaway*

We have had such amazing response over the last 24hrs to our notebook post on poppytalk and design*sponge yesterday that we have decided to offer a notebook giveaway starting tomorrow. The notebooks are not widely available until the end of the month so this is a great chance to snap up a bundle before anyone else does! Check back tomorrow morning! I love giveaways!

Frequently asked questions | Round 1

People ask me all the time about the green background that we photograph all our products against. Well - it's a vintage steel "board" in a wood frame, with a handle on the top that Doug rescued one day. It had been discarded in a back alley. I love it's authentic patina, it's outrageous green colour and its rusty bits! It has become the official Cartolina backdrop. 

I don't actually know what this board is - do you? It's 30" x 40", steel, painted green(and rusty) and exactly the same on both sides. Doug thinks it's a vintage portable chalkboard(and I think that's what it had been used for before he rescued it.) But there's something about the square handle that makes me question that theory. I think it's perfect for a photo backdrop for our products because of its rustic but rich colour and texture. I'd love to know what you think it might be - or perhaps you have one too.

Anyone who has product that they need to photograph frequently knows the value of finding exactly the right system to produce the best images. It can be a very frustrating process. This board works for me!

Frequently asked question | Round 2 

Another question that I get asked often is regarding this card holder that I photographed at Tinsel Trading in NYC last summer. People really seem to be drawn to this object for the same reason as I was - a great way to display cards and ephemera. So I thought I would do a little investigative work to see if I could find anymore online. There must be hundreds of these around today because every company had one for years and years - the junk stores must be full of them. Here's what I found . . . . 

There are actually lots of them on Ebay - easy to spot the vintge ones. I like the steel ones but there are some nice wood ones too. So on Ebay I searched using the words "time card rack". The bottom picture is from Three Potato Four. The middle right picture is from here. Happy hunting!

Ebay Distractions

So while I was looking for vintage time card holders on Ebay I stumbled on these great, original prints. Really curious engravings of fantastical planktony stuff! Thought you might like them too . . . . 

I love the title on this one(above)Schwimmpolypen!

Designer | Ingrid Anderson

Oh I love these oversized graphics and shapes of these bags from Ingrid Anderson. Lots of great patterns to choose from. If you look closely at these images you will remember what summer feels like . . . . .

Designer | Erica Munro

Clever use of discarded coffee bean sacks - lamps and cushions from Erica Munro

Aldo Londi Ceramics

My parents are moving so we were having fun going through their things over the holidays. Most of our old family posessions are either Indian or Scottish but my dad(who is really my step dad, his name is Gilbert) spent many years in Italy when he was in his 20s. He has very good taste and some of his Italian momentos are quite fabulous including this amazing lamp designed and produced by Aldo Londi for Bitossi in Milan. Gilbert says he bought it in 1963 in Milan at La Rinascente department store for about $20.These pieces are very valuable in todays market and what's even funnier is Anthropologie is selling reproductions - who knew?

This lamp is very big and heavy and absolutely covered from top to bottom in the stamped markings that are typical of Aldo Londis work. Part of the collection was a set of animals that are very close in design to Jonathon Adler's animals. Thought you might find this interesting  :-)

These are not my images, they are from here - I forgot to take photos of Gilbert's lamp!

Storage Solutions

We have a lot of stuff - do you? I don't mind having a lot of stuff as long as it's all got somewhere to go. I am a big fan of vintage cupboards. I fill them with a lot of our paper stuff. I love seeing other creative solutions especially when the storage becomes part of the display . . . . 

All images from Country Living, Living etc and Domino.

Design |  Stephen Falcke

I think they're baskets. Image from here via here.

Window Shopping | Knack

I like these. From the clever people at Knack

Illustration Update

Remember I showed you this drawing that Doug was working on in August? I really loved it - it is part of a publication that he was working on throughout the summer. Well - he is very excited today because this illustration plus the cover illustration are winners in this year's Society of Iillustrators of Los Angeles juried competition and show. I am very proud of him!

The competition is always very stiff in the illustration world but I just knew there was something special about this series of illustrations that he was working on. The juried show will be at the Gallery Nucleus in LA starting March - maybe we'll go - how fun!

New online retailer | Roddy and Ginger

Saw these pretty things on Bloesem the other day and wanted to share them with you - we're all about textile prints today!

Studios | Galbraith and Paul

I was excited to see these images of the Galbraith and Paul Studios on their site. For anyone who is interested in textile design and block printing it's a great resource. Very generous of them to share their work space and process with us all.

You can see the rest of their collection and lots more great images at their site right here.