Have a beautiful fall weekend everyone!

It's such a beautiful time of the year - all the signs of fall have arrived and there's a chill in the air. I am going to work this weekend, lots of great new designs for Cartolina to get ready for the printers. And I think it would be a great weekend for you all to practice carving intricate designs into your designer pumpkins a la Ms. Stewart. Hey, send me a picture! This is a picture of my pumpkins from last year . . . ha ha . . . not !

Window Shopping | World Market

As usual some lovely inexpensive decorative objects from World Market - you gotta love that store. The colours are so vibrant and inspiring.

Random Objects | Birch veneer trees

I thought these little birch veneer trees from Roost were really sweet. I think they are supposed to be a holiday item but I think they could be decorative all year around.

Perfect Picture

Sometimes a picture in a magazine stops me in my tracks. This page is from the soon to be defunct ME Home Companion. This issue is almost 2 years old - I ripped out this page and stuck it in my book. I love the styling, the colours and the textures of this image.

Random Objects | Wood and leather

Just a random collection of items that I fancy in the wood and leather categories. First is a dressing/jewelry chest from Graham and Green. Not sure that I actually could ever accumulate enough jewels to fill that but I do think it's quite lovely. Second up is a collection of wonderful old, french, wooden chopping boards from Sundance - also saw a huge collection of these at America Designs yesterday.

Wonderful leather bag and basket from Sundance and 2 wooden radios from Urban Outfitters. Hope you fancy all these things as much as I do.

Rumours

I just heard through the grapevine that ME Home Companion magazine is being discontinued. This is very disappointing. I really enjoyed the last issue and the wonderful images of Rebecca Purcell's work, studio and apartment in New York City. 

Rebecca Purcell's studio is a wonderful eclectic mess of intriguing objet d'art. You can see more of her work at her web site. Its a shame that we have lost so many good magazines recently.

Wake Up Eyeballs!

Outrageous wall paper from Osborne and Little. Imagine eating your breakfast with that wallpaper looming over you? Ha!

These really are all wonderful aren't they? Osborne and Little's site has lots of imagery - very inspiring for all of us pattern junkies out there.

Cicada Recommends

Yesterday I featured a couple of antique clock faces from the Sundance Catalogue. Lucky for me Michelle from Cicada Studios sent me a note and told me about American Designs in Lambertville NJ. They have hundreds of original antique clock faces, and lots of other stuff too. Since I have been meaning to show you Michele's beautiful work I thought this was the perfect opportunity to combine completely unrelated subject matter in one post!

You can view lots of Cicada Studios beautiful fabrics here at their web site or here at their Etsy shop (she has a great blog too!)

So here are just a few of the amazing clock faces from American Designs - there are way too many too troll through in one sitting.  They really are wonderful. Definitely need to visit this place next time I am out east. Thanks Michele!

Window Shopping | Sundance

It's a holiday weekend here in Canada, Thanksgiving to be precise! But we are very busy at Cartolina so there's no rest for the wicked in this studio! Thought you might like to see what caught my eye at the Sundance catalogue online.

Really love these shelves - the details are fab. Every cubby has a brass name plate. Lovely patina on the wood. The display potential on these is way too exciting!

Apparently these clocks are vintage(?) If they are, then they are very cool - and huge!

Everything about these blankets appeal to me. The iconic graphics, the utilitarian colours and the down home vintage feel - Perfect for fall.

Inspiration | Magazines

It's pages like this one, from this month's Victoria Magazine, that makes spending the $6.99, that it costs in Canada, worthwhile. This is such a pretty photograph and I discovered Victoria Mag, all over again, after reading Erin's comment in the giveaway - thanks Erin!

Ephemera | stamps and cards

These are 3 of my favourite things. A postcard that I have had in my collection for as long as I can remember. I think she is probably from about 1920. And 2 French stamps from the 1930s that are simply stunning examples of the work of the engravers who worked for the french post office. Hope you love them too.

Cartolina Giveaway Winners! 

We have winners - 3 to be precise! Once again we plunged our studio assistant Mimi into the big bowl and she carefully snagged the 3 winning entries with her sharp little claws. So the winners are Pigtown Design, Erin at Bride Design and Michaele. So I am looking forward to hearing from you three and sending out your boxes of holiday stationery pronto! Congrats!

Inspiration | Interiors

I like these interior shots from House Doctor. I like the simple, neutral but not boring, palette. I would have to have wood floors though - concrete is too cold for me. I like a lot of decoration in my work but when it comes to my living or working space I prefer this style - vintage inspired, modern-rustic. Do you think this is a real home or a studio shot?

Ephemera | botanical diagrams

Do you like these? I do. My  high school years were spent at a very old school in Scotland and in the science rooms there were all sorts of ancient specimens and weird stuff in jars - along the walls there were blackboards with dozens of these pull down scientific diagrams. They are very collectible now and I happened to notice that the fellow who had the yard sale a few weeks ago where I bought the 1930s Chinese posters had a number of these in his collection. So I think I am going to head over there on Saturday to see if I can buy a couple from him for the studio. I hope he still has them! These images are from one of my favourite blogs, more ways to waste time. 

Inspiration | Flowery things for your home.

{note the tiny bee on the shade above}

I don't actually shop at Neiman Marcus because I'm in Canada but they really do have some unique pieces that you don't see everywhere else. I am working on some new cards and notebooks and spending a lot of time looking at floral designs these days so these caught my eye. The light fixture is wonderful and I love the three dimensionality of the rugs.

Inspiration | Chinoiserie walls

Thought this would be a good place to start after yesterday's lovely chinoiserie. I presume above is a mural. I wonder how they convinced the home owner to splash yellow across the top of the wall, that was very daring - but it works for me! Picture from Dream Smile Design.

Inspiration  | Chinoiserie

Some examples of chinoiserie available here.  I have always loved Chinese textile design mostly because it was a big part of what lay hiding in my grandfather's teak trunks that he brought back from India. I will have to try and get some photographs of the amazing embroidered kimonos that my mum has stashed away(probably in the same teak trunks!)

Random Objects | Salvage

More wonderful stuff from Cleveland Art. I don't even know what that trolly thing is but I love it. If I lived in LA I would be at this store every weekend - sort of like a salvage yard groupy.

Random Objects | Inlaid storage boxes

Very cool inlaid boxes from Lombok.

Random Objects | Swarovski pencils

Mmmmmmmm - nice sparkly pencils - might make my drawings better. From here.