Live from Vancouver!

It's been such beautiful weather here in Vancouver that we decided to stay another day. We'll be back in Nelson tomorrow evening (Vancouver is just a 1 hour flight from Nelson) and I'll have lots of pretty Vancouver pictures to show you bright and early on Tuesday morning. Also Tuesday marks our 600th post here at the Cafe so we'll have a Cartolina giveaway to celebrate the milestone. So, in the mean time, here are a few snap shots of Vancouver taken yesterday in the lovely sunshine - and I'll see you all tomorrow!

Just one of the pretty houses on Mole Hill

The Vancouver Rowing Club at Stanley Park.

Coal Harbour - one of our favourite spots in Vancouver.

Time for a trip!

We are off to Vancouver for the rest of the week. Off to visit Lisa, distributor extraordinaire, and to fill up on art, design and inspiration. We are going to check out the  "Golden Age of Dutch Art Masterpieces from The Rijksmuseum" exhibition at the Vancouver Art Gallery - can't wait - lots of Vermeer and Rembrandt and other talented Dutch chaps! Love this painting below by Cornelius Gijsbrechts(can you believe this was painted in 1670!)

We'll also be taking lots of photographs and visiting lots of cool shops  - I'll report back here next week - fresh and full of inspiration for lots of bold and beautiful posts. Stay tuned - lots of good stuff to come - including a very nice giveaway to start the week off - YAY!

Inspiration | photographic composition

Truly inspiring photography from IrenaS' Flickr photostream. This stream is called "Your Faves" and I can see why. She has amazing skill and an artist's eye - her compositions are fantastic - very inspiring, I really like the asymmetry.

Jessica Hische has a blog!

Illustrator, designer and briliant typographer, Jessica Hische has a blog - who knew, not me - how did I miss that? We featured her work here a few months ago and I was thrilled to find her blog. Jessica works for the Louise Fili studio and other wonderful clients. She designed many of the books I featured right here last week. If you haven't seen her work before prepare to be amazed - right here!

This is Jessica's new letterpressed business card - beautiful!

Very Hush Hush | Open for another season

A word to all my local Nelson friends and readers - Very Hush Hush will be opening their doors this week for the first time this season - same location, in the silver Airstream Trailer, Herridge Lane next to the All Seasons Cafe. There are lots of new designers and all the old favourites too - look forward to seeing you soon Tracy!

For some more information on Very Hush Hush you can see our post from last summer right here.

Photographer  Debi Treloar

Gorgeous photography from Debi Treloar. Originally from Zimbabwe, Debi studied art then photography. She has lived and worked in London for the last 15 years. Debi has worked on publications ranging from Elle Décor UK, Italy, Germany, France and Japan. I love her style - these images are so intriguing . . . I think that our little town of Nelson would be perfect for a shoot like this because there are so many quirky, ramshackle old victorian houses and overgrown gardens here!

Ashley Rush from Rowan's Room wrote to me to tell me about her ribbon mirrors and chalkboards. I loved them as soon as I saw them(and I think you will too!) Ashley says, "Each one is lovingly handcrafted from an antique cabinet door (which makes this an environment friendly item). Most of these doors are over 100 years old, and they reflect those years through their unique beauty. The wood, originally harvested from such magnificent trees such as Maple, Oak, Elm and Eucalyptus gives each one it's own individual character. The frames, using mortise and tenon contain no nails, therefore enhancing the craftsmanship and unique appearance."

These are so simple and sweet and I love the fact that she hasn't refinished each piece and removed the well worn patina. Ashley has a great eye and all her pieces are a great price point. Check out the rest of her work right here. Thanks Ashley!

Vintage Treasures

I found all these pretty things here via Beach Vintage. This first picture of the apron really caught my eye and reminded me of all the pretty aprons that they sell at Anthropologie - they do a great job of reproducing those old apron styles but it's not hard to find originals in thrift stores(though usually they seem to be very small, have you noticed that?) Anyway, I love all the pretty colours in these vintage treasures especially the peachy pinks.

Inspiration | simple polymer clay flowers

These caught my eye on Etsy yesterday - polymer clay canes from Roni Gur's shop. Now I've tried making polymer clay canes for beads etc but I never had much luck keeping the shapes distributed nicely - these are perfect - simple and pretty and I love the fading edges on the colours. I'm feeling quite inspired to work on pretty coloured daisy patterns - maybe wrapping paper?

My Neck of the Woods

Happy Monday everyone! It's a beautiful, long, holiday weekend here in Canada and I'm taking it easy for a few days enjoying the sunshine and the great outdoors here in my neck of the woods. I'll be back here on Tuesday morning bright and early - see you then!

This beautiful photograph of Kootenay Lake was taken by Ecstaticist(you can see more of his wonderful images right here on Flickr.) We're lucky enough to have a similar view of Kootenay Lake from the Cartolina studio(just wish I could take a similarly beautiful photograph!)

Inspiration | Ephemera

I love this vintage Japanese postcard - from here

Inspiration | Donuts and Sushi!

I have been meaning to post about these fabulous pieces that I first saw over at Kim Vallee's blog. {Kim has such great taste and such a beautiful way of styling her blog.} So this is the Donut and Sushi Collection from Moroso. I am really drawn to the 3 patterns used on these pieces - from here it looks like japanese emblems, Spirograph and a heavy brocade - very clever.

Inspiration | patterns

It's no great secret that I use lots of vintage Japanese and Indian influenced imagery in my design work. I love the richness of the colours and the exotic textures. Here are some of my favourite decorative papers including some wonderful Chiyogami papers available here at the Paper Studio

Window Shopping | Tokyo Made

I thought you might need a couple of bags and a scarfe to go with the new shoes you got yesterday. Gorgeous vintage kimono accessories from Tokyo Made.

Inspiration | packaging

Warning: the following items are all far too pretty to use - so let's just admire them from here.

Mmmmmm, don't these all smell great? You can get yours from here.

Announcing the new Cartolina shoe collection! Just kidding! But if we did make shoes I could only hope they would look as gorgeous as these from Hettie Rose created from vintage Japanese kimonos. There are lots of style to admire right here.