I'm always intrigued with simple, clever ideas that can make a huge impact, so I loved the idea behind The Spruce Initiative. Vancouver's Felicity Fane {who holds a Ph.D. in Transformation and Consciousness, not to mention her additional degrees in Architecture and Chemical Engineering - whoa baby!} originated the project after she travelled to visit family in Switzerland and marvelled at how clean it was. When she returned home, she decided that she would pick up one piece of garbage {or rubbish as she calls it - it does sound so much better than garbage!} per day and she is hoping that this simple and easy idea will catch on. If everyone picked up just one piece of rubbish a day, think of what a huge difference that would make!
You can read more about the project here. And in case you need some incentive, if helping the environment isn't incentive enough - Felicity has found a bunch of cool things while sprucing up her city including a $50 bill, and a Starbucks coffee card {good for a free cup of coffee}! Happy Earth Day...
{I meant to post this on Bloomerism today, but I posted it here by mistake! I will leave it here too...happy weekend Bloomers!}..................
Growing up, my mom had a friend named Linda who was a calligrapher. We would get birthday cards with the most stunning handwritten addresses on the envelope. And every Christmas Linda would create these incredible, custom-designed, calligraphed and illustrated calendars for her extended family that included important birthdays and occasions. I thought these were the most beautiful things I had ever seen! I begged my mom for a calligraphy set and lessons. I think I was 5 years old at the time and my mom had to remind me that I need to learn to print first...oh yeah...
Well eventually the time came and I got a new calligraphy set and Linda gave me a few wonderful lessons. Finally it was my turn to create a custom calendar for my family! So, at age 10 that is what I set out to do...see above for the result. Haha...I love the whited out 'S' where I tried to write '9'. Not bad for 10 years old though, I guess!
I still love calligraphy, and with everything designed and printed by computer these days, it's so refreshing and beautiful to see elegant handwriting in its inky goodness...a true artform! Check out some of these beauties. I am thinking that I might actually give it a go again and take a calligraphy course. There's no doubt that my mouse-shaped claw of a hand could use some exercise!
Calligraphers from the top:
1. Joelle Bloomer, circa 1987
2. Jenna Hein {wow!}
3. Rebecca Trawick
4. Linea Carta
5. Crystal Kluge
6, 7, 8. Betsy Dunlap
These painted green chairs are right up my alley! A few years ago when we moved into our house, P. and I bought some lovely leather chairs for our kitchen table - they are really nice but I guess as time moves on, my taste is changing a bit and I am drawn to bright colours and cool architecture and shapes.
{I've been really bad at tracking where I'm saving my photos from lately, so unfortunately the source of this photo is unknown :(}
Have you heard of Big Cartel? It's a cool program that allows small businesses to host an online shop without all of the hassle - or in their words 'Simple Stores for DIY Rockstars'! I decided to create a small store {it's free for 5 items and under} to sell some prints of the nature pattern watercolours I created in my Australian illustration course. I've found a way to print the paintings on watercolour paper so they look almost identical to the original art. Check them out at inBloom Studio Boutique!
I finally got around to decorating my console table for Spring! I did away with the previous winter wonderland and made way for some fresh greens and yellows. Check out the beautiful forsythia! I wish they lasted forever.
A quick thank you to Celia of Design for Conscious Living for the shout-out to me and inBloom Studio on her new blog! I am blushing...
I recently designed Celia's business cards and had them printed on a linen cardstock and they turned out beautifully! For more of Celia's work, you can check out her website here...
What a fine day it is today...not only is it Earth Day, but my favourite store ever opened its doors in Toronto at the Shops at Don Mills. You have heard me gush about Anthropologie here, here, and here. I'm itching to check it out, but I also remember the lineups and craziness when Crate and Barrel opened last fall, so I might just wait a bit as a favour to my clautrophobic side. But I can barely stop myself...afterall there aren't too many stores that have blogs and Flickr collections dedicated to their inspiring visual displays, products, graphics and beautiful sense of design.
