Chariddy...

I live in a part of Edinburgh quite well known for it's abundance of charity shops. When you're in the mood there are several hours that can be spent wondering from one to another looking for a little slice of treasure. Last week I spent £11.50 on these two items!
As the weather doesn't know what it's doing from one day to the next, this 80's crossover, Scottish cashmere cardigan, with 4 little wooden buttons, hasn't been more than a metre away from me since I paid a whole £6 for it!
This little vintage top has satin sleeve and neckline details. The label is Condici Set, which appears to be 'mother of the bride' 80's-tastic...but I LOVE the way it fits and it cost me £5.50!
It seems I'm drawn to white and cream at the moment...must be because I'm so pure...

Actual Abode {Volume I}

I have a group of girlfriends...there are 6 of us and we became close in the last few years of secondary school. The years when things got heavy. We shared a lot of teen experiences and did some major growing up together. At the time, we thought we were cool but there's only so much you can get up to in suburban Glasgow in the mid 90's...
Whilst down in London recently to celebrate one of the girls' last weekends of singledom, we realised that actually our teenage years were far from 'rock 'n' roll'. Yes, we would go into town and try to get into bars and clubs, but we spent a lot of time at each others parent's houses (when they were out), with boys, watching Four Weddings and a Funeral and Lost Boys, listening to 'vocal house', smoking, drinking vodka and tequila, eating chinese food...
One of these houses belonged to Vivienne's parents...I think it was the most effortlessly stylish house I've ever been to and I still remember every room. It was not the kind of house where you have to take off your shoes or feel like your messing it up just by standing still but a real home, with real character.
I think some people have a real talent for placing objects- furniture, artwork, trinkets, souvenirs- where the outcome looks ripe for an interiors photo shoot, but far from contrived.
It seems this talent is hereditary, as the flat Vivienne shares with her boyfriend, Joe, in south London is bursting with objects, beautifully and effortlessly arranged. Some objects are souvenirs of the couple's travels, some are heirlooms or gifts and even the collecton of correspondance on a pin board looks good!

It has to be said that Vivienne has been a bridesmaid an amazing 7 times! Above is one of her dried bouquets hanging in the hallway.
Cowboy boots waiting to be worn.
And what a lovely surprise it was to see one of my own sister's photographs hanging in her hallway!

Gorgeous smelling flowers sit on top of an mini rustic cupboard in the living room.
I love the painted wooden zebra table...

A very fitting 'Queen Of Scots' plaque sits above the window in the kitchen.
In the dining area hangs a beautiful little canvas by Vivienne's very talented sister Rosalind. Rosalind's collection, coincidentally and somewhat spookily, is a study of the 'social construct of the domestic ideal' (I feel a future blogpost coming on).
The living areas and kitchen are all open plan but each area is well defined. Photos of them with friends and a vintage soda bottle stand on a very cool extending table bought by Joe's grandparents when they first moved to London. They bought it from a student at the Royal Collge degree show!!

Shelves with organic veg and a pin board with all their invitations, cards and correspondance stands between the kitchen and dining area. You can also see the MUJI flying swallow postcard I got for Vivienne.
Only a few of Vivienne's many pretty toiletries arranged in the bathroom.
The gorgeous little round vase, was a gift from Joe's mum in Spain.

The amazing upstairs bedroom has a pitched roof and porthole window. The floor space spans across the majority of the flat.


On each side of the bed is a low shelf. Vivienne's side has another bridesmaid bouquet, photo of her and Joe, her family and black and white photos of her grandparents, along with artwork, and of course some bedtime reading...

I plan to do some more real homes or 'actual abodes' of people I know in the future so I hope you like this one!

Photos taken by me on my iphone (forgot the memory card for my camera...ooops)

Summer, Sea and Ice Cream

We were at Crammond beach at the weekend in 25 degree heat (v. hot for Scotland) with Kingston. We had ice cream from a van after standing in a very long queue, and walked over to Crammond island when the tide was out...we didn't, however, look as cool as these guys...

on our way to Crammond Island (and Kingston's debut appearance on the blog)
the view from crammond Island back to Edinburgh
ice cream for a happy, wet dog!

1st image: The Sartorialist

MUJI

When I was a teenager there was a MUJI store on Queen Street in Glasgow. Now...this was quite a long time ago but I remember it well...I think it could have been my first real life experience of minimalism!
As I was in London last weekend I made a point as i always do of visiting the Oxford Street store and stocking up on stationary and notebooks and having a good nose around.
I got one of the swallow 3D flying postcards for a friend and now wish I had got a couple for myself...there's always the online shop



Also, how cool are these 3D box cards?! There's one for London, Paris and New York...


www.muji.eu

500 Days of Summer

I tend to watch films with my ears on the story, one eye on the fashion and the other on the set design and cinematography...
500 Days of Summer will surely be an example of movie imagery symbolism in film schools all over the world for many years to come. I'm a big fan of when films use visual themes to aid the characters and the storyline.

The female character, Summer, has a beautiful vintage wardrobe however, no matter how many outfits she gets through she always wears blue...baby blue, blue prints, navy blue, royal blue...even her apartment is blue. As pretty as the blue is, it helps to illustrate the fact that her personality is closed off and generally the colder, of the two main characters.
All these points aside...I loved the interior set design; Tom's apartment, especially. Definitely the apartment of a young, romantic, frustrated architect...

the empty shell

the plan

the finished set

the chalkboard wall behind Tom's bed

Laura Fox was the production designer on the film. You can see a photo reel of the different sets in the film here, including Summer's apartment and Tom's office.

Along with the production design, the music always plays a huge part in movies. The soundtrack to this film is definitely worth a buy! Not, only does it help to tell the story but it's a great listen on its own!

Also, Zooey Dechanel sings in a band, She and Him. They have just released a second album (Volume 2) that i keep hearing everywhere...and i love it!

Hot Tin Roof

Metal ceiling tiles: The more decorative and vintage looking the better.

One Up, Glasgow

The Borough Hotel bar, Edinburgh

What do you think?

Images 1 & 3 from Andy Thornton. Image 2 from The Borough Hotel.

Sainted

So...the reason for my absence from the blogosphere and all things interweb, of late, is that, as some of you may know, since becoming a victim of the 'crisis that is credit', I have been helping out at one of my husband's ventures, The Saint (website coming soon) ...not to mention a long weekend in London...
A couple of weekends ago we were reviewed in a very well thought of paper by a very well thought of food journalist. The excellent review has, pretty much, put us on the map in Edinburgh and we have been crazy busy ever since it was published.
I don't think we could have written better ourselves, and we LOVE the place!!
You may think that it's not that big a deal, but in this hoity toity pocket of the world, 'word of mouth' is more than gospel and a bad review can kill a person's livliehood.
A big thank you to Richard Bath at The Scotland on Sunday...

Read the review HERE

London Town

I'm in London this week and weekend catching up with my longest serving girlfriends as yet another one of them waves goodbye to single life.

There will be more in terms of blog posts from my visit but I just wanted to drop by to welcome new followers and thank existing ones as I haven't been able to post much recently. I'm really looking forward to getting home to a bit of normality after a hectic couple of weeks! So...welcome and thanks!

So far we've been to see Pavement at Brixton Academy (the husband came down with me for that but has since gone back across the border), devoured the most amazing Iberico ham i've ever tasted, had lunch and bloody mary's in a very cool townhouse hotel, taken a jaunt along Oxford Street and spent money I shouldn't have.

I wouldn't say i'm a wallflower but coming from Edinburgh, it always takes about a day for me to get confident in London. Getting the tube map sussed, the bus numbers to look for and accepting the enormous amount of glum faced people standing that little bit too close and moving that little bit too fast...

...more to come...x

image from here via google images

ETAC?

Paul Smith designed these bright, Bauhaus inspired, silk scarves to coincide with the Milan furniture fair. They're hand numbered and hand stitched and available here.
The scarves, were infact a consequence of my forage for these awesome camera cases, but then i noticed what a perfect 'Essential Travel Accessory Combination' they make together (if I was one for matching such things)?!
Perfect for a little European city break in the summer, being booked this week, for a certain anniversary...now I just have to practice wearing silk scarves without looking like a 1970's trolly dolly...hmm...impossible?!

Bedroom Envy

If only I was one of those people who planned their outfit the night before and didn't try on my entire wardrobe at the last minute and then run out of time to put it all away. If only I put my hair products, moisturisers and make up back in exactly the same place I found them, neatly and with all labels facing the front. If only I put away clean clothes as soon as they were taken off the clothes line. If only I didn't have a white dog losing his winter coat. If only I allowed the inner anal perfectionist deep down inside my gut to defeat the lazy, disorganised, procrastinating slob who blocks out her sunshine, then, just maybe I could have a bedroom that looked like this....

Image: Living Etc.

Stolen Thunder

Just a quick post because I LOVE this wooden jewellery from Stolen Thunder! It's available at one of my favourite shops in Edinburgh, Godiva (future post planned for the shop).

Check out the blog to see what else is new in store!

all photographs from stolenthunderboutique.com