Our Waterlily dress may be floaty and flowery enough to wear to afternoon tea but it also looks great worn with a sense of humour. Don’t be a shrinking violet and pair this dress with some tangy corals and bubblegum pinks. Finish it off with some cartoony details (Adventure Time badges!!) and you’ll look as sweet as a jawbreaker!
Pair your Foxglove Blouse with a pinafore for a back-to-school look that has one foot in the classroom and the other in a daydream.
The Something Fine Project by Karys Rhiann gathers and curates creative personal pieces inspired by the ‘whimsical, overwhelming, awkward and agonising feelings conjured by first love.’ When Karys asked me for a contribution inspired by my own first love, James Dean immediately popped into my head. He was my teenage heartthrob and I was infatuated from the day I watched a clip of this 50′s road safety PSA at the age of 14. It wasn’t so much the cowboy hat, rather his cool slouchy indifference… thankfully this is not a personality trait my older, wiser self still equates with attractiveness.
Words cannot describe how obsessed I was with those bedroom eyes so I expressed it in this doodle below:
Hundreds of poems, drawings, photos and stories have been gathered by Karys since she started the project… I could easily spend hours sifting through them all. There is a depiction for every taste and interpretation of that ‘messy chaos and blinding delirium that goes hand in hand with our first encounters of love.’ If you’re inspired to bare the agonies of your own story, Karys openly invites you to contribute here.
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One of my favourite pastimes is seeking out new illustrators online, there’s nothing quite like stumbling across something that’s just your cup of tea. I’m a big fan of Emily Martin’s blog (The Black Apple) and her whimsical paintings. Her bandit children, freak-show performers and melancholic woodland creatures have a curiously cute and gothic old-world charm. There is a story within each of the deceivingly simple compositions of Emily’s paintings and I find myself daydreaming about the origins and lives of her subjects.
Here is just a small sample of what she has on offer in her etsy shop:
Emily has also just published a book based on a series of her paintings titled Oddfellow’s Orphanage. The book chronicles the experiences of Delia, a new arrival at an orphanage inhabited by some very unusual children including an onion-headed boy and a tattooed girl.
At this orphanage of the odd and abandoned, Delia discovers the joys of Cryptozoology, Fairy Tale Studies and a sea monster-sighting field trip!
Visit the Oddfellow’s website for a glimpse into Emily’s world of the endearingly weird and magical!
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Like a melting Solero…
Here’s an ice cream parlour inspired outfit for those last long hazy days of Summer. Get your Willow dress in the shop now!
My latest browsing ground for illustration envy is the amazing online community Pixiv.net. Pixiv is the Japanese equivalent of DeviantART for anime and manga, where amateur and professional illustrators post a wide scope of styles that demonstrate the diverse possibilities of digital art. I have a personal penchant for the soft, cinematic style illustrations with lots of detail and the ‘cho kawaii’ animal portraits. Here are some of my latest discoveries…
猫のいる風景２
pancake ice cream a la carte
４組
カナールの飛行機
AERIS is an online magazine for ‘young, open-minded people who are from, or bear a connection to, China’. Published in Mandarin and English side-by-side every quarter, there really is nothing like it on the web right now. I was really pleased to do a little interview for them which can be found in both English and Chinese on their website right now!
English Version Chinese Version
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We are happy to announce we are now selling on Shop Des Créateurs. A bilingual (French and English) platform that promotes independent designers across South-East Asia. You can shop in 4 curencies and free shipping is included!
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It's Friday...
Watch the full version here… http://video.au.msn.com/watch/video/tiny-owl-loves-a-massage/xlaxs0o
Ulitmate cute therapy x
“In the depth of winter, I finally learned that within me there lay an invincible summer.” – Albert Camus
Illustration by Biljana Kroll on Behance.
