Friday Fav: Pattern by Orla Kiely

She is one of the most important designer in Uk and she loves being considered the queen of the pattern kingdom. If you like both the 1960's and 1970's-style you can not resist to the visionary brand of Orla Kieley. Orla grew up in Ireland and after a degree in design at Dublin's Nationa College of Art and Design she entered in the Esprit Maison. Then she founded her own brand and now the store in London's Covent Garden is the epicentre of her empire.

I have read this book immediately: it is so inspiring and it has delighted my eyes, really!

Traditional florals, sprigged prints and powerful colours are the essential ingredients of patterns.

Do you like Orla Kieley?

Pattern is not a trend for me, to be taken up one minute and abandoned the next when the winds of fashion change. Pattern is in me. It is my life.

Pattern Orla Kiely, p. 13.

Walk to Shere

Hi there! I have spent this sunny Sunday in Shere over the Tillingbourne. What a wonderful village!
We walked through the beautiful countryside and passed close to two of the most interesting and ancient churches in Surrey. Let's say a walk with a fine village at the start and a good pub at the end, obviously we ate a Sunday Roast.
How did you spend your last Sunday?

Finalmente una giornata di sole ha bucato il monotono cielo grigio inglese...insomma siamo ad Aprile!
Questa domenica ci siamo avventurati nel delizioso villaggio di Shere costeggiato dal fiume Tillingbourne. Abbiamo camminato tra la campagna inglese punteggiata di chiesette antiche e animali in libertà, il tutto si è concluso poi con un pranzo nello storico pub di Shere e un te con dolce in una tearoom.
Voi avete passato bene la domenica?

New Labels

Wouldn’t you love to know more about who made that handmade item you bought at a market or online, and where it was made?
So here you are the new labels!
Did I mention that I moved to Guildford back in January? ahah :)

Good friends are like stars

I've learned that true friendship continues to grow, even over the longest distance. I miss so much all my friends, however I will meet them all together at the end of the next summer. A couple of days ago I received a special package in my letterbox and inside I found something beautiful: a pair of handmade wooden earrings shaped as tiny acorns. Oh dear! It was a little surprise from my friend Elisa aka Wagashistories that now is teaching English in China :) 

Besides, I have a genuine friend, Marla, who loves adding on my Facebook page a lot of "fun-useless-cat theme-sitcom-gamer" images.

Family roots

A volte ragiono sulle scelte che mi hanno portato a emigrare all'estero e non posso fare a meno che sentirmi vicino allo stile di vita dei miei nonni materni. Perchè se i miei genitori non hanno mai dovuto lavorare all'estero, la generazione precedente di cui fanno parte i miei nonni invece si.

Sia mio nonno che mia nonna prima di sposarsi han dovuto lasciare le campagne per andare a lavorare temporaneamente in Svizzera, mio nonno come bracciante e mia nonna come cameriera per una famiglia nobile di origine tedesca.

Frugando in casa dei miei genitori è spuntata una cassetta di legno colma di foto in bianco e nero e così ho pensato di scansionarle alcune. 

Così quando mi sentirò un po' malinconica mi basterà guardarle per ricordarmi tutto quello che hanno fatto per me e gli insegnamenti che mi hanno instillato. Anche perchè la mia nonna è stata la mia insegnante di cucito...a volte severissima, diciamo old school. Ricorderò sempre ad esemprio quando a 10 anni all'ombra della nostra casa mi obbligava a ricamare le bavagline per il mio fratellino in arrivo. 

Mitica nonna e immenso nonno che proprio un anno fa ci ha lasciato.

Insomma un piccolo post per ricordarli, perchè ovunque vado il loro ricordo vive in me :)

 

Today I want to write a post about my grandparents because they had had a lot of things in common with my life. Both emigrated to Switzerland and worked there for a long period. I found a small wooden box filled with a lot of pictures about them so I decided to digitize some. 

When I feel a little sad and nostalgic I will remember what they did for me and how much they loved me. My grandma taught me all I know about sewing and stitching, even if when I was a child she forced me to learn those arts with a strictly discipline.Well, it worked! 

Just a little memory about my gorgeous and unforgettable grandparents.

My last four weeks as a freelance machinist

Here I am again! Well, it has been a while since I last posted. During the last four weeks I have started two jobs in the same time: one as Library Advisor at the University for the Creative Arts and the other as a freelance machinist. 

Please believe me when I say that I have worked seven days a week. Am I insane? No, it is because I am a Gemini and Gemini is always doing two things at once...aaaaaah! 

It has been a pleasure working for Nicole Philips England because I really love their printed materials. 

Here you are some snaps when I was working in my lab. Fabrics, bias, waddings,  scraps and a tons of threads.......everywhere.

Nicole, the founder and painter, is now in London to launch her brand during the Country Living Fair. Let's say that a piece of Fedulab is also there. A big good luck Nicole!

Friday Fav: Fortuny

My Friday Fav today is Mariano Fortuny and his magnificent and sumptuous silk dresses, cloaks and medieval style robes.

I really love this artist because his fame and art are closely linked with Venice despite his name reveals its Spanish origin: he was born in Granada on 11 May 1871 and he spent his childhood between Rome, a little town near Naples and Paris. Fortuny was just eighteen when his family moved to Venice, in a palace in the Canareggio and soon he started to love the new place, its architecture, the oriental atmosphere of the city and the work of Venetian Renaissance painters such as Bellini, Titian, Veronese and Giorgione: all these elements influenced his dress design and his friends said that he spoke Venetian better than Italian.

At the age of forty he threw totally himself into fashion design, after devoting his life to photography, painting and sculpture. His name is connected with the thin pleated silk dress but we must not forget that the Fortuny style was the result of a collaboration between him and the French modell Henriette Negrin. They spent forty-seven happy years together in Venice and in 1909 they opened the first Fortuny boutique in Palazzo Orfei, later renamed Palazzo Fortuny. They worked in this way: he invented the pleated look and the dyeing process while Henriette picked out the patterns and block-printed the patterns of the dresses.

It is important to remark that Fortuny was not a couturier because he did not present an annual collection but he was interested in reaching a big and romantic purpose: a timeless ideal form of beauty.

The "Delphos" dress, the most famous icon of his style, was cut out flat in one piece, than the imported Japanese folded silk laid on heated porcelain tubes fixing permanently the tight pleats with the help of Chinese crystallized egg white. The result was a pressed dress that recalled the idealized "flower-woman" and the "Delphi Charioteer", from ancient Greece. Every single dress had the shoulders and seams accentuated with Murano glass beads, made specially for Fortuny. The success of Fortuny's creations lasted from 1910 until the Forties.

It is today already possible to breathe and feel its power and creativity visiting Palazzo Fortuny in Venice. I went there a couple of years ago and I can assure that the "primo piano nobile" (first reception hall) had a powerful impact on me. I found his fabrics, collections, paintings and dresses simply amazing.