Tortie Hoare

Tortie Hoare was announced BDC New Designer of The Year for her Leatherwork Furniture Collection at UK graduate exhibition New Designers. I love the medieval feel of her designs!

Judges Comments: The judges celebrated Tortie’s ‘innovation, personal passion and an incredible sensitivity to materials which has reinvented a lost process from medieval times to produce an outstanding collection of contemporary furniture.’ Now, instead of trying to find a job, Tortie has decided to pursue her leatherwork and see where it takes her. She will be spending some of the prize monies on leather for a new collection. “I have never had a reaction like this,’ said Tortie. ‘I have been shocked by the interest. With all of my furniture I have used the process of forming leather to dictate the piece. It was not until I came across the French medieval process of boiled leather that I could create solid, strong forms in an eco-friendly way. “

seen at Kurbits

Styling inspiration: warm wood

Why do I like wooden furniture so much? And fall so easily for the beauty of old wooden floors? Is it the great sensation of touching the worn-out surface, feeling the warmth and genuity that vintage pieces emanate? Wood can be both humble and magnificent, but it always stays truthful to itself. It's always full of life!

Solid wood furniture items are not so easy to find and usually very expensive. But we can always choose something with real wooden veneer...

Mesmerizing blue light... and Billy bookcases from Ikea. Beautiful, atmospheric library created by interior stylist Lotta Agaton. I like the colour composition here: warm browns and cool inky blues.

Found at a great blog of stylist Charlotte Bladh

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A family hut in the mountains - inspiration from Sköna Hem. Cosy, isn't it?

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Wood in the most raw and humble incarnation: wonderful photo series showing the work of carpenter Andrea Brugi taken by Ditte Isager. Eco-beauty seen at Pure Green.

Jaanisays 2011 Collection

Furniture collection by finish designer Jaani Vaahtera... pure poetry.

"I have a dream. I want to awaken thoughts and interpretations. And I want to open doors - happy doors, surprising doors and sometimes sad doors, but only when the purpose is to lead to something good. I believe I will get closer to my dream by imagining and creating things that tell stories, that arrest, awaken and inspire. Things and thoughts that we want to take care of - things that are not disposable. Good design tells a story and then it asks you to tell it. Put simply, it talks - to you, to me to us.

www.jaanisays.com

Medusa Group: a loft office

Spectacular 1400m2 architect office, located in a former factory building, represents a true design manifesto of Medusa Group, one of the most successful architect bureaus in Poland. Przemo Łukasik and Łukasz Zagała, the authors of renovation project aimed to preserve the authentic substance of the interiors and change as little as possible.
The elevations were renewed, the walls reinforced, and only few partition walls added. New windows are protected by old rusted grids, and the wooden planking is original. Even the tattered industrial lamps were re-used! The new contrasts with the old without clashing: black, graphic-style kitchen and bathroom area compliment the surrounding, newly white-painted walls and floors.

www.medusagroup.pl

Miyake lamp by Arihiro Miyake

Intriguing lamp design by Japanese Arihiro Miyake, where the balance has been reversed: the base has become the main interest point and the source of light seems very modest. The right angle can be adjusted by turning the polyhedron-shaped base. Less is definitely more...

Miyake lamp is produced by Moooi Netherlands.

Khai Liew

Khai Liew's career is truly exceptional - it began in his forties, without formal education yet at once with fully formed, mature aesthetic sense and practical knowledge. Before establishing his own design studio in 1996, Khai Liew had worked as a renown restorer of vintage furniture for over 20 years. His first antique shop in Adelaide was filled with early Australian pieces, mid-twentieth-century Danish designs and Chinese antiques.

“Years of taking furniture apart in the restoration process has enabled me to examine and study the techniques of furniture construction from various countries and cultures, from different artistic movements and centuries. This has been the principal factor in the formation and development of my design vocabulary, and has greatly shaped the way I assess what good design is and how I apply this assessment to my own work.”

Chinese-Malaysian Khai Liew incorporates craft tradition from both Asian and mid-century European cultures. And still leaves a lot of space for creative invention. His beautiful, handcrafted pieces were presented in numerous exhibitions including a group show at the Victoria & Albert Museum in London.

www.khailiewdesign.com

photos via: Wallpaper, video via: ABC

Loft love

Living in a loft... I guess I'm not the only one that dreams of it. But if you entered an old woodworker's shop, with all the walls and ceilings covered with thick layer of sawdus, could you imagine your dream apartment there? The couple that lives in this beautiful loft transformed it from the very begining, and had to solve many adaptation problems, like for example a lack of functioning kitchen. Before all was neatly painted white, they had to struggle with cleaning all the dust - it was necessary to hose down the walls and ceilings with a power washer! Furnishing was the pleasant part: a mixture of vintage and new, high and low feels perfectly at home within old brick walls.

photos: Tony Solur, via: @properties