EMMAS DESIGNBLOGG

Today's flickr favourites is a little different than usual. I couldn't choose just 4 or 5 photos, they were all so great, so you will get to see a mosaic of my latest favourites instead, and if you are interested in seeing more, just go to my flickr page! I really like the combination of all these pictures, it gives me such a nice sense of autumn/winter coziness.

This weeks bag of eye candy is full of bedrooms, because this gloomy weather really makes me want to snuggle up in bed. The last picture is from Elisabeth Dunker's bedroom, and I believe the second one belongs to a blogger as well, but I have forgotten who?

This weekend is the start date for many of Stockholm's Christmas markets, and I will be going to at least two of them. Here are some of the ones I think will to be worth a visit:

Konstfacks Julmarknad, 900 students of art, craft and design are selling their products here, this one can't be missed! December 1-2, 11-5 at Telefonplan.


Street Market, 100-200 exhibitors selling their own jewellery, clothing, books and food. Open 11 am to 5 pm all Saturdays and Sundays through December.


Beckmans, December 15-16, the students from one of Stockholm's greatest design schools are arranging a market where they sell their own designs, exclusively made for this event. If you fancy a chance to pick up a product by a future Swedish design star, don't miss this one.

Överjärva gård, December 8-9, open from 11 to 4. This is a lovely farm just outside of town, where ceramist Karin Eriksson has her studio, so you will of course be able to buy her beatiful products and also have a look in her new studio. Other than that, there are usually very nice wool products from the farms sheep, miscellanious other crafts, a cute luciatåg and a café with delicious ecological cookies and cakes.


Skansen, traditional Swedish christmas food and crafts in a lovely environment that takes you back in time. This market started in 1903 and has been held every year since then. Open on the first three weekends of December from 11 to 5.

Stortorgets Julmarknad in Gamla Stan has been around since the Middle Ages, and looks about the same since the beginning of the last century. A lot of traditional crafts and Christmas foods, and remember to buy a cup of glögg to sip when you browse the stalls! Open every day until Christmas between 11 and 6.


Schysst Jul, a Fair Trade market with lots of great Christmas presents to be found, ranging from food and spices to childrens clothes and decorating details. If you like shopping with a clear conscience, this one is for you. December 8-9, between 10 and 5.

The Swedish liqour brand Absolut teamed up with designer Konstantin Grcic to create a whole new series of glassware to promote the brand in bars and restaurants around the world.
Grcic was inspired by the shape of the Absolut bottle, and made the glasses in a shape that is reminiscent of that, but he also felt that the famous brands message didn't need to be shouted out loud, so he discreetly incorporated the logo at the bottom of the glass. The result is a sleek, functional range of glasses suitable for all drinks and occasions.

I would like to introduce you to one of my favourite Swedish photographers, Stellan Herner. His work occurs regularly in Elle Interiör, and he has participated in several books about food, gardens, parties etc. A very versatile photographer, but with an easily recognizable sense of style and light. You can spot a Herner photo immediately by looking at the way he lets the lightest areas of the picture burn out. He is the master of white!

These pictures were all styled by Tina Hellberg, also a regular in Elle Interiör. What an amazing job she did here!

Some of my favourite pictures:

I recieved an email from Chicago based ceramist and art director/graphic artist Scott Rench, telling me about his Interactive Ceramics that are being displayed at the Fragiles exhibition in Miami Design 2007. This is what Scott has to say about his project:

"I started this series of work after thinking about people and the art they live with. I wanted to create something that engaged the viewer in its creation and evolution."

So this is a piece of art you can change according to your mood, or for the decorating freaks among us that want their artwork to match the rest of the room. :-)


Some other cool findings from the Fragiles exhibit:

...Patricia from the blog A Little Hut! Patricia wins the set of Lighthouse hurricane tea light holders from Menu, sold at Design Online. Congratulations Patricia, and please get in touch with me so I can have your mailing address!

These are the products the contestants chose as their favourites in the Design Online shop:

Muji has just released this years Christmas collection, full of nice minimalistic wooden toys, and some cool new stuff for grown-ups as well. I can only find the beautifully styled shots on their Japanese site though, so use this link and scroll down until you reach the red "Muji Xmas web" banner, then click it to see the catalogue. However, the items are also available for purchase on the European site.

I found this at the Desire to Inspire blog, and I just had to show it to you! The pictures by Australian photographer Sharyn Cairns are truly amazing. I have seen some of her pictures before, and was as taken with them then as I am now, perhaps it was in Living Etc or Elle Decoration?
I love interiors where mid century furniture is mixed with modern, and then some organic accessories added to it. This is my favourite style, and also the one I am aiming for in my own home.

Up until Christmas, Vitamin D(esign) are having a sale, with a discount of 20% off of any purchase of $50 or more. To take advantage of the discount, enter code HOLIDAY2007 at checkout.

I have been waiting for this one, and now it's here, the Stilleben shop! Straight out of Denmark, this is the best of contemporary Danish crafts and design with products from for example Ditte Fischer, Anne Black, Cecilie Manz and Anna Carin Dahl. Stilleben are also offering some classic pieces from Finn Juhl and Jonathan Adler.


So far the only available language for the shop is Danish, but it will soon be available in English and Japanese as well. Don't let the language barrier stop you from taking a look at this site though, it is very easy to navigate and has some beautiful pictures. Oh, by the way, if you were wondering, "stilleben" means still life in Danish.

Today I'm hosting my first competition in the blog, in collaboration with Design Online! One lucky winner will recieve a set of two Lighthouse hurricane tea light holders from Menu, designed by Christian Bjørn, to a total value of skr 429 ($ 65).

Design Online is a Swedish web shop aiming to provide the world with great Scandinavian design products, carefully chosen from over 100 brands. They offer modern, clean lines in everything from pot holders and teatowels to lounge chairs and garden tables, with international shipping on all items.

All you have to do is surf the Design Online homepage, find your favourite product and write about your choice and why you picked it in the comments to this post. Don't forget to add your homepage or email address so I can contact you. On Friday 23 November I will pick a winner!

I've been looking at the IJM site ever since I found it on the Style Files blog six hours ago. I just can't stop browsing the beautiful pictures, they are all amazing! This is art. Frank Visser, founder of IJM, is one of the most talented stylists I have seen.

My dear blog friend Danielle De Lange, the woman behind the super stylish design blog The Style Files, just opened up a web shop! Now you can not only see the beautiful products Danielle shows on her blog, but buy some of them in the Le Souk shop. The focus is on a cozy but no-frills style with oriental influences, and the product shots look great!

"The collection of Le Souk offers a range of home accessories for modern living, as well as personal accessories. Mixing modern, traditional and handmade, I have selected every single product at Le Souk with a lot of care and love. The goal of Le Souk is to make the life -and homes- of its customers just a bit more beautiful!"

I just recieved an email from Géraldine Le Buhan who is opening up a whole new kind of gallery on Svartmangatan 10 in Gamla Stan here in Stockholm on December 1. The gallery is called Bo-Bo Gallery, from the French "Bourgeois-Bohème" (Bo-Bo) movement, which Géraldine explains like this:

"Bobo, or Bo-Bo, refers to an individual who: lives in an urban area, is considered to be cultivated, enjoys shopping, and is also something of a non-conformist.

The Bo-Bo person is someone who is regarded to be a chic and trend-conscious person, and at the same time maintains a relaxed approach to life. Environmental protection and ecological lifestyle is also closely linked to a Bo-Bo person.

To be Bo-Bo also means to find and acknowledge young emerging artists and creators before everybody else does it, and before they become too famous and too commercial for the Bo-Bo people. Also, to be Bo-Bo is to create your own personal style by not having the same thing or the same taste as everyone else."

The Bo-Bo Gallery will present clothes, accessories and art from French and Swedish artists and creators such as Corinne Dalle-Ore, Marianne Peltzer, Sofia Antonovich, Smallstep, Gili et Cie, Anne Hubert, Martin Tallvid, Veja and Kavel Rafferty.

Géraldine Le Buhan used to live in Montmartre, Paris, working as an event organizer in the world of art and communication, arranging parties for most of the French tv and film production companies, and at the Cannes Film Festival. But then she met a Swedish man, fell in love and moved to Stockholm, and is now a gallery manager. Good luck with the Bo-Bo Gallery Géraldine!

I didn't post any flickr favourites this friday because I had found something else, that I wasn't sure if I could share with you all. I found photographs that grabbed my guts, pulled them out and twisted them around, just to finally leave them on the floor in a bloody mess.
The photographers name is Francesca Tallone, you will find her flickr account here, and more pictures on her homepage Patternclash. The series that grabbed me is called Giving up the Ghost, and here are some samples from it:

Yes, it is that time of the week again, time for a bag of candy! I don't know if you can see it, so I guess I'll just tell you, but today's theme is windows and light.

TAF is Gabriella Gustafson and Mattias Ståhlbom, two Swedish architects working together from their office in Stockholm. Their style is minimalistic and simple, quite typically Swedish or Scandinavian with lots of natural materials and basic colours. Their next mission is to design the Greenhouse area of the 2008 Stockholm Furniture Fair, which is the exhibition area for young up and coming designers and design schools. From what I've heard, TAF is going to make it look like a small town made of cardboard, with all of the exhibition booths getting their own house facade. Cool!

I want to show you some of the goodies from this months Sköna hem, and also to make sure that you don't miss the reader home of the month which used to belong to my blog friend Annika over at Hoom.Sthlm!

Paul Lowe from the Sweet Paul blog has started making these incredibly cute doilie bowls, and says he is thinking of setting up an Etsy shop to sell them. I think they would sell out in a couple of hours! Especially with his skills in styling, he really knows how to present things to make them look their best. Paul is originally from Oslo, Norway, but now lives in New York, working as a food and interiors stylist. Here is the link to his agent, where you can see some more of his work.

I think I might need some of these notebooks from Susy Jack* to cheer me up today. November has got to be the worst month of the year, at least in Sweden. The weather is grey, rainy and just above 0° C, and it turns dark here around 4 pm. All the leaves have fallen from the trees. Everyone around me has a cold. How are you supposed to be energetic and creative when living in this weather that most of all reminds you of cold oatmeal?

It was my oldest son's seventh birthday yesterday, so I was busy preparing for the party and celebrating all day long, hence no posts yesterday. But here are my flickr favourites of the week:

This coathanger by Swedish Design firm ADDI just recieved the Red Dot Award. The hanger was inspired by the shoes that workers for the Swedish telephone companies use to climb telephone poles. The hooks are coated in recycled rubber from car tires, and can be rearranged to sit anywhere on the hanger, turnable in 360 degrees. The pole itself is made from a single pipe and then split in to three at the bottom to make the legs, reminding you of the peeled dandelion stems from your childhood, or an exploded shotgun pipe from a cartoon.
The styling feels lonely but also calm and steady. Like the last tree standing in a long gone forrest. Stick To Me is expressing both intelligence and elegance in the same time as it can be used in a playful and personal manner, due to many different color variations.