Updates to Flickr and It's A Date Event Design websites

Just wanted to also note that I've updated the It's A Date website, did a little bit of house-keeping and moved some things around! I'm getting excited about the launch of this year's I Do I Do Creations Magazine, which will include a few of my designs - I have also been flat out with 21st invitation designs and some really beautiful wedding projects which will be uploaded after the respective events take place.



Also, I just uploaded a few photos that my talented husband took of our wedding invites up on my Flickr photostream. More about the process of designing these can be found here.

HomeMADE Week 3

I keep hearing mixed reviews of how the Australian viewers are enjoying "HomeMADE", I hope it doesn't get canceled due to poor viewing statistics! Another week, another episode, here are my highlights:



Jason's becoming quite a dark horse, another beautiful bedroom makeover pictured above, I think if it were me I could have gone crazy in that room with greenery, palms, etc. I love what he did with the picture frames (painting gold frames white to match the room) and also the cushions were a great choice that really paid off. He also did a wonderful job in his living area, by placing two blue-striped wicker chairs which just popped - I agreed with the judges, they were a great choice.



Here you can see Jason's living area and part of Richie's dining area. I wasn't a huge fan of Richie's room this week (which feels bad considering I love all of his work so far) but I think turning a little room into a scullery was a great idea!



Chontelle's crisp bathroom makeover - such an improvement on the small lavender bathroom originally! Chontelle used really large glossy tiles which she said gave the illusion of making the space bigger - which was a good tip.



Annie re-designed the kitchen, which made the space very big and stylish. I think a kitchen island in the middle would have finished it off and made the space more practical, but she did a great job. Also, the wall colour was more of a rich brown on screen, which I adored against the clean white.



Leonie's 'white on white' bedroom makeover was another highlight. She re-arranged the bed on David's suggestion and it vastly improved the room.

It was a shame to see Stacey go - although I wasn't crazy about either of her rooms this week, I think she acted with a lot of dignity and professionalism during the show. She seemed to speak from experience a lot of the time, and really focused on working as part of a team, rather than an individual designer. She also wore really cute dresses to each of the elimination shows! I'm sure she'll go on to great things.

Looking forward to the next episode, as always. This is becoming such an interesting show to watch in that I'm learning a lot about interior decorating. It would be lovely to have a $50,000 budget to work with, but even the little tips in re-using what they've already got are appreciated.

Wishing Trees

I'm looking into making one of these for a client, and I am completely inspired by some of the beautiful ones on the Internet:





Images above from Here Comes The Guide



Image above from Cristalier.

This is an 'escort card tree' I found on the amazing Michelle Rago's blog: "It was a tree-like structure created from hundreds of stems of white cherry blossom branches sitting on a base of hybrid white delphinium, hydrangea, and white macarena roses. The actual cards were cut from decoupaged skeleton leaves and loosely strung on ribbon so the guests could easily pull them off as they found their name."





Images above from Michelle Rago, Ltd.

HomeMADE

The first episode of HomeMADE, a new series about a weekly suburban home makeover challenge for 10 aspiring interior designers, was on tonight and I loved it. There was lots of cute, trendy designers, stress at not meeting deadlines (a lot of "We're running out of time" type lines were said, which is fair enough under such tight deadlines:2 days for bedrooms, 3 for kitchens, lounges, bathrooms...), unusual room makeovers and the crucial tell-it-like-it-is designer host, David Heimann, who did a great job of convincing me that any home can be made over with a limited budget. His best line, and I paraphrase, was something along the lines of, "A good designer can get the effect of silk on a canvas budget" and even though our current home decorating budget is more akin to sandwich bags rather than canvas, I still found the show inspiring.

I wish I had thought to apply!

For a sneak peak at the rooms these guys made over, you can check out the current issue of Real Living magazine.

Updates to It's A Date Event Design Website

Just added two new projects to the It's A Date Event Design website - Taina & Tamara's gorgeous purple Winery themed wedding invitations, and the first of four stationery suites I designed for the Bridal Expo - Laura and Jacob's red/purple/cream wedding invitations. Enjoy!

The Expo

It was, easily, the most fun, fulfilling day I've had since I started It's A Date Event Design a year ago.

The feedback we got was amazing, it was such an honor to be able to see so many people interact with these little products I had been creating, trimming, assembling at night for the last two months... And, also, I got to talk about weddings all day, which is probably, if I'm going to be honest, one of my absolute favorite topics and one I could have probably talked about for the rest of the night too. We made lots of new friends, both with visitors and other suppliers at the expo, which will prove invaluable, I'm sure, when we get the chance to recommend other services.

Renate, my partner-in-crime for the It's A Date Event Design stand, was unbelievable. She effortlessly charmed everyone that came into our stall, talked the talk like she had been doing it for years, and was the best support to me all day, as well as making me laugh laugh laugh! My family were also amazing: both with the set-up and pull-down. I know I was a ball of nerves the day before and they humored me, buckled down and just got the job done, and done beautifully. I'm very lucky to have such great people around me!

Here are some photos my husband took at the beginning of the day of our finished set-up stall. This first one is of our entire stand. We were stand number 4, which meant visitors will still pretty fresh when they got to us - after the next few rows of stands, I'm sure it was another story!

You can see the Wedding Arch I created in this image, I mentioned it a few posts ago. This is my second wedding arch, and my favorite so far, I just adored the colors we used.



Set One: Designed after a rather inspiring chat with Renate! This was one of two elaborate sets, and featured a Wish Tree! Colours were yellow, burnt orange, brown and white, with a bit of sage green thrown in for good measure!





Set Two: Colours were aqua, black, white and silver. I went for a lace motif with this set which I think worked well against all the black!



Set Three: My favourite set, the Sweetheart Table. Colours were Baby blue, Gold, Brown, Cream and everything had a travel theme, right down to the Passport invitations.







Set Four: Colours were Red, Purple, Slate Grey and Cream, and this set had a culinary theme!





You can find out more about these projects here.

All photos © James Sann Photography and It's A Date Event Design.

Dorm Decor

I kind of feel like I'd like this book - just from the cover - is that a bad thing?



""Dorm Decor" combines interior design and craft with more than 35 projects that help students add personality, organization, and comfort to their otherwise unadorned dorm rooms. Straightforward instructions and ready-to-use patterns make it fun and easy to create bold rugs and lampshades, oversize floor pillows, custom bedding, curtains, laptop cozy, and much more. Inspiring photos of fully decorated dream rooms, how-to illustrations, step-by-step directions, and small-space floor plans make it simple to pull off, all before the semester starts."

I don't think I ever grew out of wanting the coolest bedroom around - even as a kid, I was constantly rearranging and reassembling my little living space with the eye of a future designer (or so I thought!). This project in particular grabbed my attention as a way of making your space your own, without spending a whole heap of cash. And to be honest, well, this book excerpt had me at "deer templates".

Link via How About Orange.

Little Birds

I've been training for my new (part-time) position this evening - it's with a home wares company so, no doubt, soon I'll be posting lots of images I see during the day... everyone likes looking at pictures of KitchenAids, right?!

However I did really want to post these absolutely stunning "Words of Love Paper Birds" I found on Etsy - I adore birds, and I really adore these:




Image © Cotton Bird Designs.

The very talented artist behind Cotton Bird Designs makes fabric and paper sculptures, using vintage and recycled materials and hand stitching. This Etsy store is a fabulous resource for some cute little wedding extras, such as these little birds, as well as "wedding cake toppers and other textile sculptures such as cottages, bird book homes, fabric flower sculptures, and brooches".

Such beautiful work and truly inspiring - I'm very happy to have stumbled on their site!

Cameos and Lace

For the past two and a half days, I've had Design Block, where nothing seemed to go together and I spent more time deleting and closing Illustrator windows with a huff than I did saving anything. However, today I've got whatever 'it' is back. I'm now inspired to try my hand at a motif I've admired for quite some time: Cameos!

Some beautiful, beautiful cameo inspiration:


Image © Tongue In Cheek. On a side note, this blog is amazing. I'm a few pages in and already feel like I'm in another world! In another life I was French, I'm sure of it.


Image © Lou and Lee, found via Perfect Bound.

I can't wait til I can start posting my creations on the website: we're attempting to create a few 'surprises' for the upcoming bridal expo, hence the lots of talking about work, without actually showing any of it. Soon, my friends, very soon!


Image © Twin Cat Vintage.

In other news, I'd like to show my support for my favourite style icon, Sam, and her friend Sabrina who have launched a brand new business: Twin Cat Vintage - their uber-cute site stocks ladies (and occasionally mens) pre-loved vintage clothing. There is some really amazing pieces available for purchase here. Best of luck ladies!

Target - Stationery Range

Had a lovely, albeit quick, wander through the stationery section of our local Target today - there's lots of really cute stationery products on offer - probably a few more in your Target than mine, as ours is quite small. Here is some eye candy from the Target website of the Paper Chic range:









Images © Target.

One thing I cannot track down online is that Target seemed to have a really cool disposable party products range in stock - plates, cups, etc., that had really trendy, tasteful designs on them. I didn't have time to look at who made these, so if anyone has any ideas, please let me know so I can post them here!

And, just because it pleases me so! some rainbow love via ffffound.com:


Image quoted from here, photo © The Mid-century Modernist.


Image quoted from here, photo © Santos.

We are shooting a wedding tomorrow, in much better conditions than this time last week, thankfully, which should be lots of fun. Happy weekend!

The Pencil Calendar

"12 pencils, 365 days, infinite creative possibilities... The new calendar is available to buy from today. Consisting of 12 colour-coded pencils to indicate the seasonal temperature and the days of the year printed along the whole length of the pencil, allowing each day to be sharpened off. The minimal packaging is a traditional pencil box with a slide-out lid, so no further packaging is required for posting. This year our starting point was a 'back to basics' idea where we wanted to create something using the designer's most important tool, the pencil. Available to buy now for £12.00 including postage and packaging."

By Mytton Williams Design Consultancy.

For Like Ever

For Like Ever
Originally uploaded by ameeliah

I have loved this poster for quite some time (not to mention the Eames Armchair, but that is for another post). It was on a cover of Domino and was quite in demand - nearly every blog I visited for a while had it somewhere on their wishlists. I read somewhere it was $US10 and sold out ridiculously quickly.

The retailer of this product is Village and it retails now for $US60, or $100 if you're one of those international suckers like me.