Dasein Design for Vista Alegre

I've blogged about the amazing ballet-inspired catalogue for Portuguese fine china company Vista Alegre before. So imagine my happiness when I managed to track down the design and production company behind the images. Portuguese design studio Dasein Design has put together a multitude of amazing catalogues for Vista Alegre over the years, all of them beautifully themed and styled to perfection. Never before have teacups looks so interesting! The particular images are from the 2008/09 catalogue. Don't you just adore the "knife" thrower?

This MUNNA chair is a real CUTIE

Portuguese designers MUNNA Design have done it again with the launch of their CUTIE chair. Upholstered in fur and sitting on gold leaf feet, this armchair is appropriately part of the Fetiche range and just begs to be touched. It might freak out your pets though.

How to DIY: repainting vintage welsh dressers

The date: 16th December.

The setting: a darkened sitting room at night.

The protagonist: London Lisbonite.

The props: a vintage welsh dresser, dust sheets, painting equipment, masking tape, lots of coffee and several tins of Farrow & Ball paint.

That's right, the run-up to Christmas saw me working through the night to finish one of the boyfriend's Christmas presents, namely a battered vintage Welsh Dresser. He has a shortage of storage space in the kitchen and an abundance of cookery books that were getting ruined as they sat on the windowsill next to the over so this seemed like a sensible way to solve the problem. Here it is people, the London Lisbonite DIY guide to refurbishing a welsh dresser.

1. Buy a welsh dresser. This one was from eBay. 2. Remove the cupboard doors and hinges, drawer knobs/pulls, the shelves and anything else that comes off.

3. Sand carefully to remove any wax and/or varnish. It takes hours and is extremely boring. I suggest that you turn The Thick of It on in the background to keep you entertained.

4. Use a wood primer for the first coat, starting on the drawers and other small pieces.

5. Allow to dry and then coat with the first layer of paint (I chose Farrow & Ball "Drawing Room Blue" and "Wimbourne White"). Note: it's best to start with the inside of the shelving unit and cupboard lest you end up covered in paint and cursing inadvertent smears.

6. Allow to dry for at least 48 hours to prevent smears.

7. Touch up with a second coat and replace the drawer and cupboard handles.

8. hide the welsh dresser behind a curtain (you won't be able to wrap something this big, believe me, I tried) and get the recipient of the dresser to "unwrap" it, watching their face for surprise!

9. Add the finishing touches - I used a vintage tin that I'd used to plant daffodil bulbs, a pestle and mortar and other kitchen odds and ends.

Bedrooms for teenagers: from surf to Chanel

When I was a teenager, my idea of style was spraying my hair green, scraping it back into a high ponttail and using a CD as an elastic band. My fashion sense hasn't really improved that much (I basically wear anything Massimo Dutti or Banana Republic tell me to), my sense of interior design has. It must be hard to design a room that a teenager feels comfortable with and is proud to show their friends. Whilst I can't imagine that all of them want black, a large proportion surely just look for a desk, a bed, a chair and somewhere to store things that they don't want their parents to find. Hurrah for Portuguese interior designer Ana Antunes then. Her portfolio is worth flicking through simply for the attention to detail in every theme that she follows but these two kids rooms really stood out as an alternative to mess and blu-tacked posters.

In honour of daffodils: yellow interior design

One of the very best things about the arrival of spring (after being able to leave the office in daylight) has to be the slow and gradual emergence of the daffodil, carpeting the floor with happy yellow brilliance. So in honour of Spring, I went hunting for open and bright decor ideas that use the colour yellow as their theme. Yellow rooms shine with optimism, enlightenment, and happiness. Yellow is also supposed to instill optimism and energy, as well as spark creative thoughts, which makes it a great colour for a kitchen or a kids room. If it were possible to carpet a room with daffodils, it's something I really would consider very seriously!

Photos via Sibyl Colefax, Patricia Gray, Ideal Home, Country Living, Dunster living and The Peak of Chic.

Pedro Sousa: A Boca do Lobo designer

My complete and utter adoration of the Boca do Lobo brand is well documented. They are a Portuguese design house that use traditional techniques to produce the most amazingly hand-crafted modern pieces imaginable. But I'm focusing today on one of their designers: Portuguese Pedro Sousa. Take a look at some of the work to come out of his own studio as well as some of my favourite bits from the BDL collection - the bold use of colour and the strong forms make for really singular pieces!

Interview: Annett and Kerstin of ANVE

I recently wrote of my love of the fantastic long cord lights recently made available by Portuguese design studio ANVE in Lisbon. Imagine my surprise and delight then, to find that a very dear friend had spoiled me by procuring a couple for me from their shop! I immediately got in touch with ANVE to see if they'd indulge London Lisbonite with a little bit of background for my dear readers and also to stalk their new ideas, like a "paper bag" made from goatskin which will revolutionise the world of packed lunches. Over to Annett!

1. Tell us how you got started and what it is you do?
Kerstin and I met in Lisbon about a year ago. We had both recently moved here for love, still didn't know the city very well, and started roaming the bairros, the neighborhoods, together, hills up and down. Like this we stumbled into many odd little stores, specialized in screws or ropes, pans or buttons, many still holding stock from ages ago – things that in more capitalized countries like Germany have long vanished. We were just sparking with ideas what to use this or that for, and during coffee breaks our paper napkins were covered with little drawings. Soon we felt like a good team and decided that this was what we wanted to do, to design things from the materials and skills we find here.
2. What inspires you?
Places. I have been a nomad for the last ten years, living in Tokyo, in Berlin, in Cape Town and Maputo, and now in Lisbon. In Japan, a place I've always felt a very strong connection to, i learned a lot about simplicity and the beauty of time. Mingei and Sori Yanagi has influenced me a lot. Berlin stands for nowness, as it reacts very quickly to what moves us. My friends there who run very individual shops or labels like stue, or Wolfen, are also a huge inspiration. Africa told me an excellent lesson in inventiveness. It's really amazing how people there see something in any bit of material and turn it into something useful and beautiful, with the most basic means. Lisbon is a great place to live. It's beautiful city full of history, it's much slower than other European capitals, and quite affordable. It still has a wealth of culture and crafts not yet wiped out by brands and global mainstream. Nature here is powerful, in the lush old gardens, or on the wild beaches and mountains close by.

3. How did you develop your technical skills?
I've always liked making things, remodeling apartments, making my own clothes. I studied Industrial Design but i prefer learning by doing. You can learn a lot from asking and watching the right people. And a career as an interior and fashion stylist didn't hurt.

4. What's your favourite piece?
In general i like things that stay with me. Things i use every day for decades and i never get tired of. This can be a piece of designer furniture as well as a worn wooden spoon. That's what we would like to achieve with products for ANVE, to create things that stay with their owners. We have just started, but i think the LABORATORIO lamp might be something like this.

5. What do you do when you're not creating/selling?
Creating without selling. I also work as a photographer, and Kerstin works in the field of contemporary art.

6. Where would you like your business to be in 5/6 years time?
In Portugal. Apart from this i find it difficult to plan for such a long period. It would be great if we could make a living out of what we enjoy doing. 7. Any advice for someone starting out?
Personally i would recommend to stay true to your ideas and act ethically. You can't cope with the sharks anyway.

Etsy picks: chandeliers

Until I get the Art Deco mansion of my dreams (complete with sweeping staircase in an entrance hall crowned with a chandelier the size of a small elephant), I'm going to have to make do with a small one over the dining room table. But how to choose? Etsy, as per usual, is the first port of call. From the imaginative (the canning jars) to the whimsical (the bubbles), to the downright weird (vase chandelier anyone?), the number of items here is really spoiling me for choice.

Vintage clear canning jars chandelier, $149

Bubble ball chandelier, £222

VESSEL-FLARE limited-edition upcycled pendant light, $125

Vintage brass hanging chandelier, $298

Cary's Mill III. Clear Holophane CHANDELIER Trio, $189

Chic for chicks that click: fashionable DLR camera bags

Isn’t it funny how words can completely change over the course of a few decades? About sixty years ago, the word “tourist” evoked images of a smartly suited couple sipping champagne on a propeller plane before having their trunks taken to a luxurious hotel whilst they went out and calmly enjoyed the sights. These days, when I hear the word “tourist”, I think burnt balding heads, socks worn under sandals and larger louts. Whilst I have thankfully managed to avoid falling into any of those categories myself so far, the one that does always mark me as a stranger is the big ugly blue foam “lunchbox” that I tote my DLR camera around in. So thank heavens and hurrah for the new generation of “it” bags, all of them aimed at chicks that click on the go. They're mostly made of leather and all made by hand (support the small suppliers!).

Observe (geddit?):

THEIT Bag, quilted, beautiful city chic (£99 - but there's a waitlist!)

The Kelly Moore JuJu Bag (£153 - another waitlist, until late April!)


Design your own bag by PorteenGear (a snip at just £80 each and she has various beautiful red paisley fabrics on offer with a dark brown leather base...)

American opulence: Ralph Lauren Home

Whilst surfing the web (which, I have discovered, is indeed largely made of cats, see Mystic Mog for reference) looking for photos of a library with a fireplace so that I could further my dream of a large country house, I stumbled across Ralph Lauren Home. When I was a little girl, I used to steal my father's Polo perfume because I loved it so much but I haven't had much else to do with the brand. However, they have branched out away from their traditional clothing roots into a designer homewares sphere and have launched a range that really spoke to me called "Brook Street". Said to channel the "impeccable luxury of Saville Row and the glamour of the Hollywood golden years", this is exactly the kind of city pad I'd love to have for day to day living when I'm in town away from my beautiful period country house (a girl can dream...). This monochrome palette is relaxing yet stylish and if you'll excuse me, I have to go and look for some black and white tiles. I'm not too sure about the purple sitting room carpet or the zebra rug though. Focus instead on the wooden panelled walls behind the bed, the rich and glossy desk and the enormous candles in the dining room.

Etsy picks: The glorious lightbulb

It’s a dark and gloomy day. The sky, grey and pregnant, looms menacingly and rains down piercingly cold water. On days like today, if I’m not dreaming of hot crumpets in front of the fire in the library, I’m pondering how to add a little more light to my basement flat. And it was whilst lazily surfing Etsy in search of the perfect chandelier that I came across these little gems. Who knew that there were so many things that could be done with the humble lightbulb? Buy them. Buy them now!

Repurposed Lightbulb Vase (brown base) $11 from StarRedesigns


Large Lightbulb Fishbowl, $18 from StarRedesigns

Lightbulb teapot, $10 by brennabay

Concrete lightbulb wall hooks, $60 for three from Whamodyne

Industrial Oxbow Pendant from $100 by phdconceptions