33 - GREAT GATSBY

I'm so looking forward to seeing "The Great Gatsby" and so over excited by the very Baz Luhrmann-ness of the whole thing that I designed a set (or two) of stationery in honour (and bought a new typeface - any excuse).

I took the general look of the era and aimed for a modern treatment. I was thinking more J-Z than J-Gatsby or at least that level of celebrity, wealth and fame. I had found a typeface that I had fallen in love with too and a Great Gatsby styled invite seemed the perfect excuse to buy it. The font is called Port and it just seems to exude the art deco feel in a very modern way with geometric curves, hairlines and an almost navajo (think Coachella coolness) feel to parts of it. I'm itching to work with this in a live project now so if any of you are looking for a Great Gatsby inspired wedding stationery set (or any stationery set for that matter) then I'm your girl.

Fallen for the Great Gatsby style too? Follow my Pinterest board here, I'll continue adding more to it as time goes by. Its a look and feel I think has a lot of mileage and can be quite beautiful and pretty in an un-assuming way as well as being all-out blow your mind glamour.

32 - Party House

Today I am featuring a house designed specifically with parties and live music recording in mind. As far as houses on the market go, there aren't many cooler than this.

Since I got married in 2006 I have always had it in my mind that I'd like to own a wedding venue. Something a little, different. When we were venue hunting we were plagued by places that just weren't us (call us fussy but neither of us could envision ourselves getting married somewhere that it looked like several people had already been sick on the carpet - just don't get the fascination with over fussy carpets) and really just wanted somewhere that felt quite homely and un-pretentious. I'm chucking to myself now I read what I've just written as I think about where we actually got married - not pretentious but not un-assuming either, I'll post on this another time.

I digress. This house was designed by Peter Womersley in the 50's as a wedding gift to his brother (does anyone actually have relatives that generous these days?) and I just can't help have a nagging feeling thinking should I? Should I attempt to buy this beautiful place and host fabulous parties and gatherings and during the days open up to architecture students and design appreciators? Should I buy a home that would be begging for me to splash out on stacks of mid-century furniture? Should I begin to build a legacy that my children would one day be proud to take over? Could I be faithful to every detail of this time-capsule of a building?

I have dreams of a Smog Shoppe style space with living walls all around, or a renovated barn in the middle of nowhere with lights strung from the roof and and enchanting feel about it, I long to turn an industrial unit in a city centre into a hidden oasis that is part garden centre, part inner-city farm, part venue. Maybe this house is a beautiful idea, but not quite The Dream. Lately I've been trying to live by a rule that if something isn't high on my agenda or dreamy (to me) then I leave it to someone else who will appreciate it - whatever it is - and do it justice. The house is share-worthy though, and if any of you happen upon buying it, I'd like to come and visit some day. Click here to be taken to the sale site The Modern House (where I have taken the images from) or for more information on the building. The Modern House also promote some seriously cool holiday rentals, I'm eying up the one in Hunstanton, Norfolk and wondering if I dare risk the children there! 

31 - Narrative

I've known since the days of sitting on river banks colouring in with my Nan whilst my Dad and Granddad were fishing that I wanted to do something creative with my life. I've been a graphic designer for a decade now (wowzers) and that feeling has never gone away.

Lately I've been thinking about the products I create (and am beginning to curate) and really honing in on what I already know and the process behind the knowledge and actions that get it all done. I want to transfer that greatness in to some other areas that I'm interested in and at the same time give an even stronger footing to whats already there.

I have realised that beyond design and creating, all of my true loves have a narrative quality to them. Magazines with photographic spreads that tell a story from start to finish in eight photographs. Books that weave a character and their tales in to my mind and heart from a first person point of view. Movies and TV that draw me in to their own colourful reality via a story-teller character. I'm even talking way back to Never Ending Story as one of my earliest film loves, I wanted to fly that luck dragon so so badly! I'm not a writer or an illustrator but I crave the feeling of telling it all larger than life in a way that is memorable, nostalgic, meaningful and has staying power.

Right now my hero is Ed Bloom in the movie Big Fish. The man who tells every story in his life in such a fantastical way that each moment is embellished and elevated to the stuff of legend. I truly believe that we all have the power to harness our stories and experiences and root them in nostalgia and a touch of magic to make our lives immortal.

All images taken from the film "Big Fish" - Columbia Pictures Industries, Inc - 2003

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30 - New Blog Theme!

Hello one and all!

I have a new blog theme! I'm pretty excited about it but as with all new things it needs a few tweaks and changes that I need to figure out and the images that I have previously placed are not quite a perfect fit, going forward I will make sure everything is properly sized.

I'm working on some pretty exciting stuff right now. I have unfortunately fallen prey to the excitement trap of starting (or having ideas for) so many fancy new ideas that I keep running between them all like a kid in a playground but not committing to (or finishing!) any one single thing yet. I always find that trouble when I do self initiated projects as there is no set deadline and no client to worry about disappointing. I also find that it's just. never. done. EVER! Anyone else have that same issue?

I have a new desk and re-furbed studio to post on (I love the desk so much but now need a new chair to go with - thinking of getting a Gym Ball as I like to fidget whilst I work and can't stand the idea of getting a stool or fixed seat), some recent projects to post up and... ah you know what, just you wait and see!

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29 - How Alfies Studio came to be...

Image taken from "No Matter What" by Debi Gliori (found on notsupermum.com)

I often find that when networking and meeting new people when I mention what I do and I introduce Alfies Studio I am often asked "Why Alfies Studio?". They want to know where the name came from or (correctly) assume that it is the name of one of my children. Here is the story of Alfies Studio.

I have been self employed (sometimes whilst also having a "day job") since 2004 (nearly ten years, yikes!) and never really had a business name until a life changing event forced me to get serious about life, love, business, all of it, in 2008.

We were expecting our first baby, due date 7th April. We kept joking about the stork and Parcel Force and damaged goods and all of that, our stork must have been clumsier than we could ever have imagined. After a few issues for the baby being breech we had a scan on the 2nd April. The scan was to see which way around the baby was and if I may have to book in for a c-section as the consultant was not keen on the idea of delivering a breech baby. I was a little concerned about having felt a lack of movement the previous day too (after being out with a friend for lunch and a wander around Bath I thought my 39 weeks pregnant self was just tired out and hadn't noticed any kicks because of that) so they were to check on that also. After a Registrar, and another Registrar (worried at this point), and a Consultant (terrified and certain) and finally a Sonographer (white knuckles holding on to the bed and wanting to be sick with revelation of what was happening) tried frantically to find a visual of the baby's heartbeat I knew, before anyone even opened their mouth to tell us. Our baby had died. 

If I'm completely honest my memories from then on seem to be in the third person, as if watching myself. I have some views of my own, of sitting in the hospital garden watching a Robin whilst waiting for the induction medication to do its thing, of the Tiffin that we bought and shared in the hospital canteen (too sick to eat but just needing something) of being given an overnight room reserved for cases like ours away from the main labour areas full of new life (which we now "affectionately" refer to as "The Room of Doom"). I remember that this time five years ago we had a corned beef sandwich (all that was left from the dinner rounds) and were watching the new Dan Cruickshank series on the wall-mounted t.v which we had been looking forward to for weeks. I remember a haze of gas and air and contractions that would not progress during the night, Pethidine around 1pm which knocked me out completely as they had super-sized my dosage and being assigned our own midwife around 3 in the afternoon to help us through things. By 6pm I had gone through the only physical "birth" process I would ever go through (Dominic and Evelyn both being c-sections for being breech too). I was empty both physically and mentally. That night we drove home having left around quarter to ten, not with-child in any sense. I vaguely remember that there were flowers waiting for us from my good friend Sarah (these could have come the next day, I don't really remember) and the next morning I woke up and was so tired that for a second (only a second) I had forgotten what had happened in the previous two days. Then I realised and looked over at the crib in the corner of the room, already made up with boxes of clothes and nappies laundered and ready to be used in boxes underneath. The moments following, the next weeks (months) are all a bit of a haze. We moved across the country to the new home that we had bought for our new family. Our hamsters jumped ship too and died around the same time. It seemed like such a lonely place for just the two of us.

When I finally started to get it together again I decided not to go back to working for someone else full time (I always wondered a little bit if the stress and long hours in the final few months had contributed to what happened, no reason was ever found) and to throw everything in to making a real business of my own that I could call the shots with and could grow around a one day (hopefully) growing family. I felt like I owed it to our A.L.F (so called because the first time we ever saw a hand sweep across my stomach it looked like a little Alien Life Form) to achieve the greatness that they would never be able to achieve and so my business has been since then, and always will be, Alfies Studio.

Stillbirths happen ten times more frequently than cot deaths. I had heard of cot death and taken measures to prevent it such as a ventilated mattress and bedding and cellular blankets etc but knew nothing of stillbirths or that it could happen to us.
For more information go to http://www.why17.org/About-Sands.html or http://www.justgiving.com/why17 to donate to the research of Sands.

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