Inspiration Profile - Niki, My Scandinavian Home

Here we are at the end of a short week and I am finishing off with a Inspiration Profile all the way from Malmo, Sweden. Meet Niki, the editor behind My Scandinavian Home. Enjoy and have a great Easter all.

Niki

Name:Niki

What do you do: I am the editor behind the daily interior design blog My Scandinavian Home

Where do you live: Malmö, Sweden (I’m originally from London)

What are you working on: I look for a daily dose of fabulous Scandinavian home tours to share with my readers on My Scandinavian Home.

Niki's very own Scandinavian Home

Who/what inspires me: Scandinavian design, the work of talented Scandinavian architects, interior stylists/designers and photographers, Pinterest, magazines, other fabulous blogs, travel, sailing, my little girls, nature, sunshine, the first signs of spring...

I work best: In the afternoon/ evening. I am horrible at mornings (even after a super strong Swedish coffee!).

What I do when I’m stuck for inspiration: I get out into the great outdoors and take a walk along the beach or in the forest and try not to think about anything except the world around me.

The best advice I have been given is: Believe in yourself.

My latest discovery is: Finca’s (rural homes) in Mallorca in the Balearic Islands. One day I’d like to spend a year living in a finca with my family working on my blog (and sitting by the pool!).

Books that I get inspiration from: Books are so important for inspiration. I once gave my sister one and it changed her life (her husband and her upped sticks and moved to the Balearic Islands in Spain!). I love interior books and am currently waiting to get my hands on  Northern Delights: Scandinavian Homes, Interiors + Design. I also love autobiographies about inspirational people who have done incredible things.

Magazines that inspire me: Elle Decoration, Elle Interiör, Residence, Red, Covet Garden

Blogs that I enjoy: oooooh so difficult to choose. Is there even enough space for that?! If I had to pick just three I’d say, La Maison D’Anna G and SF Girl By Bay, Vosges Paris but I follow tonnes!

My favourite room at home is: Our open plan dining / sitting room. I call it the engine room of the house as it’s where everything happens; long breakfasts, arts and crafts with the girls, Sunday roasts with family and friends, planning projects with my husband (one day we’d love to sail around the world). 

My office is: On the top floor of our house next to a large glass door leading out onto a balcony. It feels like the sun is always shining up there, it’s such a lovely, bright room!

What am I looking forward to: I’m in the process of updating my blog with the talented Ana from Blog Milk, I’m so excited as I think it will be fab! We’re also about to go on a family ski holiday to the Austrian Alps next week – yay! Can’t wait! X

Want to keep up with Niki and all her Scandinavian inspiration? Get your daily dose here. She is also on Pinterest and Facebook.

Northern Delights, edited by Emma Fexeus and S. Ehmann

 Photographs - Niki's home used with permission by My Scandinavian Home, Northern Delights book via Gestalten.

Kinfolk Magazine

Cover photo by Parker Fitzgerald

Have you come across Kinfolk magazine yet? It is a beautifully designed quarterly publication from Portland, Oregon. Kinfolk celebrates all things about small gatherings and on simple ways to spend time together - whether it is over food, travelling or other meaningful activities. It is hard not to be inspired by the great photography and is a lovely reminder to enjoy the simplicity of being with family and friends. These images come from the latest issue.

Photo by Clement Pascal

Photo by Leo Patrone

Photo by Tec Pataja

Photo by Laura Dart

Photo by Kathrin Koschitzki

Photographs via Kinfolk.

Home of Karen Walker

The latest Inside out magazine has a great spread on New Zealand fashion designer, Karen Walker's home in Auckland. Effortlessly cool and contemporary.
Photographs by Emma Bass via Homelife.

Inspiration Profile - Kirsten Matthew

It's the end of another busy week and we have a great Inspiration Profile for you today. Say hello to Kirsten Matthew, editor of Urbis magazine. She'll be a busy lady this weekend with the Urbis Designday so I hope all you Auckland readers are checking it out and for the rest of us in New Zealand, we can read the new issue out this weekend. Enjoy!

Kirsten Matthew

Urbis magazine Issue 73 - out this weekend

Name: Kirsten Matthew

What do you do: I’ve been a writer and editor for 15 years and the editor of Urbis for six months.

Where do you live: Auckland, New Zealand.

What are you working on: I’m working on the editorial line-up for our June/July issue, which will be dedicated to small spaces – apartments, baches and cabins. At this stage in the process I’m juggling the organisation of photo shoots, assigning writers to stories, editing copy and thinking about potential covers.

Photo: Emma-Jane Hetherington

Who/what inspires me: I’m inspired by people – artists, makers, dancers, chefs and designers – that are going against the grain and trying to do something special and different in a world that makes it increasingly difficult to be an artist. My friends, who have great taste, big hearts and inappropriate senses of humour, inspire me too, as do my parents, who are into working really hard and getting nothing for free.

I work best: First thing in the morning, before I do anything else. If I get to the computer and do even 15 minutes of work as soon as I wake up, I can take a break and know I can come back to it  any time. But if work isn’t the first thing I do, it’s really difficult for me to settle down to business. I’m hopeless at working at night; my wheels fall off by about 6.30pm.

What I do when I’m stuck for inspiration: When I lived in New York (I was there for 10 years before moving home six months ago) I’d step out onto the street and pound the pavements, take a wander through the art galleries of Chelsea, or spend the afternoon at a museum or a movie. Nowadays I walk down under the harbour bridge and around Auckland’s waterfront with some ’70s disco on my iPod. Or make a cup of tea and start rifling through the pile of interiors’ magazines on my table.

The best advice I have been given is: Twice in my career I’ve been told off by bosses for being too self-deprecating. The second time, my boss at American InStyle explained to me that people are far too busy to think about what I’ve done or haven’t done and suggested I stop being a wallflower and start promoting myself. It’s a very non-New Zealand thing, self-promotion, but since then I’ve become better at saying, ‘I can do that’, and, ‘I’m good at this’, and my career has prospered because of it.

Photo: Scott Burrows

Photo: Klaus Vyhnalek

My latest discovery is: I’ve just rediscovered Grey Gardens. I must have seen it almost a dozen times over the past 10 years and I always get something new out of watching it. It’s a documentary, made in the ’70s, about Little Edie and Big Edie Beale, a mother-daughter duo living in squalor in the Hamptons, New York, despite their socialite upbringing. They are completely bonkers and so inspirational that I came away from my last viewing determined to integrate some of their ways into my life. I think I’ll steer clear of sharing the house with masses of cats and raccoons and eating only ice cream and paté, but I will take fashion inspiration from Little Edie and her genius outfits created out of curtains and towels and pay more attention to the lyrics of show tunes.

Books that I get inspiration from: Although I read lots of novels and really enjoy them, nothing beats a great biography. There is no film script or piece of fiction in the world as interesting to me as a real life story. I’m mad about anything written by or about the Mitford Girls, who are super-inspiring in the way they lived their lives (except perhaps, for the one that became a Nazi). And I love a good media-person biography; My Paper Chase, the Harold Evans memoir was a recent read and Grace, Vogue creative director Grace Coddington’s memoir, is next.

Magazines that inspire me: I like magazines that are artful, clever and that have a very strong sense of what they are. I read all sorts of magazines for all sorts of reasons. When I need inspiration in the craft of writing it’s the New Yorker, Vanity Fair (the serious features, not the silly celeb profiles), T, which is the New York Times’ Sunday magazine and New York magazine. I hate shopping but adore fashion, so when it comes to clothes, I’m inspired by Vogue, where the clothes are treated like pieces of art. For inspiration related to my job, I look to Belle, Elle Décor, Habitus and the much-missed American home magazine Domino.

Blogs that I enjoy: I’m not a great follower of blogs, in fact I hardly ever look at them for work-related things, but I follow overseas friends on their blogs and dip in and out of Dlisted, Internet K Hole, Girls of a Certain Age and The Selby.

My favourite room at home is: My bedroom. I am really big on sleeping – early nights, disco naps on the weekend etc. I also am not a TV watcher, so if it’s dark and I’m at home, I’m in bed reading or sleeping. And if it’s early in the morning, I’m in bed working. My bedroom is also home to the things that mean the most to me: a tapestry my grandmother made; a cushion a far-away friend had made for me from French antique linen; my jewellery box filled with family pieces.

My office is: At home, my office is my bed or the dining room table, an old antique door fashioned into a tabletop that is adorned with a candelabra from Paris and usually a vase of pink flowers. At the Urbis offices, it’s a desk in the middle of a big, noisy room filled with people that I am glad to see every day.

What am I looking forward to: I’m looking forward to tomorrow, which is Urbis Designday, the magazine’s annual day of events in showrooms all over Auckland. I’ve never been to an Urbis Designday before, but I’m excited to see what it’s like, what the showrooms produce with their creative partners, and to catch up with everyone in the industry. It’s been a lot of work for the Urbis team, so once it’s over I’ll be looking forward to a cup of tea and a lie down.

Thank you Kirsten. If you want to keep up to date with Urbis magazine - check out their website  here and Kirsten Matthew is on Twitter - you can follow her here.

Photo: Namgoong Sun

All photographs are used with permission from Kirsten Matthew and Urbis.

Ilse Crawford Speaks

Ilse Crawford is one of my favourite interior designers - and here are two great videos where she talks about two past projects and what she believes makes great interior design.



Crawford makes a great statement about places being more like a home, on a more domestic and 'human' scale - her examples of the office environment and how the spaces could be better utilised for interaction and working comfort is an excellent reference. I agree that it is the human use of the space that informs the practical side of the design.
She talks again about the human quality in the next video - about how the power of interiors can enhance the senses and create an experience.




See the cool Mathias Dahlgren restaurant and food bar here.
Videos via YouTube.

Sliding Door Over Book Shelf

By John Dwyer Architects

I like how this door opens and closes over the bookcase. Clever.
Photograph via John Dwyer.

Chair 170

This is my chair of the moment - the Chair 170 by Takahashi Asako for Feelgood Designs. Need I say more?
Photographs via Feelgood Designs.

Moby Celebrates L.A. Architecture

I am off on a overseas trip at the end of May and on my way to Europe, I am stopping in Los Angeles for 5 days. It looks like I need to check out the Pacific Standard Time Presents: Modern Architecture in L.A. while I am there. Remember Moby? Not only is he a DJ and musician, he is also an architecture blogger (who would have thought?). Here he riffs about L.A. architecture.
(Psst, I think this guy does it better - check out this video from last year where Ice Cube talks about the Eames).
Video via Getty Trust.

Colour on Doors

Here's a peek image from a job that I worked on last year - a fully refurbished traditional villa. The clients and I worked on a pared back scheme while highlighting certain traditional details. We used muted colours, rich rugs and crystal chandeliers throughout the main living areas.
I'm looking forward to next Friday as we will have an Inspiration Profile from Urbis magazine editor, Kirsten Matthew. Til then, have a great weekend all.
Photograph by Charlotte Minty.

Inside Out Magazine's Alternate Covers

I know how essential a good magazine cover needs to be to catch the eye of possible reader and to entice them to pick it up. So imagine being given the responsibility to choose the cover?! It must be damn hard at times.
The latest Inside Out magazine is out now and the images above were the four options for this edition - which one would you have chosen? Now go and find out which one made it...
Photographs by Armelle Habib via Homelife.

On the Desktop This Week

Almond trees by Laure Joliet

Oak peg rail from Father Rabbit

Simple bedroom from Est magazine.

Brad Pitt interiors shopping at the Nobilis Paris showroom - wonder what he was looking for?

Paris Fashion Week - Creative Runways

Louis Vuitton Fall/Winter 2013

Chanel Fall/Winter 2013

Paris hosted their Fashion Week recently and I just love checking out the creative fashion runways  - Chanel and Louis Vuitton were standouts this year.
LV's catwalk was decked out like a five star hotel lobby with models walking in and out through the doors - you can see the famous LV cases and bags and hints of the rooms each time the doors were opened. Meanwhile Chanel's modern catwalk was overtaken by a giant globe, which highlighted the brand's locations around the world. The whole experience of watching these shows must be amazing.
Photographs by Scott Schuman - The Sartorialist.

Striking Auckland Home

Featured on Remodelista this morning is this cool New Zealand home by architect Andrew Lister. Located in Waterview, Auckland, this is the home of Japanese actress, Yuri Kinugawa and  Kiwi producer, Owen Hughes who met on location of the New Zealand film, Memory and Desire. The house was Lister's first commission when he started up his own firm - and an award winning one too.
The house is beautifully captured by photographer, Richard Powers and the copper hand sculpture, Bee-Hold is by artist Terry Stringer.
Read more about the clients and their house here.
Photographs by Richard Powers.