It’s no surprise that I’m swooning over this headboard. It looks like my pottery! It’s so beautiful, and I’m now inspired to make a huge plate with this same wavy edge. Check back in two weeks!

This house is wee, but packed with character and charm. The furnishings are pretty basic, it’s the art and the plants that give the space life and personality. I’m lousy with plants, but after seeing this I’m inspired to snap up a few green friends for our kitchen window. I gather spider plants are easy to care for. Let’s start there.

I love the carving in the drywall, by extraordinary sculptor, Valentine Schlegel. This how I imagine it might feel to be a pearl inside a shell. There are no hard edges on boats, for obvious reasons, and I wish more homes were built in the same way. It’s softer, kinder and more natural. Give this piece a skim on why people are drawn to curved architecture. “We prefer curves because they signal lack of threat, i.e. safety.” Like a pearl feels inside a shell.

It was this Gucci ad that drew me to her work, and now that I’ve discovered Ruby Barber’s floral artistry, I’m hooked. Based in Berlin, Barber is one half of the creative team behind Mary Lennox. The name of the floral studio references the heroine of Frances Hodgson Burnett’s classic novel, The Secret Garden. Barber’s work spans from floral styling and set decoration to huge-scale installations. She’s partnered with Gucci, Asics and Zara Home, to name a few.  Wild, decadent and ethereal, it’s hard not to skip a breath when you see Barber’s creations. One writer described them quite perfectly as “perishable artworks.” That they only last a week or two, a month at most, is part of what makes them so exquisite.

My brain is blancmange today, but I dd want to share this image, only because bookshelves like these are a bit of a fantasy, (Tom Wolfe is the only author I can make out) as is a sofa pink like the pinkest June peony.

While you salivate over them peaches and that ice cream, all I’m thinking about is the plate. What a pretty, pretty thing. I think I’d always choose white plates, but this one is so unique. Even a floret of broccoli would look beautiful on this one.

In preparation for our move, I’ve spent weeks and weeks culling our possessions, in the hopes of lightening our load. And yet, we’ve still managed to fill two 24-foot trucks. Even as the movers were loading the truck this morning, I was taking things from their hands to plonk on the curb. “Free vintage Italian posters, please take one.” The idea of living as minimalists for a year, with only our bare essentials held a certain appeal, until we found an apartment large enough that we didn’t have to. What drew me to the space was that I could see our life in it. And that included all the crazy papier-mâché , paintings, textiles, glass and ceramics we’ve collected over two decades. The editing experience has been a good one, in that I now know what we own. Duplicates of photographs were discarded. Almost all the kid’s art, too. Clothes, toys, books and shoes, all tossed or re-homed. I’m a maximalist, and I’m sentimental, so while I wouldn’t make it into the William Morris school of design, his words helped me as I packed. Have nothing in your house that you do not know to be useful, or believe to be beautiful. 

When I was a little girl I used to scribble my name on everything. The urge to leave a mark on a wall, in the sand or on on the radiators, as I once I did, is so instinctively human. At least, that’s what I say to my Mum every time the incident comes up. It wasn’t the inky scribble that made her mad though. It was that I refused to admit to it. And that I was willing to let my brother carry the weight of my actions. Little sneak. Not along ago, she was setting the table for a dinner party, and she found Iole’s name written in ink on her white table cloth. “The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree,” she wrote in a text. I recognized Antimo’s penmanship, immediately. Little sneak. For the past month or so, I’ve encouraged the children to paint, draw and scribble all over the walls. The walls are their canvas, until they all come down. Everywhere I look now, I see ice creams and flowers, two-headed creatures, trees and sunbeams and hockey sticks. It’s quite magical. Hopefully, some of that urge to leave a mark is being satisfied. Although I foresee many more scribbles on radiators and linens in our future.