Kelly Bag – Did you ever dream of it?

Now you can have one for free! No I´m not kidding. See here:

When you click here or on the pic above you are leaded to the web-site of Hermes. There you just have to look for this little icon:

And the Kelly-bag waits for you in 8 different designs.

You can download the pdf-file, print it on thick paper, fold, glue it and in the end: be a star on the next party. The best of it: You don´t need to be a Eco-orientated, green-down-to-the-bones Girl to understand that it´s really a great, fashionable accessory! The only bad thing is, I suppose, that it doesn´t carry so much weight as usual being made only of paper… And as we all know: The handbag of a Lady is a dark hole, or to be more cheering up: We are all Mary Poppins, aren´t we?

The stars are on their way

to their new homes. Fare Well and don´t talk to strangers on your way! When you are in your new families: Behave yourself and be nice to the pets

And for those who hadn´t the chance to get one made by myself: Here is the crochet-pattern for download in English and German.

Industrial Designer – Josh Jakus

Today I want to focus on one of the bags I presented yesterday and the man who invented them: Josh Jakus and his UM Bags.

The designer is living and designing  in Berkeley and created the wonderful bags shown above. They are made of factory excess industrial wool felt, which would otherwise go to waste. The bags come along in different sizes and unzip completly flat, a perfect travel accessory.

For me the combination of felt and colorful-zipper makes the union between function, form and functionality visible. I would appreciate to have them in our shop!

Bags with Wood…Lether…Felt…

Here are some collectables I picked up on-line lately:

(Lara Camaron´s Birch Clutch)

(Neiko Designs “Olivia”)

(“Love Birds” Wristlet from cha cha)

(Queen Bee “Edith Tote”)

(UMBags by Josh Jakus)

The rainy, cold temperatures outside make me look for products with a warm, cosy and homely touch. What about you, do you have any fluffy, cuddly items in your favourit box?

Get to know some more bags

Last week a really nice dutch woman, who I told enthusiastically about our new business, gave me two names of Dutch designers, producing bags. I want to share these information with you and hear your opinion about these bags.

The first bags are made from two designers called Ontwerperduo from Eindhoven. The really nice and simple bags called ‘something old something new’ are made from old blankets. Look at them! I really love them.

pics from ontwerperduo

The other company, very nice as well, is a company located in Rotterdam called Vlieger & Vandam. This company seems to be bigger, because they have a really big collection of handbags and toiletry bags. Please pay attention to the weapons details!!

pics form Vlieger & Vandam

Finally once again many thanks to Ingrid for sharing her knowledge about the dutch handbag design scene and I am waiting for your comments.

Feeling Starlett-Glamour

Oh look, what I found: Anja Bruhn and her Accessories-Design!

Can you hear the perfect dance-music flipping around in your head right now?

Dam, dam, didam, dam, dam, derdamdam, dam, dam, didam, dam, dam, derdamdam.

And this wonderful woman is the first to have great belts too. An extraordinary exception!

(all images from bagios)

Numbers… or Work in Progress

… sorry to bother you with this project again, but I got a new camera which is soooo fabulous,  I can´t keep me away from taking macro-pics… tomorrow we will have some different news I promise, till then another red, numbered chaos

Preparations…psssst!

Did you start your christmas-preparation-phase jet? I started today. So you may guess what´s that gonna be.

Not too hard question but will be rewarded with one of the little stars I showed here. Just leave the answer in a comment, the winners will be designated on sunday. Pdf of the pattern for the little christmas accessoires will follow.

What was going on in Cardiff – part 2

It’s already several days ago that I wrote about my stay in Cardiff and I promised you to continue my Cardiff blog. So here it is…

The reason why I was in Cardiff was the event of the year: the Designmanagement Europe Awards 2008. This is a prize  for good practice of design management within their companies that exists since 2007. So this year was the second edition of this prize and a lot of really nice companies applied for it.

During this event at the Wales Millenium Centre in the heart of Cardiff Bay the winning companies in 7 different categories were announced and a glamorous trophy was given to them.

Here are some of my most favourite winning companies (Click on the pic to see a bigger PDF of the poster):

My personal absolute favourite is Madara Cosmetics in the category ‘first time design project’. It’s a Latvian eco-cosmetics company that was founded by three enthusiastic young women like me and Katrin are. That is probably the most fascination issue for me. And their corporate identity is great: nice photos, nice graphics and nice products as well!

The other one is Industreal (category  micro companies) an Italian company that produces very nice accessories products: vases, …

Further more: a Belgian company called Vlaemsch( ) (category  micro companies). They have really funny, off-key, crazy products like for example a sculpture of Jesus Christ that comes together with 4 nails in a small package and you have to crucify the Jesus yourself.

And Finnish architects called Plusarkkitehdit (category  micro companies) offering some very, very nice wooden single-family houses. If I  build my own house on day, I will take one of these for sure.

If you want to see a list of all the 39 winning companies and learn more about the DME Award please click here.

After the ceremony all the guests were invited to come backstage what was quite a big experience for all. It’s far from everyday routine to be backstage in a huge theater and it was great atmosphere: very dark, DME red light everywhere, nice food, delicious drinks. We all had great fun.

And now coming to my part of the whole event: people had the chance to have a look at the exhibition as well that I set up together with some helping hands during the day. Many thanks to all the helping hands again! The whole exhibition was the outcome of hard work in designing posters, collecting products, contacting companies for material… So that is why I made several trips to Cardiff recently.

Unfortunately this is my last job within this European project and finally I can say: I appreciated a lot the work there, the people I got to know and I am a bit sad to give it up. BUT: I am looking forward to our new chanllange as well.

Wood artist – Frank Leske

Scrabbling about wood, I remembered a friend of my mom who is artist specialized on wooden sculptures – Frank Leske. Barbara and me went to an exhibition this spring, where we both had the chance to meet him. The event took place at the park of Menschel Vitalresort. The areal where his work was set in place is picturesque. You have a wide meadow with wild flowers, butterflies and the scent of herbs, just perfect to sit down for a while, listening to the music of the bush crickets. The day was beautiful and inspiring, a kind of starting point for our idea.