House featured in Cleo magazine!

I was very excited that my house was featured in Cleo magazine this month!

The article is called 'Home is where the art is' and looks at the homes of four creative women and their different interior decor and style ideas.  It was great to be featured alongside other creative women from around the world - including Karly Depew from Ohio who custom designs wedding stationery and fine paper goods under the label Oscar +Emma, Susan Banchek a jewellery designer from Philadelphia who's label is Esther K, and Eleonore Bridge from Paris who is a web consultant, photographer and art director.

The homes featured are full of an ecclectic mix of patterns, colours, found treasures and great style ideas - and they all show you don't have to have an enormous budget or buy expensive designer pieces to have a lovely personal and inviting home.

Thanks Cleo magazine - I was very flattered my little house was included in the article!

New 'Me Old China' jewellery on Etsy

After a busy few weeks working at the design studio I'm back working from home again, and have finally had time today to list some new 'upcycled' plate jewellery onto my Me Old China shop!

I've still got some more pieces to list - but I'd forgotton how time consuming it was to photograph the pieces, write the listings, upload the photo's and convert the prices into USA dollars. 

I need to get some more wall plates made and add these to the shop as I've sold a few of these recently - including two which made it all the way to the States which was exciting but also a bit nerve-wracking to know if they would make it all in one piece!  I've got some new ideas and possible designs I'd like to trial with the next collection of wall plates which will be fun - so I best get cracking on some new designs rather than procrastinating by writing this!!

1950's fabric

I fell in love with this cute 1950's fabric as it depicts my favourite subject matter of all things related to vintage or retro kitchenalia.  It makes me want to put on an apron and bake a cake!

It's very pretty and I love the vibrant red next to the soft mint green.  I'm not sure yet if I'll make anything from the fabric.....or just use it as inspiration.

Oh well - I'm off to have a cup of tea and look at cake recipes ;-)

New second-hand shop finds!

I had a pretty busy week last week as I was back working at the textile design studio where I used to work full time. I left working there last year to freelance and to set up Me Old China , but I've been helping out in the design studio whilst a few people are away. It's been nice to work in a busy studio environment again and get to work with a bunch of really creative people. Freelancing can sometimes be a little isolating and lonely, and I do miss interacting with creative people and getting inspiration and learning from other designers.

However, one of the best things with being back at the design studio is getting to visit all the second-hand and charity shops in the area - and I managed to pick up a few great finds!...

... such as this very cute map desk!

It 's in great condition for it's age - I'm guessing it's from the 70's as some of the geography is a little out of date.

I also found this fab retro patterned bone china tea-cup and saucer by Colclough China, England. Colclough China was founded in 1890 but sadly ceased to manufacture in the mid 1990's. In the 1950's they merged with Ridgway and this pattern must have been produced sometime after this as the backstamp denotes the name Ridgway as well as Colclough.

I love that it's in olive green and soft ochre colours - and whilst it's floral in nature, the pattern is a stylised and retro interpretation. Too cute!

Along with the tea-cup and saucer I picked up this sweet floral oval shaped plate. It depicts a small cluster of flowers, leaves and berries but in an autumnal colour palette - and I like it because it's unusual to find this muted colouring for a floral plate.

I'm back working at the design studio this week as well - so I'll definitely be making a few more trips to the local charity shops at lunchtime! Fingers crossed for some more great finds...

The Loop

Today I'm profiling a fantastic website called The Loop.

The Loop is an Australian-based career networking site especially set up for creative professionals. Companies & individuals can promote themselves online by creating a free online profile which includes multimedia portfolio, images, photo's and resume. How very cool is that!

The site showcases the work of various professional creatives (both national and international) including designers, art directors, illustrators, animators, producers, editors, photographers, stylists, make-up artists, publicist, marketers, writers and artists. Phew!

It's great if you're looking for work within the creative field as there are lots of industry jobs listed, and it's also a fantastic way of promoting yourself and your work to people looking to find the right illustrator / designer / photographer / stylist etc for a job.

The best bit is you can upload different projects you've worked on with as many images as you like, and create your own 'website' within the site. I think it's such a fantastic concept and I've recently set up my own little profile with some images and examples of my work which you can see at The Loop/Lucy King.

It's a great resource and really easy to use. Do go and check out the website - it is a fairly new venture and it's great to support the people who are helping to support the creative industry.

I'm also putting a permanant link to The Loop under 'handy resources for creative businesses'.

You can read more about how The Loop got started here: