beautiful books

part two in my birthday wish blog series. i love reading, but mostly i go for the cheapest available possibility. paperback, second hand, library. however, i really like books with beautiful covers, so why not make a wish for some more precious editions?





penguin launched a wonderful edition of clothbound classics. coralie bickford-smith designed the most beautiful covers i have ever seen, and i wouldn't mind having all the jane austen novels, or the dickens novels, or the whole series, standing in my bookshelves.



yes, this poster is a whole book to put on your wall and read it there. it also is a piece of art to admire every day, and i think it would fit perfectly over our sofa in the living room.

a new tea pot

ever since the day after christmas, my favourite person in the world keeps asking me what i want to have for my birthday - which is in april. so i thought i'd come up with some kind of wishlist which i'll put up on the blog.

first out: a new teapot. considering the amounts of tea that i drink, and the pleasure i take in sipping my tea, it feels strange to only have two teapots, of which one actually is designed for coffee rather than tea.


pretty triangles by ferm living




this traditional white one by höganäs would probably hold twice as much as the one i use right now. perfect for having tea with friends! (they also have very nice bowls and plates... just mentioning)





fine little day has, together with anna backlund, designed some wonderful porcelain for a new label called rym. their mix-and-match concept is wonderful - and i would love one of those teapots (maybe the one with the black pattern, or the pattern with the wooden triangles? or the pattern called "tissage" on the cup in the front?). and maybe one or two mix-matched cups and saucers...

birthday wishlist

getting older is a weird thing. during the last half year or so i have successfully made myself a year older already whenever anybody asked my age - however during these last few weeks i have rather felt a year younger than i am right now, meaning two years younger than i'll be in two weeks time. getting older is a very strange concept indeed.

nevertheless, i thought i'd be smart and post my birthday wishlist a bit sooner than last year.





















kusmi-tea. i love black tea and have been wanting to try some of their sorts for quite some time. how about some st.petersburg or prince wladimir, or some classic earl grey?

























crab-claw necklace from red sofa

























poppy pod necklace from elizabeth scott designs


























large claw necklace from fashionology

























black underbust corset from audra jean

























a little helper in the kitchen: steak thermometer


















lush bathbombs. apart from the massage-bars my absolute favourite lush-product.

grey leather II

i'm still very much into grey leather. this time, it's suede.


















shoes: topshop, shallow (picture from topshop.com)

























bag: jimmy choo for h&m, out in november in selected stores and will cost a fortune. i wish i could find something similar for a little (ok, a lot) cheaper. a simple big grey suede bag with long handles and zipper closure. that can't be too hard, right? (picture via nitrolicious.com)


























ok, this is not grey but black. i just couldn't find a nice grey suede skirt, so i thought this would do nicely in the meantime. h&m divided exclusive, should be out now (and can be found on hm.com and their webshop, where the picture is from as well).

i just wish i wasn't a poor student.

here are some pretty things

from my list to the right. just to visualize. plus some other pretty things i've had my eyes on.

























h&m cardigan with puffy shoulders. lovely. (picture from nitrolicious.com)










































dinsko, lace-up heels. sadly enough no real leather. (picture from dinsko.se)

























black leather bag. found on etsy. fell in love with. (picture from etsy.com)


















topshop albert fringe boots. flat. perfect. would be even better in black. sold out though, in black. (picture from topshop.com)


























h&m jumper with flower print and puffy shoulders. i so hope it won't be sold out when i've saved up for it. (picture from hm.com)

grey leather

dream jacket. dream docs. both in grey leather.














































the docs are a collab by dr. martens for comptoir des cotonniers. apparently they are only available in france, and twice as expensive as the regular docs. still, they would be my first choice, now that i have decided i want a new pair (since i buried my first pair last autumn..). alternatives? black is boring, i'd get the white ones dirty in no time, leaves a pair of purple ones, dark navy or maybe mulberry? i really wish they had a pair in soft light grey leather. they have one in light grey patent, so a normal leather version shouldn't be too far off, should it?

pictures from somewhere in the internet. not mine.

summer shoes

this summer i love shoes in all shades of brown. like those:
















bronx























din sko, deichmann, h&m



















vagabond

and another chance to win

there is another chance to win a dress at grosgrain.. this time it's called the blueberry pie refashion frock, and it is such a sweet sumemr dress in bright colours and a lovely print. you can read more about the frock and the giveaway here...

birthday

it's my birthday today! the weather is lovely and i'll have to go to work in a few minutes, as soon as the cake is ready. tomorrow my favourite person in the world will come here, and in the evening i'll have some friends over for refreshments, meaning wine, cake and what we in german call "schnittchen". i'm looking so much forward to it!

as the big day is already today it's a bit late for a wish-list, but i thought i'd make one anyways, just in case anybody would like to get me something, or in case i forget what i'd like to spend my money on =)



















L'artisan parfumeur - Thé pour un ete Eau de parfum



























trashy diva - trixie2 dress in red

























iittala - the taika series, especially the mugs and bowls. in dark blue and in white with coloured print.
























swiss chocolate skirt by made with love by hannah
























poppy pod necklace from elizabteh scott botanical jewellery on etsy

























some alfred hitchcock is always welcome. especially parts of the hitchcock-collection series. like for instance this one. or the one with psycho. or the one with marnie. those i don't own yet.
























a kitchen aid, preferably in cream, but red is also great. a girl can dream, can't she?

made with love by hannah

there is this girl somewhere in the u.s., and she is totally infatuated with everything traditional and folkloristic. such as gingerbreadhearts, cuckoo clocks, the design of polish pottery, fairytales and so forth. also, she designs the cutest prints of such motifs and prints them herself on cotton fabric. AND she makes the prettiest skirts out of that fabric:
























"scherenschnitte skirt"

























"polish pottery skirt"
























"snow maiden matryoshka skirt" and "winter woods skirt"

especially the white "winter woods skirt" is right on top my current "i wish i wish" list. i so would like to have one and am determined to keep my money together so that i will be able to get one of them in january.
the girl i write about is called hannah, and she both has an etsy shop and her own web shop, and above all that, she has a blog called "knick knacks & ric rac" where you can get a peak behind her shop and every now and then she features lovely little prints for cards to print out for yourself or other diy ideas. have a look!!

the sniff experience

now, as you can imagine from the title (and from reading some of my previous posts), i have not been idle during those last two weeks of non-posting. indeed, i have been haunting different perfume stores (mainly the big turquoise one, but also three or four different ones in oslo, which actually were not sorted well - one of the ladies there didn't even know hermès! now, i don't expect somebody working in a perfume store to know every single fragrance in the world and every perfume house in the world, but hermès is not the smallest amongst them and doesn't exist only since yesterday... well. mainly they featured celebrity stuff and the general j'adore by dior and the one or other chanel.) and sniffing loads of bottles. i did also test quite a few on skin, most of them after reading a review or two, and i'll try to give you some of the highlights - and some of the failures...

after this post i was recommended to test dolce and gabbana's "light blue" and also chanel's "chance eau fraiche". i personally think that chanel fragrances smell of old ladies with pink poodle hair, and while i don't have anything against these ladies, i just can't stand the smell on my skin. "chance" started off with a nice fresh note, but the rest felt just unbearable..
"light blue", on the other hand, also started nicely and fresh and stayed fresh - and turned into an ugly air-refreshener's smell (think a blend of "sea breeze" and "green apple") after half an hour on my skin. which was sad as i liked the opening a lot. not such a promising beginning maybe..

the next fragrances i turned to was bvlgari's "eau parfumé au thé ..." series, and as the red one didn't appeal, i tried both thé blanc and thé vert. while i don't really recall the blanc version as anything remarcable, i love the warmth of "thé vert". it feels simple and elegant, it is not sweet at all and just perfect for winter. the bad news here was the lasting power: it vanished after an hour, as it is an eau de cologne with a very light concentration. the good news is that there is an "extreme" version which stays an afternoon plus half an evening and even survives a flight from oslo to hamburg (i applied some at the tax free on my way back). so this one is definitely something i will want to own!

what came next? i had read about this one norwegian perfume, "laila", which at some points had been recommended as a nice substitute for an everyday floral such as "j'adore" (which i actually like). i took the chance to try it on spot in norway, and was way disappointed. it was boring and had a weird buttery tone inbetween which i didn't like at all..
the same day though, i tried prada's "infusion d'iris" which turned out to smell special and soft and powdery and had a lovely wooden base. it felt very well balanced and gave me a feeling that you can have after a nice bath with some lovely soap. it felt really clean. lovely.

as i know that i sometimes do like "male" perfumes just as much as "female" ones (or even more), i thought i'd try the male version of the prada fragrance. what a desaster. the review said that "infusion d'homme" contained the same ingrediences as "infusion d'iris", but in different amounts. thus, i found out that i do not like too much incense in my scent. the thing smelled buttery and ugly, well, in the way that cold incense smells. ush. another iris-scent which went just the same way (though i don't know if there is any incense in it) was hermès "hiris". nothing for me...

so. enough perfume for today. there sure is more to come!

autumn coveting

one of the nicest things on the internet is definitely etsy. you can find all kinds of lovely things there, arts, jewelery and other things you never thought of before you saw them there.

lately, as autumn comes closer, i have been coveting these beautiful felted scarf-collars from etsy-seller Rudman (i borrowed the pictures from there, thus the watermark):















































they are not cheap (not sooo horribly expensive either, i have to admit), so i have been thinking about making something similar. but, as i do not do felting, i still haven't come across a way how to do it. i will update you as soon as something crosses my mind!

in the meantime, these lovely creations will stay on my i wish i wish-list, and, as we all know, christmas comes probably sooner than we all can say "i wish i wish"...

perfect glass

i don't know how they do it, but when it comes to designing nice glass, finnish Iittala is just plain best. one of their collaborations with marimekko, the maribowl, has been haunting me these days, and the craving does not seem to go away. i wish i wish!!!

















i mean, look at the small details! it looks almost as if it was made of coloured ice, the form is classic and it comes in don't ask me how many different colours....

























it's just plain perfect glass. for dessert, ice cream, cookies, pralinés, cherries, whatever you love.

i wish i wish

number 1 on my current i wish i wish - list.

















beautiful shoes by vagabond. oh, i want to have!