11/24/07
Enter Donna Wilson’s world of brightly coloured and somewhat eccentric knitted dolls and textiles if you dare. Be prepared, because you may be eaten by a Cannibdoll, dwarfed by a gigantic doily or bored by a bigheaded boffin. It’s a place where your conceptions of shape and size are toyed with, where you could stretch out on a sea of pompoms, have a picnic with a poodle or get grumpy with a ginger man. Wilson’s work is playful, tactile and bright, inspired by the everyday oddities and deformities of life. She likes to think of each of her creations as a character in her very own wonderland where scale and perception are turned on their head. Donna creates other products including brightly coloured felt rugs, doily placemats and coasters and patterned cushions and blankets.
Donna, aged 29, of Bridge of Marnoch, near Aberchirder, has specialised in knitting since graduating from Aberdeen’s Gray’s School of Art eight years ago. Now already a multiple design competition prize winner, Donna enjoys many leading European design magazines featuring her work. Press publications, media releases (Kate Hare is available here) and many exhibitions around the world certainly contributed to the overwhelming success of her collection. An outstanding creative talent, Donna is now finding herself in a cul-de-sac: On one hand her friendly creatures are extremely popular, on the other Donna ist tied down with the time consuming manual work of knitting, stitching and sewing to meet the huge demand. She now seeks for help to create her collection in order to be able to free some time to perform her true creativity. Donna agrees it would be cheaper to have the dolls produced abroad, but insists they are made in Scotland (Europe) as they would loose their genesis like many a great brands did when their management executives decided to drown them in the Far-Eastern floods of anonymous, heartless mass fabricated goods in order to increase their profits.
We met Donna Wilson almost two years ago when she was exhibiting at the Designer’s Blog during Frankfurt’s Fair Ambiente. Facing her colourful, inspired doll and creature jungle we were really taken with the strangely cute knitted creatures. We immedietely felt the desire to intruduce them to our clientele. Having done so for more than 1.5 years we were always sad to see one after the other go to their new homes.
If you wish to take one home as well, we might let one go. Please enter Donnas world here.
See you, Jo
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10/25/07
Autumn time. High above the valley of Visp, 1500 m above Mean Sea Level, in the small, 500 inhabitant village of Törbel in Haut Valais the sewing-machines are rattling at full speeds. In a saddlery, where until quite recently, bell straps, horse bridles and belts were manufactured – mostly for the Swiss Army – 11 employees are working overtime in order to fill the many incoming retailer & trade orders from all over the world. With the “Swiss Army Recycling Collection” they are delivering a piece of Swiss history into the world. Living accessories, rucksacks, brief cases, bum bags, messenger bags, shoppers, body bags, spectacle cases and wallets – the collection has grown to more than 50 different articles by now. Each piece is made by caring hands.
The stuff dreams are made of: The basis material of the collection are the hand felted blankets of the Swiss Army, which have been resting in the armouries since 1969. Raspy, coarse, brown-grey coloured, long stored and nearly forgotten, they are – as well as disused leather rifle slings and belts – now rising like a phoenix and celebrate their resurrection as highly fashionable accessories, thanks to Titus Karlen’s saddlery. Whether with shoulder strap or handle, as rucksack with rugged leather straps or as diary with up-to-date calendar – the saddlery in Törbel is practicing recycling in a trendy way. The white cross on red background is the common trademark of all articles. Woven into the brown-grey woolen fabric of the posher models, the felt cross is sewn on the smaller articles. For those who believe that the Swiss design of Törbel’s wool blanket production is only favoured among the patriotic Swiss people, is far from it!: The “Swiss Army Recycling Collection” sells like hotcakes in Japan and enjoys a huge demand in Germany, Austria and Scandinavia. Even the USA show interest in the trendy pieces. Only recently one of the leading London investment banks placed their order. As Karlen agreed to render possible a delivery of 50 unique bags and hence burned the midnight oil – the bags arrived at London’s City Square within 10 days. Even the former Russian Presdident Gorbatchev, who was attending the London financial symposium as speaker, witnessed when all the invited international top private-wealth customers accepted with pleasure a very unique present from the Swiss alps. The discovery, that each bag had a unique character of its own led to an unanimous enthusiasm among the attendees. Prerequisite for an owner’s pride which cannot be rivalled by any of the pricy pieces from the Parisien Champs Elysées.
Normally life in Törbel has its own steady pace though. And that’s why retailers accept to wait 5-6 months for their order to be fulfilled. Today the saying “Good things come to those who wait” is as true as it was in the olden days: Only a carefully manufactured product satisfies the customer in the long run.
Additionally, Titus Karlen, aged well over 70, wouldn’t dream of outsourcing the production of his collection to satisfy the ever growing demand. “Never ever”, he says in his resolute manner, as handcraft and recycling will always remain to be the leading principles and quality characteristics of his products: “The production of bulk goods is out of question!”. Moreover, each piece of the collection has its unique character. Each blanket has a history of its own, each belt and strap likewise: “I can’t think of a ladies name that we haven’t found written or carved into the leather straps” the saddler smiles.
Since this year’s summer Karlen and his team were industriously producing the large order of Fair-kaeuflich.DE. Only a couple of days ago, the time had come, the delivery from Haut Valois arrived.
In case your desire has grown even more to call one of these treasures your own or to make an extra-special Christmas present … we recommend you act quickly. As proven over the last years it’s as usual the early bird that catches the worm!
We are well stocked at the moment but experience shows that the first shortages could occur in November for one or the other model. The whole Swiss Army Recycling Collection can be viewed and ordered here.
See you! Yours, Ingo
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08/31/07
Auch dieses Jahr wird wieder eingelocht, denn Sat.1 präsentiert in seiner Golf-Show am 01.09.2007 zum zweiten Mal der “Große-Promi-Mini-Golf-Turnier”.
All diejenigen, die nun das grosse Minigolf-Fieber packt, können aufatmen. Wir haben unsere Trüffelnäschen rausgestreckt und mit myminigolf einen Minigolfplatz entdeckt, der allen ein Lächeln ins Gesicht zaubert: Minigolf zum mit nach Hause nehmen, warum gab es das nicht schon längst?
Als Crossover zwischen Golf und Minigolf wird das Spiel ohne feste Bahnen gespielt. Je nach Untergrund variiert der Schwierigkeitsgrad. Gepunktet wird wie beim herkömmlichen Minigolf. Es kann auf allen ebenen Untergründen indoor wie outdoor gespielt werden. Zum Beispiel auf dem Rasen im Garten, auf der Strasse vorm Haus, dem Teppich und dem Parkettboden in der Wohnung oder im Büro. Hat man wenig Platz zur Verfügung wird Bahn für Bahn nacheinander aufgebaut und durchspielt.
Von nun an ist Minigolfspielen unabhängig von Wetter, Tages- oder Jahreszeit.
Viel Spaß beim Minigolfen wünscht Euch Ingo
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Ingo |
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08/21/07
We all always want the cream of the crop. And we are particularly rejoiced when we have managed to hunt beautiful things as a bargain. The recent incidents have shown though that not everything which was pretty cheap is actually healty. Very often true poisoners are at work when it is about cheap products. This is why we might pay a terribly high price for alledgedly cheap things – and risk our health. No later than now we should start rethinking and ask ourselves the question if the things we wish to acquire really are good value, i.e. worth the money. Whether the humans who produce these things are adequately paid for their work? Whether these people are working under humane circumstances? Whether they receive social or company benefits so they are secured? Whether the manufacturer acts upon a corporate stewardship? And as like in many cases the best things are right on our doorstep, let’s just simply stay in Europe. And here we discover manufactured products that are not only fair but actually worth the money we pay. A fine selection of such products you find at us, Fair-kaeuflich.DE. More than ever we have made it our business to offer beautiful and high quality products from Europe at worthy rates. At the same time create and establish a trustful and successful partnership together with our customers, the society, our suppliers and the environment.
With prudent greetings,
Yours, Paula.
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Paula |
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06/22/07
Fishnet-Design liegt voll im Trend. Und so zeigen sich Möbel, Wohnaccessoires, Geschirr und sogar Schmuck ab sofort in angesagter Netzoptik. Laut ELLE DECORATION 4/07 sind “die feinen Maschen die filigrane Antwort auf die Leichtigkeit des Sommers”. Wer nun Familie und Freunde nicht nur mit köstlichen Speisen, sondern auch mit einem trendstarken Augenschmaus überraschen möchte, könnte seinen Tisch beispielsweise mit innovativen Sets und Läufern aus gewebtem Vinyl-Garn von Woven Lattice Aufsehen erregend “vernetzen”. Ebenfalls echt netzig sind Bags und Fußmatten aus der Chilewich Vinyl-Collection. Es zeigt sich: fair-kaeuflich beweist mit seinem Trüffelnäschen professionelles Gespür für Trends. Sommerliche Grüße von eurer Paula
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Paula |
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