Push (and pull) the button

I’ve long been a fan of changing drawer and door knobs on furniture to give it a whole new lease of life. However, there isn’t actually a huge choice of little knobs around – you can get a few at Ikea, Bombay Duck,  John Lewis and Oliver Bonas, but to be honest, the selection isn’t that great and they’re often fairly expensive.

So, I was excited (and admit I went a little overboard with my online shopping basket) when I found Trinca Ferro, http://www.trinca-ferro.com.

They sell literally hundreds of different little knobs in a huge variety of shapes and colours (below), for around £2.95 – £3.20 each. Bargain!

My absolute favourites are the chunky Acrylic Retro Button knobs, above. They come in eight shades and are a decent 4cm wide. You could use just one to jazz up chest of drawers; or even change all the handles on your kitchen cupboards for a really quirky look. I’ve got a big white chest of drawers in my bedroom – I reckon a mixture of different colours on each drawer would look amazing!

Nothing but the pouffe

These handknitted Urchin pouffes are things of beauty. Soft, chic and woolly, they’re perfect for lounging in front of the telly, putting your feet up on, or rolling out when friends come to visit and you need an extra seat. But at £470 each (from http://www.hollys-house.com), they’re they sort of thing you could only dream of owning…

…until now. Several canny high street stores have recently launched their own, equally stylish versions.

First up is Next, who have small ochre yellow, powder blue or classic neutral cream ‘pods’ for £75 each:

Then there’s Dunelm Mill, whose grey pouffe is an extremely purse-friendly £49.99:

And finally, Very.co.uk have the Sabichi knitted pouffe, in either neutral or black, for £59:

PS: Want a pouffe with a bit of oomph? I also love the Estaban pouffe, £109 from http://www.very.co.uk made of hundreds of multicoloured felt pom-poms. Okay, so it’s still a bit on the costly side, but it’s so lovely it’s like a work of art in its own right…

Sew worth reading

A couple of years ago, I had the privilege of working with the very talented Christine Leech. Not only is she an amazing magazine art director, but she’s also a champion crafter, and one half of the duo behind the Everything Alice and Everything Oz books (making things inspired by Alice in Wonderland and The Wizard of Oz – check ’em out at http://www.amazon.co.uk).

She’s recently branched out alone and has just published two lovely new craft books, Felt Sew Good (30 simple and stylish projects using felt) and Little Sew & Sew (sewing and embroidery projects).

Felt Sew Good is perfect for anyone (like me) who likes their craft projects to be simple yet look really professional. Working with felt means you don’t have to faff about with hems etc as much as you do with fabric, and I particularly love her ideas for a flower covered wreath and fun pom-pom style baubles – neither require a sewing machine, just a good pair of scissors and a few stitches:

Little Sew & Sew, on the other hand, is a great book for anyone who already knows one end of a needle from another, and has some gorgeous ideas, including a really simple shopper bag, and sweet fabric covered notebooks:

The books are beautifully laid-out, the photos are super-stylish, and even the paper they’re printed on feels classy. Either would make a great present for anyone who loves crafting and wants to make things they’d actually be proud to have on display. The books cost £12.99 each (or £8.96 and £10.99 at http://www.amazon.co.uk) and are published by Quadrille.

Love Christine’s ideas? She writes a great blog at http://www.sewyeah.co.uk which is full of fun homes finds and easy-yet-stunning ideas for doing up your home on a shoestring – just take a sneak peek at her handmade pegboard noticeboard below…

(both images above from http://www.sewyeah.co.uk)

Good clean fun

Last week, I went without a proper wash for four days. Was I at Glastonbury? Nope, sadly not. My boiler had broken.

They say you don’t appreciate something until it’s gone. So now I can have hot showers again, you can’t keep me out of the bathroom. And I’m thinking of celebrating with one of these, quite frankly, awesome new shower heads.

You just screw one onto any normal shower hose and the coloured LED lights inside change from red to green to blue etc, powered by the pressure of the water. If you showered in the dark on a hot evening, I reckon it’d like being under a disco-tastic waterfall. Particuarly if you popped some music on at the same time (I suggest something suitably cheesy, like the Bee Gees or Abba).

You can get them for £9.36 on Ebay (from powersupply-best-buy, or search for ‘rainbow shower head’) or for £10.08 from TechBitz at http://www.amazon.co.uk