March 26, 2014

Wednesday's Words of Wisdom - A.A. Milne on friendship

Since this lovely piece by A.A. Milne is quite self-explanatory, we won't bore you with our analysis of it. We simply wanted to share it, because we think it is one of the cutest "poems" ever written about love/friendship (and because a little Winnie the Pooh makes every day a little brighter ;) ).

xx Lisa & Ivanna

PS: We loved this piece so much, it inspired us to make this set of bracelets.

March 24, 2014

Monday's Musical Delight: Playlist #30: An Homage To Men

As you may have noticed, we spent most of the past few weeks working on our men's jewelry collection. Of course, we wouldn't have made this collection if we didn't love men so much (because we do, and sometimes that just needs to be said ;) ), so I figured a little homage in the form of a playlist would be fitting. Enjoy!

Love,
Lisa

 
PS: My apologies for the more somber song at the end, but it's one of my favourite songs about men ever, so I had to put it in here!  

PPS: I never noticed how incredibly hard it is to find positive songs about men.. Do you know any?

March 23, 2014

New: The Men's Collection

Instead of our usual “Weekly Inspiration” post, we’ve got some very good news to share with you today: we have finally finished our men’s jewelry collection! Maybe you remember our little Moodboard that we posted a few weeks ago to show you what we were doing? Well, this is the result: 


We tried to make this collection as diverse as possible, using lots of different materials, and mixing different styles. The thing that binds this all together, though, is exactly the concept we started with: “adventures”. We wanted to make a strong, masculine collection, that is easy to combine, and makes the man wearing it seem like he collected the pieces himself from all over the world. As a matter of fact, you could say that this collection is one great “journey”! 


We start our journey with these anchor and compass necklaces. We love using symbols in our jewelry, and we couldn’t think of anything more appropriate to symbolize the idea of traveling than these!


Obviously, when you travel the world, you also come across more “primitive” places. The kind of places where cavemen are still hunting down mammoths with spears and arrows. Those places don’t exist anymore, do they? Well, perhaps we just needed an excuse to use arrows :p


Because we love arrows so much, necklaces alone weren't enough; we also made a sturdy arrow bracelet. The rough leather, chunky beads, and big clasps also match the "primitiveness" we were talking about.


Instead of merely using black and dark brown, which seems way too common in today’s men’s accessories, we tried using lighter materials as well, such as cork, bone, and wood. The light colours and natural materials, give the pieces a summery and beachy feel. Think of the tropical islands you pass on your journey, pirates, and hidden treasures.


Of course, since black and dark brown are still the most popular colours among men, we figured we’d best do them a favour. After all, there is something incredibly manly about these colours, especially when they’re combined with these rough pyrite beads, and cool charms. Imagine tribal warriors and brave knights and the like ;)

The next couple of days we’re going to retreat into our imaginary caves and devote ourselves entirely to the tedious task of writing our Etsy listings for these new items. So, we’re gonna get ourselves some more coffee!

xx Lisa & Ivanna

March 22, 2014

Sims 1 Diary

Last Thursday I told you about my love for the computergame the Sims 1. I introduced you to the last household that I created and to the crazy life of one of my sims. Here are some moments from my sim's diary.. Enjoy!

"Everything is going wrong. My house burns down every week, because I can't cook. My fridge is completely empty, because I am a terrible singer and don't earn any money with it. I'm feeling so depressed. That's why I went to town to buy a turtle (that comes in a small yellow paper package)."

March 20, 2014

The Sims 1

One day I was watching videos on Youtube, just for the fun of it. You will all recognize that I suddenly found myself watching videos that I didn't intend to watch, but that suddenly just came on my path. One video in particular made that a new phase in my life started. Or actually, it made me rediscover this phase. The video was a parody of the computer game the Sims 1, where a guy pretended to be a sim and acted just like a character in the game (find the video here). This was the moment that I went complete retro and started to play this game again (I got the Complete Collection).


March 18, 2014

Etsy Vintage Nature

In January we first started with the idea to show you our favourite items on Etsy by creating a 'treasury' list of items that fit a specific subject. Last time we showed you our favourite Valentine's Day items. This time we made a treasury in the category of 'Vintage Nature'. 

What we collected were items with more or less the same color tones, ranging from brown to blue. This resembles nature of both earth and sea and makes the whole collection coherent. The graphics that are used on some items appear old-fashioned and antique and seem to be derived from an old biology book. Ivanna immediately fell in love with the hand printed shirts of Friendly Oak and wanted to buy them all; Lisa is crazy about the antler necklaces.

If you want to see the pictures in better quality, or want to find the shops where they sell these items, you can click here.

Do you like this style? Which is your favourite item?

Love,
Lisa and Ivanna


March 16, 2014

Weekly Inspiration Post - Natural and sturdy

Two weeks ago we showed you a collage of sweet, romantic jewelry that you can wear on a relaxing Sunday afternoon. This week we created a collage of jewelry that is more sturdy and contains 'earthy' tones, which gives these sets a natural look. We combined a variety of charm bracelets with different symbols. In our web shop you will find that a large part of our jewelry is available in different colors and with different charms. This means that you can be creative and combine the same sets as shown below, but in other variations!

What do you think of this look?

Love,

Lisa and Ivanna


March 12, 2014

Wednesday's Words of Wisdom - Friedrich Nietzsche "and those who were seen dancing"


Sometimes, when we're working on a project and are talking about it to other people, they seem to be surprised about our enthusiasm. They like that we enjoy what we're doing, but they don't really seem to get it, and often when we're ranting to them about our ideas for a new collection, or our blog lay-out, they look at us with raised eyebrows. Do you recognize that - that you get really excited about something, and other people don't understand your enthousiasm, because they don't see the beauty that you can see? Luckily, we found a perfect quote that describes this! It's always nice to know that you're not really crazy, dont you think? ;)

Lisa & Ivanna


March 10, 2014

Monday's Musical Delight - Playlist #29: Indie Invasion

Yesterday, Ivanna and I worked all day on gathering new supplies for the major projects we have coming up in the course of the next few months - Queensday, our men's bracelets (which we will probably be finishing this week!), and some new, secret plans. We ordered some of it online, mostly things we were running short on, but we also received an enormous amount of new materials from Ivanna's mother in law :D It's such a shame we can't show you, seeing as we don't want to give away our new plans yet..

But we really have an awful lot of materials now, and still the same tiny bit of space to store it. So today, I spent most of the day reorganising everything, which is actually quite a fun job if you have nice music playing in the background!

xx
Lisa

PS: I know "indie" is not really a genre; it just covered all the songs in the list so nicely ;)


March 9, 2014

Weekly Inspiration Post - Jewelry Rack

Sometimes you just have so many pieces of jewelry that you don't know where to put them. We also have these issues regularly, which is why we were very happy to display our jewelry on an elegant jewelry rack during our photoshoot. 
The jewelry is sorted by color and style; the picture on the left shows a collection of colourful, bright and bohemian jewelry, while on the right we created a collection of jewelry that has a calm and natural appearance and reminds of the sea and beach.

Which style is your favourite? Let us know! 

Love,
Lisa and Ivanna


March 7, 2014

Friday's Fabulous Photos - Rough Textures

We've been pretty preoccupied with our men's jewelry lately, and we're very, very sorry that we have not even offered you a glimpse of it! We had simply forgotten how much work and time it takes to make a collection like this, when you also have to worry about work and internships. The funny thing is that making the jewelry doesn't even take that long - it's the whole process of ordering supplies, trying out different things, photographing the items, and eventually creating a "listing" with all the information, that takes a while.
To make a long story short: we'll give you a sneak peek real soon, and we hope to have the collection online this month. In the meantime, you can gaze at these mesmerizing pictures of different rough textures that - at least partly - inspired us.

Have a great weekend!

Lisa & Ivanna

staples, stone wall, leather, labrodorite

March 3, 2014

Monday's Musical Delight - Playlist #28: Modern Soul

When people ask me what kind of music I like, I usually respond with "uhm pop? and rock..?", because these words pretty much encompass half of modern day music, and most people understand what you mean by it. Of course, these descriptions are pretty vague (and boring), and can quite easily be subdivided in and led back to many other genres, that are far more specific. Like bluesrock. Or Britpop. Or death metal. When you look at it like that, I really like a lot of genres! One of the genres that I have been listening to a lot lately, is soul. Not the original soul though, but things they call "neo soul" and "blue-eyed soul" nowadays (because we love making up new labels :p) But that's enough talk for now - bring on the music!

Lisa

PS: Do you like a particular genre of music?

March 2, 2014

Weekly Inspiration Post - Romantic Sunday Afternoon

A romantic Sunday afternoon.. The perfect moment to relax and enjoy your time with your favourite quiet activities. Having a high tea with your friends, going out for lunch with your boyfriend, reading a good book, going for a long walk or watch your favourite series. A good moment to withdraw with a cup of tea and recover from a busy week or from parties that you joined during the weekend.
During this shoot we wanted to capture a soft and romantic atmosphere, using light colours and sweet accessories. The jewelry that we picked in this collage is romantic and playful and an be worn during all kinds of Sunday activities - on a romantic date, while hanging out with friends, or just when chilling at home. Speaking of which, we think that's what we're gonna do right now..

What do you love to do most on a Sunday afternoon?

Love,
Lisa and Ivanna