House versus Home?

London is still being buffeted by horrible rainstorms and we are wondering if that is all the summer we are going to get.

Tonight was a late night shopping trip to Ikea to buy a cheap table for me to use as a print table. I got what I wanted aswell as some box frames which I am going to use for some mini chook worlds (pics to explain what the heck this is will follow soon).

Ikea have the slogan of 'do you live in a house or a home' which got me thinking ours is definately a 'home' ! Most of the houses in the interiors magazines I have read lately just leave me a bit cold. It's a bit wood floors - check, large gilt mirror - check, glass extension for a kitchen - check and the houses are always in London and always have a couple who are architects/interior designers who have impossibly cute kids with names like Song and Otter.

But I do like the 'feng shui' house in this months Living etc. The kids rooms look like real kids bedrooms that they can have fun in rather than an adults idea of a 'styled' kids room. I also like thier mix of vintage furniture and street art like the banksy print.

Baby Banksy at the Tate Modern

Nice relaxed day today with lunch at Wagamama's on the south bank followed by a walk to the Tate Modern. My cousin was with us and needed to get a train back to Edinburgh so we didn't have time to visit any of the exhibitions. Instead Katherine ran around the turbine hall with her Daddy while I had a look in the bookshop resulting in a couple of purchases for me but I also bought Katherine an Eric Carle book "brown bear brown bear what do you see". It is almost as fab as The Very Hungry Caterpillar. I love kids books and their illustrations particularily anything by Eric Carle.

The Tate is adorned with large scale "street art" from various street artists from around the world at the moment. It's ok I suppose. I did like the American Indian/Horse one but wasn't convinced by the others. They were ok. I was surprised though given the UK street art talent (Hush, Prefab etc) that no one was chosen although apparently Banksy declined their offer to take part.

However I think I spotted the new banksy working on the posters by the entrance!

littlechook in the Schmap Guide

One of my flickr photos was chosen to appear in the London Schmap Guide. It's an online guide and covers loads of cities/countries aswell as London.

It's a picture from the first artichokeltd gallery of Hush's work in Carnaby Street. His work is now selling for big money and he was asked by Banksy to appear in a recent show of street art - the 'Cans Festival' which took over a disused tunnel near Waterloo.

http://www.schmap.com/ Seems like a good idea but I find the site is very very slow to load.

Tonight I am trying to do some work on my neglected etsy shop but finding other design blogs far more interesting.

artichokeltd pop up shop

Went to see artichokeltd's latest pop up shop in Earlham Street (in seven dials) today and managed to buy two Prefab prints. Artichokeltd is run buy Pete Matthews and focuses on street art. His pop up shop features limtied editions signed by the artists. Pete is the pioneer of the £1 print which gave Banksy fans a chance to own a print for you've guessed it £1....

His current collection includes work by Prefab, Remi/Roughe, Seamo, Oliver Harud and Jef Aerosol. His website is http://www.artichokeltd.com/ and the prints are available to buy online.

I've put other pics on flickr including one of Katherine in her new role as 'the baby boss'. She had a blast today and then we went to Wagamama for dinner. Perfect end to the day!

http://www.flickr.com/photos/littlechook/