I am loving the handmade textiles and tableware collections from Jacaranda Home. I love the bold colors and the happy designs. The beautiful au natural cotton canvas is embroidered in the traditional style by Mexican Otami Indians and can take up to three months to make! I also love the various ways you can use the textiles, from pillow covers to shower curtains or as framed wall decor. As usual they have been all over the design nets and design mags but yours truly is just getting hip to them. If they’re new to you too enjoy!

Needs some inspiration for reupholstering your Sunday Flea Market finds? Head over to the incredible Lotus Bleu for designer Jeannie Fraise’s boldly reupholstered vintage furniture. Jeannie travels annually to France and Southeast Asia to gather her beautiful fabrics for custom upholstery, cushions and curtains. I’ve got my eye on some bedding from India and I’m definitely filing this place away for my next upholstery project. Bonus for me, Jeannie’s store is in San Francisco!

Also peeped in Domino this month, Carolina Irving Textiles! Her gorgeous patterns are hand-printed on 100% hemp and have a casual Indian vibe. I definitely need to hit some flea markets for a hidden gem to upholster with these beauties. The Peak of Chic, another obsessed fan, wrote a post on how to find these fabrics until Carolina’s website is more complete. If you live in LA, you can find her prints at Hollywood At Home. (LA friends we’re going there on my next visit).

The always fabulous textile designer Lotta Jansdotter has recently made her fabric collection available online. The best part is that she is now selling little bags filled with fabric remnants perfect for small projects like this change purse and tissue holder from Etsy seller Little Byrd. Each cotton bag is filled with 5 different patterns of 36×36″ fabric for $16.00.

I was recently hired as a freelance blogger for a new eco-blog called EcoSalon.com. At EcoSalon I will be covering artisan, decor and fashion items, similar to the things you find here at Little Willow but with an eco-edge. The thing that sets EcoSalon apart is its authenticity. It’s real people sharing how to live an eco-friendly lifestyle without being preachy or crunchy. For example you can find out how to properly wash a pillow (which I am doing as I write this), where to buy stunning recycled glass carafes made from broken windshields or how to get a healthy high from herbal espresso. I am really excited for this opportunity to contribute to the rainbow of “green” knowledge available to women! Feel free to send me suggestions and if my Editor approves, (yes people I have an Editor now, it’s the big time), we’ll write about it!

Sweet find via Figments, another great online retailer. Shinzi Katoh Design is the Japanese design and manufacturing company of artist designer Shinzi Katoh. He produces his unique designs on tote bags, fabric and these aluminum bottles. If you don’t already have a Sigg bottle and are looking for an eco-friendly option for carrying your water then I would highly recommend one of these bottles. Here is what Shinzi says about his products: “We call these goods ZAKKA that make people feel happy and exist like comfortable air. This is what we always keep in our heart when we create new designs”. Beautiful.

moda fabrics

Volksfaden is a Berlin based website run by Linda Gaylord who has an eye for great fabrics. She has a solid selection but the best part is the way she displays the fabric in these expressive vignettes. If I were her I would sell these images as collages. In addition to selling fabric, she is a talented quilt maker and sells her handmade quilts and other accessories through her website.

joel dewberry fabrics

Tia and I both flipped out over John Robshaw’s textiles for baby crib sets. You may recognize his patterns from Anthropologie, they carry some of his items. But now you can buy directly from the man on his new shopping website, including clothes, bedding, pillows and curtains. Inspired by his travels around the world his patterns are so rich and exotic all hand stitched, hand embroidered and printed on the finest cottons and linens, sigh…

I thought I’d share a picture of my chair living happily in our book nook. Maglie made a pillow for me out of the extra pinwheel fabric and gave it that finishing touch.

I adore the latest Amy Butler pattern for her Gum Drop Pillow, seen on blogger Yvestown, who made her own, below.

Maglie get your sewing machine out, cause once I buy some fabric from the neat-o Japanese fabric spot SuperBuzzy, we’re making a pouf!

Yvestown’s Gum Drop

Check out one of Maglie’s latest creations

Finally the chair project is complete! 5 years ago my sister and I bought these interesting chairs at an antique shop in CA. They had been languishing in my garage for the past 2 years until Haley finally took charge and got the project started. She deserves all the credit since it was she who decided to paint them white, do two different fabrics, one for the front and one for the back and she found an inexpensive ulpholstery guy to put it all together. We both used pink as a starting point. Haley’s fabric came from designer Etsuko Furuya at PurlSoho and mine is Vanessa Arbuthnott from her Sky collection. I am thrilled with the outcome!

Haley’s Chair

Larkyn’s Chair

I am salivating over the incredible selection of fabrics at PurlSoho. If you live in NYC or you’re going to visit, definitely stop by either of their two stores located on Sullivan Street in Soho for beautiful fabrics, yarns and pattern books. Now I need to come up with some projects to use these fabrics!

I am contemplating using wallpaper in our small guest bathroom and thanks to the sister-in-law team at ModGreenPod I can wallpaper in style while being good to the earth. ModGreenPod’s 100% organic fabrics and non-toxic wallpapersare gaining in popularity in the inconvenient truth world we live in these days. I’m a believer that if everyone made small changes in the way they live, whether its with planet friendly fabric or composting your dinner scraps or buying a Prius it will make a difference. It’s hard for me to decide which pattern I like the best, but I’m leaning towards the Butterfly Jubilee in cherry/stilton.

Gorgeousity! Check out these fabulous items from textile designer Virginia Johnson. Inspired by nature and her travels throughout the world, Virginia creates watercolors of her patterns before block printing these designs on her textiles which include pillows, caftans and scarves. Buy her home collection here.

Sharon Spain is a local San Francisco textile artist making gorgeous silk-screened pillows and handbags from silk dupioni and hemp. Her feminine and organic floral designs look perfect on the simple ecru background. The handbags have matching lucite handles and she has a line of American Apparel t-shirts with a bursting bouquet design. Prices range from $68 for pillows to $72 for the handbags.

I love my accent pillows and find myself looking for new fabric for them constantly. So here is one of my faves, Amy Butler Designs. Amy creates her own fabric and patterns which are the quintessential cottage living style. She also sells handbags, pillows and stationery. If you’re super crafty you can buy her patterns and make them yourself! Buy here.

I lucked into some fabulous dark blue velvet fabric for 1/2 off at Britex in San Francisco to cover my chairs but that has not stopped me from finding beautiful fabric on the web. Vanessa Arbuthnott is a UK designer specializing in traditional country cottage style fabrics. I love the design idea page, if only I had the house for all these ideas!

Here is a gorgeous spread from the color issue of House & Garden this month. This realm of blue is what I’m looking for to redo the chairs below. I love #11 a soft blue mohair and #12 in blue/grey leather which might be a whole new way to go. I like the camel color mixed in here as well, maybe I could do camel colored matching cushions. The possibilities are endless!

I am having a love affair with everything 70’s lately! Check out these great patterns on lampshades and pillows at Poppy Cotton. They bring me right back to my childhood.