Greenery in design

I've really got an obsession at the moment with succulents on desks, garden walls, pot plants and terrariums in kitchens and herbs in draws! These are all such good ideas! They make the indoors so much nicer and soften harsh architecture as well as bringing the outside in! This is something anyone can have, small house, big house, it doesn't matter how much space you have, it can always work and freshens up any space.

This is a photo I've taken at my own home where myself and my housemate have started a herb garden, it's on our balcony but I wish we had more bench space in the kitchen so I could keep it in there! One day I'll have my kitchen herb garden...one day. I'd really like to get a little cactus pot for my shelf in my bedroom too but I'll see if I can keep these baby's alive through the summer first.

I absolutely love this idea. Hollowing out corks to put tiny succulents in them and pinning them to a wall makes a beautiful wall decoration for indoors or even outdoors on a boring wall next to an outdoor living area.

This one is very 'better homes and gardens' isn't it? It's very neat and simple to make and very effective. Very good if you are super keen to have plants but have no floor space for them!

This is by far my favorite and I'd love to do this one day. If your interested, I found a basic tutorial on design sponge.com on how to make upside down planters so feel free to try it yourself!

http://www.designsponge.com/2010/04/diy-project-recycled-upside-down-planters.html

Happy Making! Ellen x

Colour choice

I took this photo in my boyfriends backyard on a damp, cold morning. The glass had been knocked off a desk and had smashed in the middle of a courtyard area. 

I just had to take a photo because I loved the colour scheme of the scene as I stood surveying the yard from the porch so I got down on my hands and knees to take it. 

I love the way that the sharp pale blue of the glass plays against the brick and also tiny but of green weed behind it. The moss on the brick ties it all together. 

The colours in the shot make me think of somewhere in Asia, (not that I've ever been) with bright clear oceans and the dark red wood of boats going to market. 

That glass just was so astounding in it's simplicity. 

Anyway that's enough rabbiting on about glass in the dirt!

Shop Front display

The following are some displays that I put together with my boss for the new mothers day campaign at the kitchen ware store that I work in. There were key products and brands that needed to be a focus but because the store is a franchise, there was more flexibility in what we could do and work with.

This is a table which I get to redo later as its being replaced with an outdoor furniture setting. For now its a tea party featuring a certain crockery range and cupcakes from a store nearby. The Easter eggs are left over from a guessing competition we had a few weeks ago! I have slowly been eating them with the help of customers.

A display cubby of 'enchante' crockery. Such beautiful pieces! 

This is what you see as you walk into the shop. Theres a cabinet identical behind where the photo is taken from. It also is full of candels. You cant see much detail here so I posted a photo below of one bay.

I made those flowers myself from tissue paper. 

This is the front window! Kitchen Aid is of course the star of the mothers day campaign so I chose the colours to match the posters behind them. I'm actually quite proud of my display in this window :) the colours are really nice and its so simple and I see people stopping to look often, which is of course what we want!

Above is the second window. I'm less proud of this one, its not as simple and eye catching as the other. 

Working in retail when its a change of campaign is actually quite challenging. There are so many rules with presentation to follow. The store has certain display styles that it wants so that all stores have a continuous experience. I enjoy trying to push those rules though, as bad as it is to admit, my boss encourages me to try and think up new ways to promote products and brands!

Until my next break from procrastination, Ellen xx

Medium Density housing. Melbourne

Designing for Medium Density living: Melbourne

Project requirements included: creating a plan that can be copied a series of times over a block in the inner suburbs of Melbourne. The block is 3 times 9 x 40m and there is a firewall in between each which is as high as i choose my floors to be.

Spaces required are:

- minimum of 4 apartments for singles, couples and family's

- office space.

- retail/cafe space.

Must be for medium density living

Must contain both garden and water features.

This design used a very creative process to start with. Experimenting with Water color paints and lines I began blocking and space planing with a mind free of restrictions. 

Then it was onto actual spacial planning. I decided I would make the spaces in blocks and build in a way that there would be balcony's and spaces in between. I later chose to make the block into two mirrored halves, with 6 apartments, 2 on each floor starting at the first floor, 2 family, 2 couple and two single spaces with the ground floor being for retail and office spaces. 

The final result was 6 almost identically planned apartments, each getting smaller the higher the floor. Each space had a balcony, all of grass. They each had significant window space and lighting, a sizable bathroom, kitchen and living area.

The sides of the building that would usually rest against the firewall have been offset by 800mm so as to create an interesting and private lighting opportunity for the living spaces. The idea is that the firewall will have some sort of vines sprawling up along it and that the shard of light coming down from above would make a cooling and calming atmosphere within the living areas of the apartments.

The offices and retail space below all had nice natural lighting also. The design created shared bathrooms between retail and office, and one the other end of the block, two offices. 

I was conscious of environmental impacts when I was designing this block, taking care to provide plenty of natural light and air flow opportunity's. 

I feel like I really thought this project through. There were lots of changes and I really felt like I had a true focus on what was to be achieved. The central staircase is probably the part of the design I feel like would need to be changed as it is a bit of a space waster. The staircase could definitely be condensed and be made far more practical. Also if need be, the apartments could be built to a much higher scale.