The man with no manager

I don’t even remember how I heard about it, but at the end of March husband and I attended the Bill Murray: Chasing the White Whale OFFSET Exhibit. We’re both pretty huge Murray fans so we were excited to go. And as it happens, so were about a thousand other people. Rightly so. The event was held in The Library Project and housed prints of all shapes and styles from talented designers and artists, all of which of course were paying homage to Mr. Murray. 

During the exhibit, I spotted Sean Cummins‘ piece Lost in Tranglation. I loved everything about it. Its geometric structure and composition and form and stuff. It really captured Bill’s nonchalant attitude, but he also looked happy in it {some of the prints were a bit scary. Is that rude? I don’t mean it to be. But a small few were}. 

There were also Murray masks going around and I couldn’t resist picking one up for myself. It’s currently hanging up in our living room, but I’m waiting for an opportune moment to scare husband with it. I’m not sure how just yet. 

Sean’s print is originally in multiple shades of blue. I asked if it were possible to get a copy of the print in grey-scale. I know, that’s a pretty cheeky thing to ask for, but when I went to collect the print last week, there it was with the original copy. I’m really glad I got both the original blue as well as a grey scale copy, because you never know, one day soon I may redo the living room around blue. 

I reused an old charity shop frame I had and backed the print with some pink paper that was laying around. I think Bill pulls it off well. Down came the plummy painting {I was feeling a bit meh about it anyways}, and up went Bill. He now takes pride of place above our TV and is a pretty stellar addition to our living room. 
Thank you Sean, and your incredible work.

UPDATE: you too can order Sean’s Bill Murray print for your own home! Yay!

Delightfully vile

There’s nothing I love more than a good four letter word. If you’ve ever spent more than 10 minutes with me, you’ll quickly find out the extent to how many four letter words I like. But for the sake of remaining lady-like in today’s post, I’ll refrain from listing off my favourite ones. 

One of my favourite bloggers is Anna Dorfman of Door Sixteen. She has been a huge source of inspiration for me over the years, has influenced my style and encouraged me to make our home sleeker, simpler and bolder. If you haven’t already checked out her site, you better get on it. 

In recent months, Anna opened her own society6 shop, K is for Black. It’s full of all kinds of amazing designs. One thing I think is very nifty about society6 is that each graphic {as seen above} is available as a print, mug, canvas, rug, iPhone case, pillow, canvas bag, you name it. I had my eye on Anna’s vile collection for some time, specifically in pillow form, but, shipping. Living in Ireland always means shipping makes me make an ugly crying face. 

But not all was lost. One day Anna tweeted that her society6 shop had reduced prices {from $20 to $15}, AND free worldwide shipping {which is still happening!}. So I ordered the vile pillow case, it arrived, I tore open all of the packaging, and it now sits with pride of place in our living room. A perfect punch of black, white, and a paint smear of baby pink {let’s face it, I tend to like messy paint. Have you seen my website header?} for our living room. It’s lovely. 
Let’s pretend the below picture is a lot nicer than it actually is. It does zero justice to new pilly-willow. 

A touch of glass

Back in December my edible Christmas ornaments were entered into the DaWanda Creative Xmas Decorations Facebook competition, which I was quite excited about. All entrants received a €20 gift voucher to spend online at DaWanda, and the winner received a €100 voucher. Not bad at all … My DIY didn’t win said Facebook competition {and I wasn’t expecting to}, so I was pleased as punch with my gift voucher. Now, what to spend it on? 
I trolled the DaWanada site and decided I should treat myself and spend my voucher on something I wouldn’t normally buy. A little fancy treat. Home related, obv. So I searched, and I don’t know how I happened upon Everstraw one day, but I’m glad I did. 

Made by Michael Kraus, Everstraw glass straws are exactly what you think – glass straws. They’re beautiful, dainty and the perfect quirky accompaniment to our bar cart. I was worried they’d be quite frail, but they’re tough and have survived their first wash in our sink. I bought six straight straws, and a bent straw to throw in the mix to make it look more convincing and natural. Do other straws look natural? Nope. You get my meaning though.
We took our new glass straws for a spirited spin yesterday {for photographic purposes, of course … } and they’re very smooth to drink from! Does that sound weird? It does to me, but they were really nice to drink with. 

For those of you wondering, we have teeny pipe-cleaners at home that I use to clean them, alternatively Everstraw sell cleaning brushes for their straws. For those of you, like me, who immediately thought of the maintenance side of things and how many hours I’d have to spend cleaning them. All of 30 seconds should do the trick. 

xx A