Monday 31st Dec: 2012 Review: Saga Sig - Part 1

"My stand out moment of 2012 would be the trip to Iceland in end of July beginning of August of this year.

For three weeks me, my boyfriend and family drove around the country.

I grew up in the countryside of Iceland, so I miss the Icelandic nature, the cold fresh air, the feeling that you are alone in the world,  the magical light and the people I love.

I remember two moments from this trip that were magical. My favourite time of the day is when the sun sets. The colours inspired me to start taking photos when I was little, somehow the worlds changes and becomes more magical and beautiful, the moments before the darkness.

The sunset when we drove through the heart of Iceland was so beautiful. On highland road / area Kjolur the sun was setting, the colours were magical, I was in awe."

Saga Sig, Photographer

See more of Saga's trips and photography on her site, Tumblr, and keep up to date with her news via Twitter,   Facebook and beautiful blog.

Monday 31st Dec: 2012 Review - Roses Gabor

"My first festival ON MY OWN (eeeeek;-) .... Global Gathering ... was really nervous and my dad was going in for heart surgery that day ... I did alright .. he did alright ... errythang was alright! #SOGRATEFUL ;-) Looking forward to loads more for 2013!!"

Roses Gabor's highlight of 2012

Follow Roses into 2013 via her Facebook, Twitter, Soundcloud ,  site ........ revisit the video her debut solo single "Stars" mixed by Redlight........ and buy it on Ninja Tune.

Sunday 30 Dec: 2012 Review - Amber Jane, Theatre Of Fashion & Broken Hearts

"2012 has been pretty epic. From a DJ perspective we played a series of gigs for the Louis Vuitton/Yayoi Kusama collaboration, and we were also nominated for a Sony award for our Jazz FM show. From a fashion historian perspective I contributed to programmes for BBC Breakfast, BBC 2 and Radio 4, and I've given talks and lectures at the V&A, Wellcome Collection, British Museum and University of the Arts. But nothing beats meeting one of my heroes: Barbara Hulanicki from 60s/70s brand Biba. You can see from my face how awestruck I was!"

Amber Jane, Theatre Of Fashion & Broken Hearts

25th Dec: 2012 Review - Kerry Shaw, Gilded Birds

"For me the highlight of 2012 was seeing my friend, Thomas Adès, conduct his opera, the Tempest - at the Metropolitan Opera in New York. Contemporary opera can be hard to listen to - but even though the Tempest is incredibly complex musically, it's mesmerising and completely magical from start to finish. I wish I could have been to every performance. Here's my picture of the curtain call. The rapturous reception from the Met audience was really moving. If I look back through my iPhone at my pictures of the year, this one sums up Beauty for me."

Kerry Shaw, Gilded Birds

(I asked Kerry for an image of the most beautiful thing she saw or beautiful thing that happened to her in 2012 in specific relation to the subject matter of her "Gilded Birds" project where she investigates "a snapshot of contemporary ideals of beauty".  Keep up to date with the content of contributors via her Twitter)

Sunday 30th Dec: 2012 Review - Rachel Khoo

"My 2012 was bit of a rollercoaster ride with my debut BBC TV show and cookbook coming out to say the least (I ended up in some places I never thought I'ld ever be) but in between all that I did manage to get some downtime. Taking part in the traditional Swedish crayfish party was extremely fun! Exploring the Swedish forest, picking berries, fishing for crayfish and then celebrating all the amazing finds with friends has to have been one of my highlights from 2012."

Rachel Khoo
(Follow Rachel's 2013 over on her Twitter, & Facebook)

Sunday 30th Dec: 2012 Review - Me

To kick start (pun intended) the end of year review - here is my favourite moment of 2012 - training with Boiler Room Football Club.  Come rain or shine, it was the highlight of my week to switch off from everything for 90 mins, exorcising stress whilst literally exercising.  Ive never followed a football team, been to a match or enjoyed watching the World Cup..........Ive never even played before.  BUT now I've caught the bug and become a fully signed up member to the cause, with a skill to share with my nephews and niece.  As it goes (with no surprise) I'm pretty terrible, but its the taking part that counts.  That's the ethos of the BoilerRoom family and why they set up the women's division at the end of Spring.  
From starting my year on a NIKE trip to NYC in January and meeting Thristian (master of ceremonies at BoilerRoom) to rounding it off at their WHotel residency with TEED & Disclosure - and all the gigs inbetween like Micachu, Kwes, Horse Meat Disco, LCD Soundsystem and Carnival.......... its been a corker 365 days and I feel incredibly lucky to have had introduction to both dancing in sweaty small venues and getting sweaty on the pitch, getting to know a new network of lush London ladies and gents.
Big up everyone at BoilerRoomFC!  
(If you have little or no interest in sport, don't dismiss this irrelevant rant and take it as inspiration to discover your own team game this year as I can't recommend it high enough!)  

Read my report on the summer specatcle Fives tournament here.

Friday 28th Dec: Patternitrip - GOA

The ethos behind Patternity is about discovering unexpected patterns in every day places and spaces (a creative consultancy that’s driven by the certainty that pattern is everywhere; from the mundane to the magnificent).  Wherever the girls go, they document these shapes - such as stripey tents at music festivals or simply spectrum oil spills on sidewalks.  This holiday, roving reporter Anna Murray is in Goa - recording colour and lines in India by looking up at the palm tree sky and looking down at the rippled wavey sea water.  Here are some of those snaps, mixed in with a selection from her travelling partner Jamie Freeth.  To see more of Anna's Patternitrip fieldtrip photography - head over to their Instagram...............

Tues 25th Dec: Gemma Tickle Studio Visit / Advent Calender for District MTV

As you may be opening the window to this blog post on 25th Dec, you may also have just opened the last door to your advent calender as December has done its annual deed and landed on Christmas day already!  Whilst different sites have dreamt up their own online versions of the traditional pop-up cardboard calender, District MTV have compiled a daily gift guide via an epic still-life story. To set the scene for the suggestions,  set designer Gemma Tickle took on the mammoth task of engineering 25 stand alone stories for each product shot, collaborating with photographer Thomas Brown.  Here are some of those props now returned to her studio and nestling in amongst her organised shelves of archive pieces and future plans in prototype.  I visited her Dalston hub to get a hands on grasp of her acute craftsmanship and precise skill in what is otherwise a fairly "winging-it" vocation.  Coming from a props discipline background myself I can appreciate exactly how much work goes into the role of art department and it looks like Tickle is taking it seriously despite the surname which may suggest otherwise!  From detailed sketch-books of brainstorming story-boards to the beautifully smooth and sanded finished articles that could be products in their own right ..................... for instance these lipstick building blocks carved for a recent accessories editorial shoot could equally be ornaments that have been thru the mill of a product design process.  The lipstick motif also appears as part of her secondary sideline  Electric Stripes - a capsule collection of neon art including this AMAZING spectrum cloud which hangs above her desk........... adjacent to a rainbow-maker in her window which casts real specturms out around the room.  Experimentation in combing light rays as actual set design appeared in an abstract graphic shoot with Leandro Farina for 125 Magazine (see Polaroid tests) where the pair explored the title of "Time" in the visual language of science fiction films and illustration from the 70's & 80's.    Another shoot with Farina for the cover of Viewpoint magazine's  "Money" issue found Tickle gilding bricks in gold  - seen here now as possible paper weights or blinged up book ends at her studio.  The collection of pencils are left over from making an appearance in the Giles advent day 10 on District MTV, whilst the ping-pong ball totem took place in the Sunspel scenario from the previous day.  Head over to the site to open the final virtual door of Nicka banana earrings which neatly brings me back round to the first time Tickle's work appeared on my blog in 2009, when WAH! Nails opened its doors with a window display of her banana props! 
Keep up to date with her shoots as they are published on her site here.

Sunday 23rd Dec: Wooden Hills Bedding Co.

Wooden Hills Bedding Co. is a new venture from ex-comedian Tim Stevens, whom I once saw  do a sketch as a surgeon (at an inaugural You, Me, Bum Bum Train), operating on a patient laying on a gurney making incisions to the beats of the Ferris Bueller movie anthem - "ch-ch-ch-gah-Oh Yeah".  From hospital bedsheets as props, to patterned linen for your bedroom - this artist has combined his love for Illustration, printing, African textiles AND sleeping to create a duvet cover company like no other.  

To explain more, I've likened the concept akin to the original music cassette tape format, taken one stage further than just the 'single' or 'double' analogy, with an A Side and B Side variant.  The bespoke bed linen company offer a service for you to create your own combination of cosmic patterns so that you'll never grow tired of just one colour-way.  Infact that's the only way they do it!  Their spectrum selection of wax cottons can be teamed to have a reversible option of sides and sewn in any formation to contrast the pillow cases to the duvet.  Head over to the site to see the choice of prints in stock which will be replaced over time in an ever-evolving catalogue of cartoon illustrative styles to ensure maximum variation in products put together.  There's currently a choice including Chanel logo interlocking C's ................. spraycans................ electric fans............. kryptonite crystal .............. car keys and sombreros................... or my personal fave the wing mirror repeat.

"Each duvet cover we make is reversible, and made bespoke at the customer's instruction: one could, for instance, opt for a fake Chanel print on the A-side and a desk-fan pattern on the reverse; equally,one could match a beautiful, simple langoustine pattern with a spray-can held in a set of green claws . Whatever you like. The choice is yours."

See more of the bedroom antics over on the Facebook, keep up to date with Daniel Beddingfield banter at Twitter and "like" new patterns as they appear on instagram (see below).

If you are a fan of Dutch Wax fabrics, may I also recommend Bombe Surprise for a collection of rad garms.