Wednesday, 3 November 2010

Interior design by ifdesign, Brisbane :: Three Little Girls and a Boy Named Ted

ifdesign recently completed the interior design scheme for Three Little Girls and a Boy Named Ted on Oxford Street, Bulimba, Brisbane.

Owned by Charmaine McDonald, this young children's clothing store sells quality children's clothing made from natural fabrics with labels from Australia, France and Italy.
With an increasing awareness of the benefits of healthy environments and natural materials we were delighted to work with Charmaine, Greener Kitchens (for the joinery) and Building in Green (the builders) to create a natural and healthy environment one should expect from a Children’s clothing store.

The project involved the strip out of existing walls and finishes to allow for a new retail layout, new kitchen and stock area all with new floors, lighting scheme, bespoke joinery and furniture.
new store plan
Our brief was "to create a French inspired retail store" with healthy low toxic materials and a sustainable focus. Working closely with Charmaine our inspiration was drawn from an ecletic mix of French shabby chic, the Hamptons and shaker styles. We also combined a mix of hand crafted items, fair trade products, reclaimed and natural finishes. The use of healthier materials and finishes such as low VOC and no VOC natural paints, low energy light fittings and recycled timber was used to create a healthy and sustainable retail environment.
early design ideas
Rather than select mass manufactured retail fixtures and furniture we designed a family of “Shaker inspired” original joinery cabinets. A local wood turner was commissioned to make traditional “Shaker coat pegs” for product hangers and many decorative items were sourced from local reclaim centres around Brisbane.
ideas from our trip to reclaim centres
The biggest delight was finding some vj’s from an old Queenslander in West End. These timber panels were stripped of nails and old paint, then installed to create a feature display wall to the rear of the store. Once installed they were painted with a natural based paint made from milk bi-products and given a wax finish as shown in the images below.
the feature VJ wall "under construction"
Hand made jute display baskets were also sourced from the Dharma Door, a local supplier working with a “Fair Trade” program in Bangladesh.

Finally, many thanks to Katrina Philips of Style My Room in Brisbane for all your beautiful final touches such as the beautiful French jars that complete all the joinery cabinets.

For a fine afternoon of retail therapy why not pop along to Three Little Girls and a Boy Named Ted located at Shop 4, 77 Oxford Street, Bulimba.
We are also very proud to be featured in this months copy of Brisbane's River Wrap... Thank you!


Also just stumbled across the October's issue of Style Magazine Brisbane and seen an article on one of my latest Interior Design projects. 

Three Little Girls and a Boy Named Ted, owned by Charmaine McDonald, is a beautiful young children's clothing store selling Australian, French and Italian labels in Oxford Street, Bulimba.
With an increasing awareness of the benefits of healthy environments and natural materials, we were delighted to work with Charmaine, Greener Kitchens (for the joinery) and Building in Green (the builders) to create a natural and healthy environment one should expect in a Children’s clothing store.

Our inspiration was drawn from an eclectic mix of hand crafted items, fair trade products, reclaimed and natural finishes reflecting the quality clothing and natural fibres available within the store. The use of healthier materials and finishes such as low VOC and no VOC natural paints, low energy light fittings and recycled timber was used to create a healthy and sustainable environment.

I hope to explain the interior design in more detail later on, but in the meantime if you fancy some retail therapy in Brisbane, feel free to pop along to Three Little Girls and a Boy Named Ted, Shop 4, 77 Oxford Street, Bulimba.

Sunday, 31 October 2010

Natural modern interiors on Desire to Inspire

I came back from a lovely day out and picnic yesterday and checked into my blog's stats page. I nearly fell off my chair when I saw that I had over 1000 page views on Sunday alone!

I looked into this and was so excited to find that my natural modern interiors blog had been mentioned on Desire to Inspire's blog list for the week. Click here to see the full post as there are some amazing blog sites listed this week.
click here for post
It's so nice that they mentioned such a young blog like mine.
Thank you again Jo and the team at Desire to Inspire!

Thursday, 28 October 2010

Natural modern design by Lisa Coulburn

Design Refuge has posted their October challenge... What is your design style?

When I design interiors for my clients I always design for their own personal design style so this is a lovely opportunity to share my own design style with you.

My style can be described as natural modern with an eclectic traveller twist and a strong connection to the outdoors. As an interior designer I am also inspired by recycling old materials and the use of non-toxic and natural finishes.

These images (courtesy of photographers Richard Powers & Rhiannon Slatter and Linda from Oeke design) are a collection of natural materials and textures, reclaimed wood and objects that tell stories of past memories and experiences with different cultures. They really sum up my own style which reflects my life, my travels and my connection to nature. They will also be the starting point for my own dream home. 

What's your design style?

Tuesday, 26 October 2010

Hand printed organic fabrics :: Thea & Sami

Yesterday I had the pleasure of meeting up with Thea from Thea & Sami at her amazing screen printing and design studio. Thea & Sami create hand printed natural and organic fabrics for the home.

It was a great opportunity to see the variety of designs, feel the quality of the fabrics and get an appreciation of the scale of patterns and designs.

Thea & Sami
I fell in love with these natural linen peacock party cushions. As the national bird of India they reminded me of my past travels through Rajasthan and North India. In addtion to the fabric prints Thea also creates custom-made furnishings like these lovely lamp shades.
Something else that also caught my eye was Thea's printing table. With many years of print pattern overlapping across it's surface it is a piece of artwork in its own right! If you are interested in getting creative Thea also runs screen-printing design workshops at her studio. Click here for more details.
Thea, thank you so much for your time. It was lovely to meet you and I look forward to seeing your future designs.

Sunday, 24 October 2010

Natural interior design ideas :: Narrows Escape Rainforest Retreat, Montville

With all of my interior design projects I tend to use my camera quite often to either record the current site or room conditions, for shopping trips for furniture and finishes or for interior design ideas and design inspiration.
These leaves were gathered on a rainforest walk in the Sunshine Coast hinterland prior to me working on the interior design for Narrows Escape Rainforest Retreat, Montville, Queensland.

When you think of a rainforest colour you normally think of the colour green. As you can see from these leaves there are many more colours to be found in a rainforest.

I used these colours and textures to help build up a mood board to communicate the inspiration and interior design ideas below.
Here are some photos of the finished interior design and renovations.
We kept the living space and kitchen lighter in tone to allow the bedroom to feel more cosy and inviting.


Warmer colours are used to make a smaller room more cosy.
Keeping the walls, window coverings and decor within the rainforest colour scheme.
A fully glass shower unit maximizes the indoor outdoor feel of this bathroom.
This full glass shower recess creates the feel of a larger bathroom.
Great rainforest views from the deck.

I would love to know where you find your inspiration and interior design ideas from. Have fun.

Tuesday, 19 October 2010

Interior design workshops Brisbane

Earlier this year I presented an interior design workshop in Brisbane on "Discovering your design style". It was a great chance to meet some lovely ladies and to help them answer questions regarding specific interior design and decoration issues.
images by Porters Paints, Designer's Guild & Udessi
I have found that many people underestimate the amount of time and what is involved to create their desired room look. The challenge is knowing where to start, what to do, how to prioritsie things and who to call. Also, with so many choices in the market in can be quite confusing to make decisions.

I had great feedback from that workshop and now plan to run a series of interior design workshops next year and would love to hear what topics you would be most interested in. The topics could be:

"Discovering your own design style"
"How to decorate - the first steps"
"How to use colour in the home"
"How to design a bathroom"
"How to design a kitchen"
"How to create a healthy, non toxic & eco friendly home"
"How to style a property for sale"
"How to design a French inspired room"
"How to design an eclectic Asian inspired room"
"How to renovate for profit"

I would love to hear your feedback so I've have created a poll in my sidebar. Please feel free to vote for your preferences for the workshops and in which location.

If you would like to know any further details feel free to email me here or if there are any other interior design issues you would like to understand please leave a comment.

Thank you for your guidance and have a great week.

Sunday, 17 October 2010

Lavender ideas :: How to make lavender sachets

Yesterday I had the chance to spend a lovely sunny afternoon tending to my garden. Last year, against local advice I planted some lavender bushes in my front garden. I was told that they would struggle to grow in the Brisbane climate, however, mine are growing wild and are in need of a bit of a trim.

So I started looking for ideas on how to dry my lavender flowers and stumbled across these pretty lavender ideas and images.
image by herb companion
image by wikihow
image by dog island farm
I then started to look at how to make lavender bags and found these great ideas. These printed little linen fabric bags with stamped owl images look great for children's wardrobes.
images from Meridian Ariel
images from alphamom
Also, these handprinted lavender sachets by Alphamom are just the perfect thing to make with children. If you would like to know how to make these lavender sachets just click here.

I would love to know if anyone else grows lavender in Brisbane? Have fun.