IKEA Furniture Catalogue Imminent

The ubiquitous homeware retailer IKEA has previewed their latest furniture catalogue. Featuring some of the stand out items from its 2010 offering, the sneak peek revealed that the continue to champion ground breaking designs.

The includeds a hand-woven, long-fibre Andrea rugs, Tallvik steel lamps and Ronas candlestick and tealight holders, which were created by Ehlen Johansson.

It also included three-in-one cushions, which can be laid flat along a sofa or folded up into an s-shape to make a soft seat and Evabritt panel curtains, which are hinged to fold in the middle.

The IKEA catalogue has been produced every year since 1951 and is now read by more than 400 million people in 28 different languages across 38 countries.

This year's catalogue will present approximately 2,000 products, including several hundred new ones. The full IKEA range is made up of 10,000 products.

Editor of Homes & Interiors to launch new chocolate business

Former editor of glossy magazine Homes and Interiors Scotland Sandra Colamartino has turned her back on the magazine sector to launch a new confectionery business which combines her two passions - books and chocolate. The Chocolate Library, based in Edinburgh, creates chocolate bars designed to look like books with packaging that opens so that buyers can read an article about the subject on the cover of the product.

As well as offering its own products, The Chocolate Library has already expanded to offer an extensive private label service ranging from bespoke products being created for single bars for hotels through to complete packaging ranges for large organisations.

Colamartino said: “I launched the first range of chocolate bars, Landmarks of Scotland, in the spring of 2008 with the help of renown illustrator Iain McIntosh. He created a fantastic set of drawings to go with the series and it was a bit of an experiment to test the market. These bars attracted a lot of interest and requests came in from companies keen to develop their own unique bars in a similar style.”

‘It’s a bit bonkers, I’ll admit.” she says. “But it’s exciting to be working on something totally new and there certainly does seem to be a demand for the product. Oh, and of course I can eat as much chocolate as I like and pretend that I am proof reading!”

Interior of the Week

This week's interior is from our friends at Wallpaper magazine and the 'Rossana Orlandi 'pops up' in Sardinia' feature.

The Gallery Fumi space, complete with Bokja sofa and pendant light by Pieke Bergmans

Habitat to launch online magazine

The home furnishings retailer Habitat has appointed Fitzgerald Shurey Tarbuck to launch an online digital magazine. The mag is intended to provide ideas and inspiration to the growing number of customers who interact with Habitat on the web.

A digital newsletter will showcase the Habitat range and keep customers up-to-date with current interior decorating trends and the latest store news. Recipients will also be able to click through to the magazine microsite.

Habitat recently got into some hot water for using the Iran election and interest in products such as the new Apple iPhone to help publicise money-saving discounts at its stores on Twitter. It used its Twitter account to add keywords, known as hashtags, to Tweets.

The UK's largest and only flooring event

Whether you're a retailer, flooring buyer or contractor, National Floor Show provides you with the opportunity to touch, see, source and be inspired by all the latest trends in flooring. National Floor Show provides the largest forum to meet with existing suppliers as well as source new ones and network with peers.

Are you visiting the National Floor Show in Harrogate this year? We'd love to hear from people who have visited or exhibited in the past.

DEENA is a punk rocker

Apparently these sculptural coffee tables with their slatted pedestal frame are as light as a feather. (What happened to heavy furniture being a sign of quality?). We think they look fantastic and would fit perfectly into a contemporary open space. But with a price tag of £249 you would have to make a feature of it!

Blogs and Coffee, a great combination!

I just came across this beautifully simple screen print; perfect for any cosmopolitan bloggers' kitchen or home office. Made By Girl is the brand of blogger and coffee lover Jennifer Ramos. You can view the full eclectic range of unique and original home decor items here.

Five of the Best Interior Design Quotations

1. I'm for style - fashions change too often.

Coco Chanel

2. The mood of a room must dictate. Every room has a mood or personality - sometimes - latent - and it is this that one desires to develop.

Eleanor Brown

3. It is just as disastrous to have the wrong accessories in your room as it is to wear sport shoes with an evening dress.

Dorothy Draper

4. Have nothing in your homes that you do not know to be useful and believe to be beautiful.

William Morris

5. The essence of interior design will always be about people and how they live. It is about the realities of what makes for an attractive, civilized, meaningful environment, not about fashion or what's in or what's out. This is not an easy job.

Albert Hadley

Channel 4's Kevin McCloud Goes Green

The Triangle’s 42 properties — which will meet the testing Level 4 of the Code for Sustainable Homes — will be built around a traditional village green, with a contemporary eco-touch. There is, for instance, a wet meadow, part of the development’s drainage strategy.

The model for the two and two-and-a-half storey terraced homes will be Swindon’s Victorian railwaymen’s cottages, but the properties will be updated with 21st-century green extras, such as triple-glazing, eco-roofing and rainwater harvesting systems.

The 19th-century layout will also be modified to fit in with today’s thinking on energy efficiency, as McCloud explains: “We have decided to raise the ceiling on the downstairs living space to give more light; this makes the first-floor bedrooms more womblike.”

McCloud, who studied scores of examples of domestic architecture when formulating his plans, considers the railwaymen’s cottages quite beautiful. This is appropriate as his development company is called Hab — Happiness Architecture Beauty.

Tre Pezzi Makes a Comeback

The guys over at interiordesign.net recently highlighted the return of Cassina. Franco Albini and Franca Helg introduced their three-piece Tre Pezzi in 1959 as an update on the bergère.

The comfortable proportions, crescent shapes, and tubular-steel base endure. However the latter, originally painted black, can now also be ordered in polished chrome, and the wool fabric, formerly offered only in red, now comes in other bright colors and a selection of neutrals.

Original Article

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