The story behind....our Ida and Naomi prints!
Our Friendly prints project was born out of an invitation from artists Laura Aldridge and Anna Mayer to create an offering for their Openaries project during Glasgow International 2014. Together they built a portable ceramics kiln and invited local artists and practitioners to make ceramic offerings for one of their three firings. We 'offered' to create a protective apron for them to wear (more can be read about this on our blog) which led to our first print design in the series called 'Laura A' which can be seen in the image below (and yes it got picked out by Vogue as a top product at designjunction in 2015 - thank you Vogue!):
We decided to make tea towels and kitchenware products out of this idea of 'Friendly' prints as the kitchen always feels like the hub of a home. It's the place where conversations, meals, laughter and sometimes tears happen - of both joy and despair! These moments shared with our friends so often seem to happen in each others kitchens, that it seemed right that we created the designs into kitchen products. Plus who doesn't love a splash of colour and pattern in their kitchen?
We started out with Laura A, ventured on next to a Dave then Von design and for 2016 introduced Ida and Naomi. Each of these designs is inspired in some way by the person it is named after, people who've made us smile, we've shared unforgettable times with or are maybe just an inspiration to us. Their personality has stayed with us, maybe this all sounds a bit much, but people, the communities we create and surround ourselves in are maybe the most important thing. So this is a small celebration of some of the great people we get to share things with...
IDA - has a smile that warms any heart and means it when she says 'it's all good'. Ida works as an assistant at Arteles Creative Centre in Finland and I met her whilst on a residency there last summer. Never annoyed by residents continual questions, she really does bring a smile to everyone's face with her generous nature.
This design is based on an abstracted smile....pushed into our graphic sensibility with colours that remind me of Ida and Finland. The blue skies, green grass...often we were outside - picking berries, eating or making bonfires.
Next is Naomi...
NAOMI - has a magical love of rocks, nature, colour and the universe. Naomi is a painter who lives and works in Australia and is an inspiration. I also met Naomi at Arteles (and many other lovely people I should say!). This is an example of some of her work which inspired our tea towel design...
(Image courtesy of Naomi Bishop)
(Image courtesy of Naomi Bishop)
Naomi's bold use of colour and love of mystical things inspired the rhythm and palette for our design.
The completed set of designs and colours of Ida and Naomi (available as single tea towels or gift box sets):
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