a match made in fashion heaven

With every new fashion season, I find myself falling in love with English design house Mulberry. While I lusted after almost every piece from their Fall/Winter 2011 collection, it was their advertisements I loved the most. Designed by one of my favorite set designers Shona Heath, I couldn't be anymore happy with how she chose to display the garments and accessories.

Oh, Andy

After working for both the Thomas Heatherwick Studio and Shona Heath, set designer Andy Hillman opened his own studio in London in 2005, and has since produced props, costumery and art directed for such publications as Vogue (American, British, Italia, Nippon, Casa), Vanity Fair, Dazed & Confused, Lula, and Wonderland. His work continues to amaze me, from a giant rabbit head, to large eagles and swans. Absolutely beautiful.

in love

I'm in love with Shona Heath

beautiful mess

I want to live in this world imagined by Trish Stephenson

doll parts

Set designer Amy Henry reimagined the polaroid in the January issue of Details magazine. Playing with dimensions, she catches the viewer off guard - challenging our idea of the traditional flat polaroid, by placing doll-sized accessories over top of the polaroid itself. I love it.

beautifully bizarre

These installations and illustrations of artist Gary Card have be absolutely captivated. He seems to have so many different stylistic facets to his work, from his quilted snail window installation for TopShop to his comically odd sketches. (He even does high fashion set design and prop work.) Visit him here to view all of his work.

size matters

The manipulation of size has often been played with by many artists over the years (Claes Oldenburg, Louise Nevelson, Ron Mueck), distorting reality into something more akin to fantasy and fairy tale. One of my favorite set designers Simon Costin took this idea, but mixed it up a little. Not only did his model crouch within a glass greenhouse, but lean on a larger-than-life apple and pose amidst tiny chairs. This difference between the model as a giant (but also as a smaller, fragile being) creates a more visually interesting contrast. To put it simply, it's fun. (And to finish off the spread, he hangs bedroom furniture from a tree. I'm in love.)

maybe sometimes

I'm not always a fan of artist/set designer Michael Howells, but sometimes, when he gets it right, I'm truly blown away.

He's done it again

After reviewing a spread by set designer/artist Simon Costin in W's October issue several months ago (see it here), I once again returned to his site on CLM and found this spread. It takes the art of shadow puppets (those funny animal-like images you made on your bedroom wall with a flashlight and your hands when you were little) to a whole new level. How can you not love this darker take on such a childlike idea?

found again

I recently found an issue of W Magazine featuring one of my favorite set designers Simon Costin. I'm not sure how this October issue slipped by me for several months, but I'm glad I found it. This fashion spread (photographed by one of my favorite photographers, Tim Walker), inspired by nursery rhymes, is absolutely enchanting.