The Beat That My Heart Skipped – A blog dedicated to daily design inspirations. By Rohini Wahi.

My boyfriend made me these for Christmas last year, but actually they are pretty neat for summer time so I’m giving it a go myself – the plan is to put them out on the windowsill (the closest I’ll be getting to a garden in my London flat) while the nights are still warm enough to go to bed with the window open. If you get the patterns right you’ll find you can stare at them flickering away for hours.
Continue Reading…

It must be my all time favourite DIY blog, just crammed with super clever projects and DIY tutorials . So I am really pleased and excited that Benita Larsson, the brain behind the blog Chez Larsson has agreed to contribute a guest blog post this week.

Recently Benita was asked by hobby craft shop Panduro Hobby to take part in a pretty challenging competition, alongside 39 other Swedish bloggers. Each competitor was sent a kit containing concrete and other supplies and were asked to be creative and come up with fun ideas that could inspire others to try the crafting with concrete.

I have to admit, I’ve never considered using concrete for my projects because I’d imagined it would be too complicated to use.

Benita proved this isn’t the case though, and she submitted seven different concrete crafts projects – ending up winning the grand prize, a gift card with 4000 kronor / £350.

Here Benita’s going to show us how to use concrete to make a heavy, raw looking book end. So clever, no wonder she won the prize! But all the ideas are wonderful so it’s worth going to the blog and checking the rest out too. I can’t wait to get my hands on some concrete and try them myself, but in the meantime, here’s Benita with the details.

Cat x

I prefer making stuff that has a use and a purpose rather than just being decorative and I really needed a bookend. Here it is! B goes three ways. B for Benita, B for books and B for böcker (that’s books in Swedish).
Continue Reading…

This adorable ceramic tile by designer Sarah J Miller perfectly sums up how I’m feeling about Cockpit Arts – both in terms of where to spend my cash, and more importantly how to decide what to feature in this post. If you haven’t heard about Cockpit Arts Open Studios before, listen up. The even runs in the Summer time and just before Christmas, and sees 165 designer-makers open their doors and let you in to see, sample and buy their wares.

It doesn’t matter whether you are looking for jewellery, furniture, fashion, or just something fun to do at the weekend, there will definitely be something there to catch your eye and capture your imagination. Oh, and on top of that, it’s free too!

As well as designers, you’ll also find delicious treats to eat and drink dotted around, and if all this creativity gets a bit too much for you, there’s the chance to try get crafty yourself in one of the ‘Flash Workshops: Millinery with hat maker Judy Bentinck, or a leatherwork workshop with designer Katherine Pogson.

Here’s the rundown of just some of the artists and makers I liked the most, but I’d urge you – if you live in or near London, to check it out for yourself.

Next weekend, 18 – 20 June, the event will be running in Deptford, and you can find all the information you need at the Cockpit Arts website.

I love the font and the bright colours against the white porcelain of Sarah J Miller’s designs. As well as the tiles, I was keen on her mugs and plates. They were all affordable, and would make wonderful gifts.

From something stylish and practical to something truly unique, I think the artist who most blew me away was Francesca Prieto. To see her work in its glory you’ll have to visit her website because no pictures I could take would have done it justice. Most impressive was a huge work in which the entirety of the Complete Works of Shakespeare is intricately folded and framed. Only when you step away from the work do you realise the way the paper has been folded creates a quotation mark in the design. It’s really worth a look. I’m also now saving up for her collection of prints in which she’s cunningly picked up on the similarities between Roman numerals and the Hindu Alphabet, and then combined similar characters into beautiful hybrid symbols. Check it out.

Continue Reading…

After an ambitious tutorial last week today’s tutorial is something relaxing and easy to do of a summer’s afternoon (it’s always a bonus when you can make something crafty at the same time as drinking Pimm’s in the park). You can use these flowers as a decorative garland, to decorate a table, or even to adorn cakes.

For this pretty origami flower garland, you will need:

Small squares of thin/origami paper (five for each flower you want to make – so I started with 25)
Gue
Thread
Needle

Now remember, like with any origami project, it’s key to take care to make sure the folds line up neatly as you go along, or gradually the whole flower will end up warped. So maybe don’t have too much of that Pimm’s before you start! Also, if you are cutting your squares from larger sheets of paper, it’s crucial that all the edges really are identical lengths.

Step 1 Fold your square in half diagonally into a triangle

Step 2 With the long edge of the triangle as the base, fold the left and right points up to the top point of the triangle.

Step 3 Carefully flatten out these little triangles into kite shapes.
Continue Reading…

This week, I’m leaving you in the capable hands of a special guest blogger – Centsational Girl, aka Kate. If you haven’t already come across Kate’s Blog , this is where she shares her incredible talent for budget friendly DIYs and revamping old items on a shoestring. In her own words, Kate is “a simple gal with a simple dream:  transforming the drab into the fab with an arsenal of paintbrushes, primer and power tools. I’m in pursuit of diamond style on a dime, and I refuse to believe quality must always be expensive.” That’s our kind of thinking!

Kate will be sharing a wonderfully inventive tutorial with us this week, in which she turns a rickety old headboard into a beautiful, and practical, coat rack. Over to you Kate.

Cat x

Headboard turned Coat rack

You will need [as well as the old headboard]:

sandpaper
wood filler (optional)
saw
primer
paint
a second, contrasting paint colour
an old cloth
hooks
D rings x2
screwdriver

A little while ago, I bought a spindly old-fashioned twin headboard at the local thrift store with every intention of turning it into a bench.  I’d seen the idea traveling around on some blogs, and loved it.

After some thought, I decided I had less use for a bench, and greater use for a coat rack in my guest space.  I had a bare wall, so why not fashion the headboard into a rack for scarves, sweaters, jackets, robes, or hats for my guests ?   You may recall, I’ve done this before, turning a footboard into a message centre with some white and chalkboard paint.

So I decided to do it again, but this time with a headboard.  I also used a different paint technique to give my coat rack an antiquated look.  Now, the twin headboard has been transformed into an architecturally decorative piece, providing both form and function.

Follow along and I’ll show how I turned this:

Into this:

Continue Reading…