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

Sigh! I’ll bet Claudia Varosio is one cool lady…you can tell right? From looking at her painfully clever popular culture inspired illustrations, she seems like the kind of girl who you’d be too shy to talk to for the whole year at art college because she looked too cool to be your friend, and her work was always used as an example in class, but then in the last week of college you suddenly found yourselves in conversation and discovered she was nice as well as cool and could have been your friend the whole time! Too late!

Anyway…after over-thinking that one slightly[!]… I present to you Claudia’s retro film inspired posters. How beautiful are these? I love the restrained palette of colours used and the minimal text really gives the posters a sombre poignancy. Claudia also illustrates iconic song lyrics, and and more recently rock icon paper dolls prints.

Each poster is priced at just under $17 dollars from Claudia’s Etsy shop.

I just found this house sitting in my drafts. I can’t remember where I found it but I had titled it ‘Practical Magic House’. I recall it being an artists’ home in France. It embodies completely the house in one of my favourite books and films ‘Practical Magic’ by Alice Hoffman. The rambling old house in a small Massachusetts town is central to the story. Having housed generations of pagan witches it is well loved and worn, with bottles and jars and herbs and flowers tumbling out of every crevice. I suppose it is the film that really brings the house to life. (how many times did i say ‘house’ then? I really don’t think it could be helped).

How could you ever be unhappy if you lived here…

A good interior to me is equal to how foodies feel when they put a spoonful of exquisite buttery pastry in their mouth, or watch the beginnings of a chocolate souffle on a cookery channel…that melting, swooning, contented, undulating emotion. I feel the same way when I see a breathtaking interior in a film or photograph…is there such a thing as interior porn???

Well if there is, I found it a few nights ago when we watched the film Revolutionary Road, starring Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet. Based on the first novel of Richard Yates. Set in 1955, it centers on the hopes and aspirations of Frank and April Wheeler, self-assured suburbanites who see themselves as very different from their neighbors in the Revolutionary Hill Estates. As the film progresses they discover they are not as different as they would like to believe and frustrations begin to arise. It is an indictment of American life in the 1950s when there was a general lust for conformity all over the country. Such a sad and beautiful film – it’s so still and so quietly complex it reminds me of something Ian McEwan might create.

Anyway, the cinematography was immaculate. Each scene a quiet masterpiece and I fell in love with the elegant decor of the the 1950’s cookie cutter homes…my favourite scenes were the stunning and peaceful ones without any people in, but i couldn’t find any online, you’ll have to watch and see for yourself! These images don’t do the film justice.

On Sunday night we watched The Curious Case of Benjamin Button – so so sad…I know the story is impossible but it still made me so thoughtful…

Most of the film was based in New Orleans which is one of the places that has always been on the top of my wishlist to visit…I believe it to be one of the most magical, emotional cities in the world. When I was younger I used to read/watch anything I could get my hands on about New Orleans, it’s vibrant culture, its colourful gothic history and especially it’s enchanting architecture speaks to me!

How beautiful are these buildings, can’t you just feel the rooms glittering with late night soirees and late afternoon tea parties? The first one was the home of Anne Rice at one point.

Back to work tomorrow. Had a lazy lazy long weekend. Watched The Happening last night by M. Night Shyamalan. The acting was a bit strange and a bit difficult to follow, but as with all of his films I think the concept is always really strong and it’s about how you feel after you’ve watched it and the story has sunk in.

The story begins with a high school science teacher who quizzes his class one day about an article in the New York Times, about the sudden, mysterious disappearance of bees.  They discuss how yet again Nature is doing something inexplicable, which we take for granted happens in the animal kingdom. Meanwhile something similar begins happening in New York, people start dropping dead mysteriously on mass. We learn eventually that this is a force of nature, a momentary imbalance in the air.

I thought about this for a long while after. Life is so fragile.