Famille Summerbelle

A day at the beach

Yesterday. A beautiful day on the beach 30mn away from Amsterdam.

Our home featured in Spur magazine, Japan

I am delighted to finally show you the article in this month issue of Spur Magazine featuring our home in Amsterdam and other homes of illustrators living in other european cities:
Hanna Konola and Teresa Moorhouse in Helsinki, Isabelle Boinot in Paris, Tina Berning in Berlin.
It has been a pleasure to meet the photographer Fumie Tsuji (who's also the lead singer in her band Fleckfumie!) who came from Berlin for a day to shoot our house back in May.
You can view more photos of our interior on Spur website.

Illustrator of the day

Tokyo based illustrator Ryo Takemasa
You can buy totes, prints, mugs and cushions with his designs on Society 6.

Inspiring 48h in London

I wanted to share with you some inspiring photos I took while I was in London last week. I was there to work in the Famille Summerbelle studio in Finsbury park. On Saturday I met with my younger sister Emeline (we call her Milou!) who lives in Shoreditch for a nice breaksfast at Albion. She took me in all the cool shops in the area. Oh and I also went on Regent street to Anthropologie and J Crew. There were so many nice things to buy!

The Handweavers Studio on Seven Sisters Road.

Anthropologie, Regent Street.

J Crew, opposite Anthropologie on Regent Street.

Albion on Boundary Street.

Nice pattern on the front of the building Forge & Co on Shoreditch High Street

Opposite, Ace Hotel and Hoi Polloi restaurant with the pretty That Flower Shop.

Custom made umbrellas at Lockwood Umbrellas on Shoreditch High Street.

You Can Now shop on Rivington Street and I really recommend reading their magazine.

Labour and Wait on Redchurch Street.

The Creative Guide to Amsterdam

Dutch graphic designer Naomi den Besten from Pretty Unexpected has created this beautiful Creative Guide to Amsterdam packed with her favourite addresses: design book stores, concept stores, restaurants, art supplies shops and many more cool things to do in Amsterdam. Her creative guide is available here.
A new excuse to go on my bike to explore this city!

Letterpress Amsterdam

This morning I met up with Thomas Gravemaker the man behind the creative Letterpress Amsterdam studio in the centre of town. It's a fascinating workspace full of charm, old machines and wooden draws filled with handset metal types. Thomas has an extensive knowledge and experience in letterpress and graphic design. He worked for many years in London and Paris where he set up his own studio. I enjoyed speaking to him in French for an hour (I mainly speak English with everyone in Amsterdam so it was nice to speak with a (Dutch) francophile!)
The Letterpress Amsterdam studio produces bespoke prints, cards and invitations and also two-day intensive workshops or evening classes to learn the skills of letterpress printing.

In search for wallpaper and interior fabrics

Famille Summerbelle is very excited to be part of Patternsnap a newly launched application for iphones and ipads which helps you search, save and share a very large selection of wallpaper and interior fabric patterns. Choose a design and Patternsnap provides detailed samples of similar patterns then links you directly to the stockists and company website where you can purchase your favourite product.It is really fun to use and very useful for searching beautiful patterns (You will find the work of designers like Deborah Bowness, Louise Body, Abigail Edwards, Erika Wakerly, MissPrint, Timorous Beasties and many many more...)

Win a paper cut map of San Francisco!

This month we are very excited to collaborate with Babyccino to offer you the opportunity to win our bright pink paper cut map of San Francisco (worth £120)
You just have to register on their lovely website to participate!
This laser cut map is an exact replica of the original hand paper cut of San Francisco. It shows all the interests and attractions of the City by the Bay, as well as some of the quirky side of San Francisco life.

Watch the making of the map of San Francisco here!