LIZ-E-LOVES: February 2012

lanalou style - decor, fashion & Cape Town life

lanalou style - decor, fashion & Cape Town life

Get outdoors
Posted: 28 Feb 2012 01:23 AM PST

Since summer will soon be coming to an end here, I've been trying to make the most of the lovely weather and be outdoors as much as possible. On warm days I set up a little desk in my my back courtyard in dappled shade and work away. It's such bliss. I thought I would share some inspiring images to help you get outdoors, whether it's for work (I wouldn't mind working in this sweet garden setting below created by love in october) or whether it's just to relax, enjoy a picnic or read a book.

Image credits: 1) photo by Linda Bergroth via Nordic Design, 2 -5) love in october, 6) housetohome, 7) Ngoc Minh Ngo, 8) Corrie Bond via 2c Management, 9) Lonny

Lanalou

lanalou style - decor, fashion & Cape Town life

Colour trends 2012

Posted: 06 Feb 2012 12:14 AM PST

Morning friends! Ready for a new week? Thought I'd share some colour inspiration with you today thanks to Dulux who sent me a a beautiful and inspiring ColourFutures 12 book which introduces key colour palette trends for 2012.

The colour of the year is said to be a vibrant and warm shade of red, perfect for both accent and feature walls. Red is a powerful mood lifter and held in high regard world wide, so it makes sense that this colour takes center stage.

ColourFutures 12 also lists five key colour trends, I'll feature two today and the rest next week, so look out for that! The first trend is Delicate Mix, I particularly love this colour palette with it's subtle and understated yet luxurious feel. Gorgeous corals, nude pinks and elegant neutrals paired with hints of forged iron steel, copper, wood and polished concrete.

Another trend is Living Scrapbook which reflects our current tendencies towards social media, sharing, collecting and the need to be more quirky and reflect our selves. It's a balanced, warm and charming palette with hints of craft paper and mature pastels. Modern yet slightly non-mainstream.

All images via ColourFutures 12 via Dulux

YES!

decor8 daily

Pastels, Natural Wood, Neon and Hints of Copper

Posted: 06 Feb 2012 07:56 AM PST

Hello everyone! How was your weekend? I hope it was a good one. I got stranded in Holland due to the weather but made the best out of it and as a result, made some new friends and got to meet up with Eline Pellinkhof in her home city of Haarlem AND I was able to see a shop I've longed to see for several years now called Ottomania. It was such a great experience and I'm so glad that bad weather brought me to Haarlem though the travel bit was just horrible. I'm home now and made a little "me" time this morning as a result of the stressful journey back by train (a 4 hour trip took 17 hours and two days of freezing on platforms trying to go east into Germany) so a salon visit made everything right again. Total girl power! I thought I'd begin this week by announcing some good news and spotting a lovely trend. I thought I'd share the trend first and then, my next post, will highlight the very good news.

via Design Files the home of Lucy Young.

This is a trend I spotted in Amsterdam last week when I was out and about with Stephanie Rammeloo who is also quite keen on this color combination, too. I saw these tones together on a wall and my heart exploded with joy! It made me so happy to see something before me that I felt such an immediate connection to. Have you ever felt like that about a color palette? I thought to show you the palette best, I'd share some products and images that fit the scheme I'm referring to since I know you're visual and well, seeing is really believing, isn't it? From mere text, it wouldn't seem as though a soft pastel like (god forbid I say this word), "peach", would look great with neon pink, mint green, butter cream yellow and bold copper but oh.my.goodness it SO does. See for yourself…