Joy Of Toile

This week so far has been a rough one, lot's of angst, pressure and overtime on the work front and tired, listless evenings filled with take-away food and desultory web surfing on the home front. Meh. Oh yeah, punctuated with cussing as my internet connection keeps dropping out. My phone line that was playing up a few months ago seems to be crackly and erratic again.

Anyhoo, the high point of this half arsed websurfing though is discovering a few fantastic new design oriented blogs. With a new sewing machine in my custodianship, and ideas bubbling in my head about remaking, reusing and recycling some of the things in my wardrobe, I stumbled across a cool community of wardrobe re-fashionistas. Like the amazing Finnish 'trashionista' OutsaPop Trashion, and Queen Michelle of Kingdom of Style.

On the yang side of design and fashion Mr Peacock is my new fave. Not a re-fashion blog this time around, but a wonderful curated mix of food, interior design, fashion and interviews with stylish 'peacocks' about town. One recent post that really put a smile on my face was about the tattooed vintage peacocks of doll maker Mimi Kirchner. Mimi has a wonderful blog Doll: The Art & Craft of Mimi Kirchner and an Etsy shop full of goodies.




Kirchner had the genius idea to use Toile de Jouy fabric for the tattooed bodies of the dolls. Genius! The scale and fine line art style of the drawings are ideal and have a great vintage look.



She compliments the fabric with vintage strong-man style togs, and super cute illustration style facial features. Cute non?



I've never been tempted to be a doll collector, but I'd love a couple of these guys. Of course, as handmade dolls the prices (while being reasonable for the work involved) are a little out of my budget for something so non-essential. Although, if I re-classified them as essentials...



She also does a line of other female dolls, like these super cute mermaids, and magical little 'tiny world' pincushions in a tea cup. So clever and inspiring! Aside from having a go at re-fashioning, maybe it's time to get the sewing machine to work on some other fun stuff.

[All photos and doll designs by Mimi Kirchner.]