the Art of Daniel Merriam

Part of the joys of having a blog is not to bore you with my daily tedium, but to show you exciting things I've found or classics I've loved for years, be they clothes, interiors, music, or in this case art. Specificly the art of Daniel Merriam who I have loved for years. When I do a blog about something I do a bit of research about whatever it is, and naturally, I find out more things about something I all ready know I like, but perhaps don't know much about. Its an excuse for me to learn a little more myself and handily, can share it on to you lovelies. Basically he's a genius, and that's all you need to know ;-)
Ok, Italian American, born 1963 and did I mention he is a genius?

Feast your eyes on this beautiful madness!

This one is actually the first of his paintings I ever saw and just thought it was so special, reminded me of the Smashing Pumpkins album 'Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness' and old theatre stage scenes.

This one reminds me a lot of another artist I also love called Kay Nielsen who I'm always banging on about. Anyway, Daniel is very prolific and there is a ton of amazing stuff of his out there, so just go do a google images search and find your favourites!

Van Asch Crafty Customers & Creativity

As I mentioned last week, this blog is dedicated to my crafty customers who use my fabrics and cushion covers etc to make things look fabulous.
Crafting has never been so popular as it is right now, almost everyone has some kind of need to create things. For some people it is gardening or cookery but for me it is beads, mosaic, upholstery, sewing, painting, collage, decoupage, lampshade making, photography... and the list goes on for as long as the imagination does...

A lot of my customers use the fabrics for upholstering old chairs, giving them a new lease of life and I love that on many levels. Firstly, I'm hugely into upcycling and reusing things and secondly, old furniture has more soul and well... twiddly bits...I do love twiddly bits!

These are a few chairs by Liloli Design

Using our Shrine Fabric

Our Treasure Fabric

Our Esoterica fabric

And here is a selection from Rinas Art & Design and you can find lots of her fabulous work on Instagram @rinas_art_design

Covered with our Edwardian Gothic fabric

This chair is too amazing for words! Using our Skull Keys & Peonies cushion cover and augmenting with swarovski crystals and chains...Hello!

Using our Mirror Mirror cushion cover

Using our 2 Halves Makes a Whole cushion cover

But not everyone uses the fabrics for upholstery or curtains... Here is an ingenious way to store those ugly plastic bags

And here is a lampshade made from panels of Golden Skulls fabric.

And here is the Golden Skulls fabric again used as art...

And in the back panel of this fabulous chair. I love the daring colour of this chair, what a great combo!

So are you feeling creative? How about starting a new project this weekend?

But what ever you choose to do this weekend enjoy yourselves! I'm off to sell my old car, then go to a party tonight and then have a big italian style extended family dinner on Sunday... If I've got time, I'll squeeze in some jewellery making...and that's my weekend all sorted!

opps! What Happened to Friday?

I usually do my blog on Friday afternoon but today I have to go and buy a bike for my daughter, a bit of a last minute thing, so no time to rant and rave about my special thoughts or any such nonsense! What I would like to ask though, if you have used Van Asch fabrics or cushions or whatever, to make something with, then I would like to hear from you!

I'm going to do a blog next week dedicated to all my crafty customers.
If you have pictures of the things you have made and would like a chance to be featured then please email pics to rachel@vanasch.se

Have a wonderful weekend!