Maxine Sutton's lampshades at Radiance

I am so pleased to have Maxine Suttons new printed and embroidered lampshades at Radiance. They arrived this morning and it's the first time I've seem them in the flesh. They are better than I imagined.

I first met Maxine a few years ago at The Great Northern Contemporary Craft Fair where I saw some lampshades that she had made. She couldn't wholesale them though at the time so I couldn't buy any for the shop :(

I did write about her in Illuminate though and found out all about her and her work and her lovely shop Blackbird in Margate.

But since then there have been developments and Maxine had developed a brand new range of shades. They are printed on hand woven organic cotton and printed with Soil Association approved inks and some of them have embroidered details too.  

 I'm very happy to have them at Radiance.

 Here is Maxines page on the website.

Sarah Lock Lighting

I've been excited to share these beautiful wood turned lamp bases with you for ages but have been waiting until the launch of the new site. I went down to Brighton to interview Sarah Lock for the book a few months ago and totally fell for her work.

This is Sarah in her workshop with one of her lamp bases on the lathe. She taught herself to turn after wanting to make use of great chunks of timber left over in her partners carpentry business. She discovered how much she liked it and over time found that she was quite good at it!

When she has her finished shape she had paints each one. She creates the tiny stripes by leaving them spinning on the lathe and painting them while they spin.

They are all topped of with a linen shade (also made by Sarah) and a twisted gold cord.

They are sooo lovely. You can see them on the website here.

Pretty Heirloom Lights

This very beautiful set of Heirloom lights by York designer/maker Louise Traill arrived today. It's particularly lovely....I know....I always say that though each time a new set comes in. This one has very soft colours when the lights are off and a lovely warm glow when they're on. Ahhhh! Soon Louise is going to make us some of her 'Carnival' shades too. I'm looking forward to them...

Tom Raffield

We have just got some work by craftsman Tom Raffield. Each one of these pendants is made from one 80 metre strip of English Ash which he steams, bends, coils and twists into shape. Truly beautiful.

New work by Helen Musselwhite

Helen has sent us a new batch of work. Beautiful as always! See them here.

Louise Traill Fairy lights are back!

It is with great happiness that I announce the return of Louise Traill's marvellous fairy lights. Louise has been unable to make them for a while and has been sorely missed but now she is BACK and the first two sets from her new batch arrived this morning. Each shade is lovingly made by hand from beautiful papers, beads, buttons, sequins and whatever pretty things Louise can lay her hands on. Every set is different but the ones that we have in at the moment are a mix of pretty pastel colours. Gorgeous!

Fruit and vegetables in a basket

We've displayed Joanna Couplands creative Fruit and Vegetable fairy lights in a basket. They look really cute. I love that radish!

Birdy Fairy Lights by Joanna Coupland

I had great fun this afternoon photographing these new handmade bird fairy lights by Joanna Coupland. In fact it was one of those moments when you realise how happy you are and think 'I am so lucky, this is my JOB', to sit little bird lights in a tree and make them look pretty! Ah! :)

Each one of them has it's own unique character. Thay are adorned with glitter , beads and sequins and all have colourful flowers on their little heads. There are twenty lights all together, ten are birds and ten are little pods.

You can see more pictures here.