Wednesday, December 09, 2009

a little retro inspiration



one day at the flea market, i snatched up these two embroidery books from the seventies for a song. it was that day that i got a discount on the discount. both books are done by an embroidery artist named lis paludan. here's a link to someone who did a bit more research on her than i did. she's a danish woman who taught handicrafts for years and apparently is very well-known for her crochet books as well.  although these books are quite dated and in many ways really, really seventies (to the point where i feel i should listen to ABBA when i look at them), they have a timelessness as well in the simple, almost childlike motifs and bright colors.


i can easily see doing an updated version of these borders


a little tweaking of colors and these flowers would be very noughties.


i love that little owl.


i love this idea of appliquing children's drawings to cloth.
and the anatomical correctness of those three in the middle - very seventies.
sabin did some super cool flower people as a little girl, i think we'll try it with those.


and this row of houses is just so charming.

i think sometimes we look at previous decades and think we can't go there (for me, it's the 80s), but by taking bits and pieces and updating for right now, i think these books were definitely worth the 40 kroner i spent on them.

11 comments:

Unknown said...

These are lovely! Definitely worth it. I like the houses, soo cute! So, are you listening to ABBA?

Char said...

love the houses too - the genitals on the monsters cracked me up.

what great finds.

Elizabeth said...

Love them, especially the picture you made of the houses. That is a superduper idea. Coincidentally, I am working on a project called House or Home.

The 40 kroner are well spent, enjoy your finds and mix them up with your own creativity.

Barb said...

OOh, those are really cool. They'd even make good wall art.:)

Shokoofeh said...

These are absolutely lovely!

rxBambi said...

I love the monsters, put only 1 eyeball on them and you have a new set of Monocules!

Anonymous said...

it is always good to find old treasures.

Gwen said...

Something about these reminded me of the Bayeux Tapestry. Weird, right?

That owl is pretty darling.

Kristina said...

How lovely, I really like the borders! I look forward to seeing what you'll use this for.

paris parfait said...

I love embroidery! Once I did quite a lot of it, before I got too busy. I was thrilled to see really wonderful examples of Palestinian embroidery when in Jordan. Nothing beats handmade and handwork.

Elizabeth said...

these books are so much fun to look into. on one hand you can see they are from the 70's on the other hand they are still so much fun that they also fit in nowadays.

my word is latehans isn't that funny!!!!