oh i do like to be beside the seaside....

abalone shells, carousels and veggie fish and chips - a perfect bank holiday weekend beside the seaside (....beside the sea.........). after a long and lazy lie in we nipped off to brighton for a bit of coastal strolling. the brighton fringe festival was on so the streets were teaming with jugglers, percusionists and football fan belly dancers (though i think the latter may have been a stag party straggler rather than official entertainment, but his wobbly belly and boobies were incredibly hypnotic).

after wandering along the beach front and taking a few obligatory carousel and coastline shots we took an early dinner at terre a terre, a really scrummy veggie restaurant just off the main beach front. despite being vegetarian we tend not to eat in veggie restaurant as they seem to be overpriced and full of very...how can i say...'vegetarian' food! so, lots of beans, lentils, pulses....raw peculiar vegetables i've never heard of and a massive clash/fusion of intense flavours that seem to be used to 'replace' the meat. by the way, my description says more about my uncultured palette than the quality of vegetarian cuisine! but whilst the prices were still high at terre a terre at around £8 a starter and £15 a main dish it was actually delicious. i had veggie fish and chips, which was a plate laden with very chunky homemade chips which were more like roast potatoes, very minty mushy peas and the amazing buttermilk soaked halloumi coated in chip shop batter. it really was bizarrelly like a bit of cod, or maybe it's been a veeeery long time since i've eaten fish. definately worth a visit.

here are some more snaps from the day:

did anyone else manage to enjoy a bit of the beautifully rare bank holiday sunshine?

and the winner is...

thanks so much for joining in everybody! i hope you all served yourself tea and cake to celebrate your very merry unbirthday. from the entries through blog, facebook and email it's time to announce the very merry unbirthday winner....who is number....

by hannah.aviva





number 2: 'down and out chic' you are crowned the very merry unbirthday girl and win your prize of 'boheme in brass' necklace!





thanks so much for entering everyone and i'll be sure to celebrate again your very merry unbirthdays very soon!

post your secret...

i hadn't been on PostSecret for a while...not sure what reminded me of but thought i'd have a wander over and have a look. i love the idea, sharing a secret anonymously through a postcard sized piece of art. and i would love to be the post person who gets to deliver all those postcards, that's a pretty interesting batch of post!

i can imagine that sharing a postcard secret is hugely liberating....but also really scary too. i've thought about sending in secrets, i have a few i would like to 'share'. but they are secrets that i've almost hidden from myself and i think it would take quite a lot of thinking about the secret to get it onto a postcard...thinking that i'm not sure i'm quite ready to do yet. maybe it's more the thinking than the sharing that's putting me off, the sharing is fine, it's getting it out in the first place.

like this one. i wonder if it hurt to write that. i wonder if they had to admit to themselves what they had been doing and if it made them reflect on it, likely in a really uncomfortable and painful way?...

an old one i found over here, something i most definately did when i younger, partly out of excitement, mostly out of fear.

and some more below from here

the archive on the site seems to be much smaller than it used to be...guess they are keeping them for the postsecret books. would love to see more postcards, please point me in the direction of your favourites!

dont forget the free jewellery giveaway...

choose anything, ANYTHING from my shop, let me know you want it here, and then wait to be the very merry unbirthday boy or unbirthday girl. i'll be pulling the winner from the mad hatter's hat/teapot/vessel on monday which means there are only 2 days left to enter!

dont judge a greasy spoon by its shop front...

after a 'night on the tiles' we were on the hunt for some good english grub of the greasy spoon variety. after wandering by a few particularly dodgy looking vendors in faringdon (london) and deciding that they were just tooooo greasy to risk we were faced with our final option 'the popular cafe'. hmmmm....cafe didn't seem THAT popular (we were the only customers bar one), and claims of popularity always make me nervous. the cafe looked like it hadn't been touched since the 70's, which added to my worry about the food. however, the boys' stomachs did the talking on this occasion and we ventured in.


and then i fell in love.


one, with the gorgeous formica orange tops. two, with the lovely smiley waitress. three, with the retro sauce bottles. four, with my rather suprisingly tasty mushrooms on toast (though i'm sure the hangover improved the taste). five, for the tea being served in chunky mugs. and six, for the red top newspapers (i actually really dislike red tops, but they seemed an important part of the picture at this cafe). it was the 70's throwback that made me love it. and the best thing is i dont think they were trying to be 70's, they just were.

and aren't these pictures soooo cool? and no, unfortunately i haven't recently acquired a lovely polaroid camera (i wish), these pics were rather geniusly created through a little program i stumbled across on amity's blog. poladroid creates polaroid style images of your photos though a simple drag and drop program, and as a nice little touch you get to see the photos 'develop'! not sure how but i managed to save one of the photos as it was 'developing'....got a nice washed out look from it. you've got try it out, it's very addictive.

would love to see the poladroids you create - please share links in comments below!

p.s. dont forget to enter the GIVEAWAY - win ANY, yep ANY piece of jewellery from my shop!

is nakedness enough to turn city folks heads?...

what an awesome idea for a music video from make the girl dance. but what i love the most is the apathy of some of the passersby....the same amount of people dont seem to notice as those who stare, even a pretty naked lady isn't enough to turn some city folks head! much like this video, the world continues on by...can't help but think that if that had happened in regent street london there would have been a little more crowd participation (positive/negative?)...do ladies often get nakey in france?

now, i wonder if i could ever have the courage to walk nakey down a street?! would you?

my new home design...

when i was 10 years old, this was my dream home. isn't this amazing?! beautiful and completely covetable. i so hope it's real and not just photoshopped. they should sell these babies, i would most definately be buying one.

giveaway: your very merry unbirthday...?

giveaway? to you? yes you! yes indeed there are 364 unbirthdays in a year and to celebrate your very merry unbirthday go grab yourself a design from my shop, go on, any piece....what do you like the look of?

image by AnitaInverarity

A very merry unbirthday

To you

Who, me?

To you

Oh, me

Let's all congratulate us with another cup of tea

A very merry unbirthday to you

Now statistics prove

Prove that you've one birthday

Imagine just one birthday every year

Ah, but there are 364 unbirthdays

Precisely why we're gathered here to cheer

From: Alice In Wonderland

so, have you decided what you'd like? just drop me a comment below telling me why you would like it or email claire@gugaw.co.uk. then, in a weeks time on Monday 25th May 09 i'll randomly select one unbirthday boy or unbirthday girl and will whizz your unbirthday present your way.

dont be late!

welcome to the beautiful...

loooove this design book from habitat. first off, the cover is a gorgeous course paper style chipboard (there must be a proper name for this?) with letter press font. and then, when you open the cover, you are met with gorgeous double page macro shots of their textural pieces. and the chartreuse and dusky lilac accents are EXACTLY what i've been umming and ahhing about for the past few months. oh habitat, how you tempt me.

strawberry!

in dedication to my first taste of english strawberries which we devoured this weekend...they were sweet and teeny, and tasted delicious dipped in caster sugar (i know, very naughty, blame my mum). this enamelled cutie is now available over at my shop

sight, sound, taste, smell, touch...

i was originally gonna post this last week, but the competition was closed, and now it's reopened, and closing is midnight tonight (11th May)! vice magazine and wrigleys have teamed up to launch wrigleys new '5' gum, so they're looking for 5 ideas which will stimulate the senses for their creating sense5 launch party in June. hotchip will be curating and the 'sound' sense category will get to support them on the night...i'm not 100% sure if your idea has to be fully realised to enter into the competition or whether you can enter with a prototype or even an idea...but hey it's worth entering (particularly if you have a prickly chair you have created to hand).

probably a little late for inspiration (see, the idea was i was going to blog about them and have enough time to post these out....i was too slow!), but i have a box of this new gum if you wanna try it. sorry for the dodgy iphone pic...but thought i'd share a pic because the packaging is quite fun. think you can see that it's sleek and black...although possibly a little like a flavoured condom pack. is that a bad thing? and though i'm not sure how or if it stimulates the 5 senses (sound?) the flavour is very good, kinda a minty cross between chugger and bubblegum...drop me a message a claire@gugaw.co.uk if you're interested.

what i wish i wore...

so this is a roundabout post....i saw this blog via this twitterer....that is, i saw 'what i wore' via the etsy twitter stream, and then on the blog i saw these g.o.r.g.e.o.u.s. shoes.

and the 'what i wore' blog is just gorgeous too...good graphics, good content, and lurverly vintage delights...

my mates are doing it diy...

they've just realised their single and made this rather good video to accompany, nice diy feel, a touch of slo mo and a little dash of london for all those of you who are missing it...buses, tubes, coppers and zombie commuters (love how they barely turn a head to a guy who has stood almost perfectly still on the tube platform for AGES!)...check out 8fold's shindig tune, tis good.

dusky lake...

back in store...after 6 long months...so sorry for the delay! labradorite is a real favourite of mine, understated and yet super sexy in one of those unexpected ways - you know the type of ladies...those real natural beauties whose sexiness just shines through without the need of short hems and low necklines....


...sorry, i've gone off on some random metaphor about sensuality and gemstones! find the bracelet in my store...matching necklace coming soon....and in the meantime i'd just like to take the opportunity to share another labradorite favourite of mine:

like the bracelet above, this necklace is made with flashy labradorite rondelles...these rondelles are smaller than those in the bracelet and perfectly match the silver beads i found! the karen hill tribe beads (.99% silver - even more 'silver' than sterling silver) give a gorgeous organic texture to the necklace, each bead slightly different in shape and size. these silver beads and the clasp are fairly traded too - so you can wear and know you are helping to support the rights of the workers who produced these beautiful beads.