A professional's guide to junk hunting part II

I posted up some pictures on Sunday to illustrate that day's Insider column in the Independent on Sunday magazine, which I write each week.

The theme was how to collect good junk and do interesting stuff with it. I interviewed Sarah Brunner, the co-presenter of a new Sky Arts 2 show, Design Dealers. She's a pro. She had some good tips. Now, to go with the images from last week, here is the extended version of what she talked about with bonus tips and images...

"Old toast racks (above) are also something you always see in nearly every charity shop – which, especially he 1930s ones, make great letter racks. Anything that looks nice and has a good form is worth picking up if it appeals to you. It’s just about thinking how you could get it into your home."

 “Lots of things can be made into lighting – including taxidermy. I love Alex Randall's work, especially this sparrow [swallow] light (above), which looks as it if has flown away and is trailing the lightbulb behind it."

Light by Dale Chihuly

"You also see people doing lots with old bottles and mason jars – it is quite a trend. And I like the work of Dale Chihuly, who has done hanging clusters of coke bottles and made chandeliers from them (above). Although neither of these projects are something the average person could or probably would try to do, nor afford to buy from the artists, they are still inspiring because it's about realising that you can take the ordinary and do extraordinary things with it."

Light by Alex Randall

"Brass instruments make great lights, too. People are doing some really beautiful stuff with them – and brass is set to be one of 2013’s biggest interiors trends, so worth taking a second look if you see a collection of old brass anything for sale on your travels. I have a euphonium in my own home as a light fitting: it took 15 minutes to do – you just buy a light holder and thread it through." (See the previous post on this topic for more details on this). Alex Randall also does interesting things with brass – check out her organ pipes and gramaphone trumpets, above).

"I keep finding lots of broken old glass beaded jewellery: I’m collecting it and using the beads to make Victorian-style glass bead flowers by threading them onto wire. These glass bead flowers (above, top) made from broken jewellery are heading over to Arrietty in Exeter, Devon, a lovely shop full of handmade and haberdashery. I'm giving hands-on upholstery courses there in March if anyone is interested." (See end of this post for how to contact Sarah direct.)

For sale on the Mint List, designed by Lilly's Lightbox

"Another thing to look out for is lightboxes – they can be fantastic for the gloomy corner that every home has: use them as they are [I know someone who has a little one as his bedside table – it casts a lovely glow] or you can have anything fixed to them – old photos, pictures of your children, vintage advertising signs… just take the lot to a sign-writer who will apply it to plexiglass and do the job for you if your craft skills don’t extend that far. It's not very expensive – I had some really big ones done and they only cost £100ish, so smaller ones would be much cheaper. I had an old 50s toothpaste ad with Marilyn Monroe in it that I really loved – and I took that to the sign-maker. The combination of light and colour really brightened a dark corner at my place."

The image above is in a brilliant new book, Teeny Tiny Gardening, which I will be writing about in full over the next few weeks. It is by Emma Hardy and published by Cico, and gives step-by-step instructions for this and other excellent plant-based projects. It is available to pre-order on Amazon

"I learned a lot from having to do retail window displays at my old junk shop Otto Retro in Devon (now under new and very good management – do check it out!): you have five seconds to grab people’s attention – one time, for spring window, I had loads of lovely 20s and 30s wooden dining chairs I’d collected, but broken and had no seats. So I made seed trays the right size for where the seats would have been and filled them with compost and grew grass where the seats would have been." (See photo above for a similar idea).

"Another great one for gardens is old filing cabinets – and you see LOADS of those at junk fairs or second hand shops, not even beautiful ones. Simply turn them onto their backs, remove the drawers and fill the cavities with soil and you have a perfect divided herb garden – and usually in great colours for gardens."

And here, in case you missed the original piece in the paper, are Sarah's original tips that go with the above-mentioned images I posted last week...

“Recognise what fills you with ‘object lust’ – then think how to get it into your home. For example, I LOVE 1970s glitter drum sets: wall-mounted, they’re shelves for rolled-up blankets; on the floor, a side-table. Approach junk-hunting by thinking: ‘what do I want to look at?"

“Teapots have many lovely uses. I like them as outdoor planters hung at intervals with wire.”

 “You can do LOADS with gorgeously old, paint-spattered ladders – like wall mounting one horizontally (with l-shaped hangers) and using it as a book shelf.”

“Find sources of inspiration before you go junk hunting: I particularly love James Plumb – they bridge the gap between art and utility with their repurposing.”

"Wooden skis are just beautiful. I like fixing them on walls – minus the foot holders – to hang fabric from. People are also making beautiful coat stands using three of them lashed together upright.” 

Does all that sound daunting? If you aren’t crafty – just source a good maker. Chances are, you’ll still have found a bargain, and a unique one that tells a story. You can also hire Sarah Brunner’s skills via the Design Dealers’ Facebook page. 

A professional’s guide to junk hunting

In my Insider column in today's New Review magazine, in the Independent on Sunday I interviewed Sarah Brunner, one of the presenters on a new TV show on Sky Arts 2, called Design Dealers. 

The woman is obsessed with junk – but beautiful junk or, more often, junk that looks unpromising to the untrained eye, but which she manages to turn into beautiful things for the home. Read her top tips for what sort of junk to hunt, and then what to do with it, in today's paper. Meanwhile, below, some images of her ideas to accompany her tips.

 

70s drum kit as shelves or side-tables. These drums aren't quite the spangly retro ones I know Sarah had in mind, but the way the green ones are hung illustrates her idea for her dream drum shelving. While the red version, chopped in half vertically is reconfigured differently to the way Sarah describes, but I quite like it as an alternative. And handily there are full DIY instructions for both over at Tom Tom Magazine. I also like them turned into side tables, top images, via the Home Jelly blog and Indulgy.

Teapots as outdoor hanging planters, via Beeldsteil

 

Ladder shelves, via Upcycleus

Wooden skis coat hanger, Orvis. They also sell another version, the one Sarah was describing – which you can see here

Brass instrument pendant, from the Antique Lighting blog. This is more complex than the one Sarah describes, as it has been adapted into a pendant. She simply threaded her lamp-holder through the intact instrument and propped it up, with the bulb in the open end and the wire exiting the mouthpiece. Make sure you get a lampholder with a plug and switch on it (known as an inline switch) to make things super simple. You can get rather ugly ones from Amazon, or if you'd rather go down the antique styling route, speak to the most helpful (and affordable) Urban Cottage Industries about what you're after, and they'll be able to sort you out so that it looks more like this, below, which is their version of the plastic-y Amazon one.

Suitcase chest of drawers by James Plumb, the design duo Sarah finds hugely inspiring for their creative way with what others might see as junk.

I will republish the text of the piece on the blog later this week, including a few bonus tips, so if this is your kind of thing, come back!

Also – should you require Sarah's style services for some pimping in your own pad or shop, you can contact her by email at: brunner.sarah [at] gmail.com

East London Furniture exhibition

If you are in London a week too late for the Design Festival (it's just finished), and you don't mind a bit of hipster, you might enjoy combining a coffee or a cocktail with the East London Furniture exhibition at the oh-so-east-London bar, DreamBagsJaguarShoes.

The installation, which launched in time for the Design Festival, remains in situ until November. East London Furniture have re-fitted out JaguarShoesthey entirely, using only recycled materials, found objects or waste.

The exhibition will also feature new illustrations from graphic designer, Alessandro Mistrulli, who designs their hand-drawn wrapping paper (£3.50 a sheet). It comes in owl, moustache or dinosaur and is printed on textured paper. It is nice.

I really like that they photograph every piece of found wood that gets turned into something new; the idea is that every piece of furniture sold has a record of its back-story – so you get to track where each bit of it was found and what it used to be. There will be an auction at the end of the exhibition in November.

Failing that, you could always just look at their online shop. They have NICE stuff. It's not cheap, but it's free to look...

I think the milk stool made from a single pallet (top right) is beautiful. The coffee table, £180 (bottom left) is reclaimed plywood and the feet are coated in industrial rubber, and I just love the large cube floor-light, £220 (top left). The wrapping paper (bottom right) is the stuff mentioned above. I'd love it more if I could knock these things up myself. Maybe I should invest, instead, in one of the Furniture Magpies short courses at West Dean College in Chichester.

Introducing... Folklore

I've had my eye on Folklore since the holding page for their online shop appeared over the winter, and offered a tantalising glimpse of some beautiful furniture and homewares to come, selected by its co-owner, Danielle Reid. 

Finally, they came – last month, the shop was fully up and open for business. The Folklore look is clean, calming, unfussily stylish and – beautifully – designed to last. The shop is pretty much the diametric opposite of my own home style – which starts with intentions of coming over all grown-up, but quickly gets hijacked by my hoarding habit, inability to resist lots of colour and a trail of things I haven't quite got around to finishing. So I am in awe of Folklore and wanted to find out more about the shop's style and how to create it. Over to Danielle...

What is Folklore and who are you? Folklore is a new independent home and lifestyle store in Islington [and online] started by myself and my husband Rob. We curate mindful design for home and life. We stock a selection of homewares, furniture, lighting, art and lifestyle goods that are created with care and made to last.

Sum up the Folklore look Our product range is a mix of handmade or antique pieces or items made from recycled or found materials. Others are easily recyclable at the end of their life or made in an environmentally mindful way. Our aesthetic reflects this and is clean, modern, simple and natural.

Tell us about a couple of the designers you sell The work of Naomi Paul is stunning. She uses recycled, upcycled, organic, industry waste and British luxury material to create unique and intelligent textiles. We stock her GLÜCK pendants (below), £399 which are just beautiful.

David Shillinglaw is an artist who immediately stood out to us. His work combines street with studio ranging from small handmade books to canvases and from reclaimed materials to large scale wall murals. We’re very excited to have collaborated with him on the first of our own in-house range. Backgammon (below) and Domino cushions, £80 each, are made from vintage linen and are screen-printed using David’s designs. They are available exclusively from Folklore.

Hendzel + Hunt are a creative studio based in Peckham in south London. We collaborated with them to make The Cabinet (below), £2950 – the first of a series of storage pieces currently being designed and produced. Their work is outstanding but even more so when you consider they use only salvaged and reclaimed materials to construct their pieces from.

[Scroll down for my pick of Folklore's more affordable goodies]

Where do you like to shop? There’s a little boutique in Paris that sells beautiful handmade ceramics called Le Petit Atelier de Paris which is really special. Closer to home, Anthropologie is one of my favourite stores. 

Who/what are your style inspirations? Anything that catches my eye really! We have a Pinterest page which is brilliant for keeping hold of beautiful imagery that I come across all the time. 

What are your interiors commandments? 
Craftsmanship, quality, simplicity and durability. This is reflected in the interior design of our store where we chose a simple colour scheme with raw, natural and reclaimed materials. For example, the hanging shelving (above) is made from reclaimed scaffolding planks. We sanded them back and left the wood untreated to allow the natural beauty of the wood to come through. The wall cladding is Victorian floorboards which we left bare.

Thanks Danielle. Now here is my pick of some of Folklore's smaller items... 

From left to right: Large Wooden Horse, £48; Cardboard Trophy, £50-65; Ceramic Dip Cup, £29

Out of the dark

If you are near west London this week, there's an interesting (and colourful, as you can see below) event going on in Shepherd's Bush until 29th. It's a pop-up shop/fundraiser, featuring furniture made by the very cool charity, Out of the Dark, which trains young people in need of skills and jobs to recycle and restore classic pieces of furniture.

The organisation found me on Facebook and I was really interested to discover what they do. So even if you can't make it, they're worth checking out (as is their tempting online shop).

               Orange G-plan dining table from the 1960s with chairs. Made in High Wycombe. £600 (sold)

It is a great idea and the training – headed by founders, Jay and Jade with an excellently placed combination experiences of photography, construction, textiles, design and teenage rebellion –  is clearly good, as the pieces produced are stunning and unusual. Here is a small selection of some from the pop-up to give you a taster (and there will be other things going on at the shop, including upcycling workshops)... 

Blue Ercol dining table and Ercol chairs. Made in High Wycombe. £450

But you can also find their striking furniture at their online shop or at their HQ in High Wycombe, once also home to design greats including G-Plan, Parker Knoll and Ercol. As well as selling items like the ones you can see here, other Out of the Dark services include interior design, sourcing and customisation of your own bits of furniture. 

                         Orange G-plan sideboard from the 1960s, made in High Wycombe. £400 


The workshop is open on Fridays and Saturdays, and you can see more details here, where there is also a list of events during May around the country where you can catch Out of the Dark playing away. 

                                                    Yellow/orange coat rack, found in Lille, £400 (sold)

The pop-up shop is hosted by two more excellent organisations, Petit Miracle Interiors and Design Bank. Find the event at JJB Sports Retail Unit,  West12 Shopping Centre, Shepherd's Bush Green, London W12 8PP. 

Bin raiding

Yesterday I began the long task of preparing for a car boot sale, to rid my bulging storage areas of things I can't bear to part with – often because I plan to turn them into something else. Or, in marketing speak, to "upcycle" them. 

Of course, for every five great ideas I only ever get around to one. Sometimes less than one. But my enthusiasm burns on. Here are two ideas I spotted over the weekend that I can confidently say I will never get around to copying. Unless I become very rich and retire to live my dream life of messing about with furniture all day...

Last week I walked past a skip full of some beautiful Victorian doors. "But what would you do with one of those?" the sensible half of me asked. Had I seen this simple but useful and good-looking conversion I'd have been in trouble... I seriously need to open a shop, that is one expensive door-shelf-mirror at £250. That said, Home Barn, is a new shop on my radar and is full of lovely stuff. Not much I can afford, though.

I've also recently started struggling to throw away tin cans. Labels off, they are just so pleasing to look at, but I'm useless at keeping kitchen herbs alive (I like the look of a small plant growing from one) and all visible utensils are already canned. So this wall storage idea really appealed. It reminds me of that design classic, the Uten.silo, designed by Dorothee Becker at the end of the 1960s. That version, however, is 200-odd quid. I love how the very creative Meg Spaeth, who runs craft-focused blog, Elsie Marley, has used the idea – and some other excellent ones – in her children's bedroom.

Now I just need to focus on my mind-bending jam jar collection; why are they so hard to throw away? I like the idea of using them as glasses, but many are so little. And there's only so many tea-light holders one household can handle. What, if anything, do you do with yours - or what do you think I should do with mine?

And if you have made something clever and/or beautiful from rubbish, cast-offs or other things that were once something else, I'd love to hear about/see your (re)creations. So do get in touch.