London day tripper

Sometimes I get homesick. I know it's normal but it gets annoying because I get confused where my home actually is. Prague is where I grew up and I do think I want to end up there but I spent all my student years in England and this is the place which taught me to be independent. Things like setting up a bank account, making sure I have something in the fridge, getting my first proper part-time job, dealing with people not having a clue where I'm actually from (e.g. 'So when are you going back to Serbia?') etc. So whenever I do go back to Prague (I repeat, not Serbia, nowhere near.), I end up missing this damp island after a while. And vice versa of course.

Today I was waiting at the bus stop to make my way to uni when an elderly man joined me. After a few moments he dropped his walking stick and I mindlessly picked it up. A giant smile spread across his face and he said: 'This is as close as I get to a chat up line these days.' It made me laugh and reminded me how much I like the English humour and that I'm probably not done with the place just yet.

Last week I went to London just for the day with my friends Fika and Myra. It's always nice to get away from Birmingham- even though it's Tolkien's home town, nothing all that exciting actually happens here. I always get so much inspiration from London, I love how every part of it has its own character, it's like tens of villages in one. This time we explored Islington and went to The London Textile Fair.

 

The fair was more for business owners looking for big amounts of fabrics for good prices and not so much for designers as we hoped. But I discovered Malhia Kent, a French company with some really beautiful woven fabrics.

After we got some lunch at The Breakfast Club, one of my favourite places to eat in London, we discovered an amazing shop called SMUG. Wrapping paper, notebooks, screenprints, toys, I think you can see why I liked it so much. I want a shop like that!

We also made it to House of Hackney in Shoreditch, a luxurious brand specializing in interiors, fashion and lifestyle. When I walked in it was like stepping into another world, the place was filled with patterns of plants and lemurs playing accordions, otters with fans - I felt like Alice in Wonderland, it was amazing.

photo credit: Myra Wen.

Thank you London, once again you didn't fail to amaze me. Here's a snapshot of all of us from Liberty, another beautiful place where I hope to be able to afford at least some ribbon one day.

What's your favourite design shop in London/elsewhere?

photo credit: Myra Wen.

Love Walk Cafe

Last weekend was just so inspiring in all aspects- after Renegade I decided to stay with Kim one more day because we were having such a lovely time together and I just wasn't ready to go back to Birmingham yet!
We went for brunch at Love Walk Cafe in Camberwell (South East London) which was really cute, not only was the food amazing but the design of the cafe was just funkyyy. I've started noticing interiors more recently and really liked the way this one was done.

 

Also I've never had an iced chai late before and it absolutely blew my mind. Together with my beetroot quinoa burger!
Also the company was seriously nice, my friend Tom joined us and him and Kim hadn't seen each other for about 3 years so we did some catching up and reminiscing.

love these stairs and this girl!

in a nutshell

Hello all of you out there! So I'll be honest- I'm totally new to blogging and I guess it'll take me a while to figure out how I'm gonna go about it. But as I've been learning, it's usually better to just do things instead of think about them too much so I'll just jump straight into it. 

in St James Park, London

I'm 24 and I'm from Prague, Czech republic but this is my 5th year in England. I did my Fine Art degree in London and have now moved to Birmingham to do a Masters for a year. 

Textile design to be precise. I only realized I wanted to keep studying towards the end of my degree- I kept looking for textile design jobs or internships but they all wanted a qualification in a similar field and Fine Art was just too broad. Then I stumbled upon this course in Birmingham, went to see the campus and talk to the deputy course director and just knew it was just what I wanted.

So here I am! It's a really nice change to be able to draw lots and not having to think about the meaning behind it too much, which makes a nice change from my degree. 

It'll take some time till I figure out how to actually use this medium that's completely new to me, but I'm pretty excited! I guess I am a little old school- don't have a smart phone or anything, which I think will have to change soon since in the design field it's obviously essential to be active with your social media sites. And as much as I hate to see people on the train all staring into their iPhones or Kindles, I guess I'll have to subdue quite soon. 

Not to Kindles though! Nothing beats a real book.