DESIGN AT HOME

I should really call this post "What I Do When I'm Procrastinating". Just 24 hours to go until an intensive 3-week-long work trip to Indonesia, and instead of checking I've got my notebooks and dictaphone, I'm rearranging my bathroom shelf.

I have an excuse though - I just picked up these two blue saucers from Portobello market and they seem pretty happy holding my jingly jangly gold Indian-style jewellery. The ceramic saucers are European by design, but the saucer in the top left corner looked Rajasthani to me as I walked past the stall, even though it's apparently over a hundred years old, and hung out in some old English dude's manor house until recently. Oh and those cute silver circle earrings just about visible in the top right corner were made by my lovely flatmate and jewellery-maker extraordinaire. The earrings are mine but you can buy her other gorgeous stuff here.

Ok bathroom re-organised. Back to my packing. Sob.

TREASURES IN THE ATTIC

I lived in Mumbai in 2010, which sounds cool except I was stuck in the not-so-cool northern suburb of Andheri. Bandra is where it's at. It's a tiny little area jam-packed with more shops, restaurants, and bars than you'd know what to do with and in most cafes in the middle of the day, you'd find a motley crew of musicians singing their latest compositions to each others, grumpy writers bashing on their laptops, and out-of-work actors gossiping about why Pinky made it into the latest Bollywood blockbuster and Bunty didn't. I love it. In my near-daily pilgrimage to Bandra, I almost always stopped at Attic, a teeny tiny store that has madly colourful mix of fashion, baubles, and home stuff.  

Check out this necklace they've just got in their store. I want it now!

ps: if you're ever in Bandra, have a drink and bite to eat in one of my favourite places ever - the Pali Village Cafe. It's all vintage greeny-blue inside, wrought iron, and sparkly lamps. I could seriously live there.