and today’s find is a lovely lady with an eye for beautiful fabrics, which she collects on her travels and works with them turning them into beautiful handbags! and i think the idea of traveling with an actual professional reason is also a great thing. it’s like when i imagine i travel the world for picture sake. imagine what would be like to travel around the world just to take pictures of what you find along the way? wouldn’t be great? yes indeed! and though this lady doesn’t travel for pictures, she travels and brings beautiful fabrics that we can wear in these gorgeous handbags! psst, check the photography! oh, this is absolutely great!
aren’t these so elegant and feminine? i love the subtlety of the illustrations on the fabrics. some came from india, others from japan and mexico… allison used sari and kimono silks for these handbags, mixing femininity with utility, with a twist of daydream!
“when i was a child i saw a woman selling dresses made from sari silks at a market in my hometown of victoria, british columbia. i thought this fabric was one of the most beautiful things i had ever seen and it conjured images of palaces and maharaj, smoky mysterious places, exotic smells and foreign music. at that time i vowed to myself that when i was old enough, i would go to india. several years later, at the mature age of 20, i did in fact go to india and returned to canada with a backpack full of sari silk. i promptly started sewing clothing, pillows and bags and selling them at local consignment shops. since that time i have traveled far and wide in search of beautiful and unique textiles to use in my designs, from the thar desert in rajasthan, india to tokyo, japan to oaxaca, mexico.”
“to this day i still lovingly gather textiles from around the world to use in my designs. grace is a collection of accessories made from found, limited edition textiles that have been sourced through my travels. the fabrics i search for are storytellers, they speak of their history and traditions of craft, of adventures abroad, foreign marketplaces, culture and creativity.
though i have traversed down many avenues in the past fourteen years, i always return to this and i know that this is what i am meant to do. after all this time, i can finally call myself self employed.”
so what do you think? are these handbags speaking to you or not that much? my favourites are this one above in shades of light blue and coral as well as the one above with a red flower, that one was made from a girl’s kimono and that pattern is just so lovely!
images: click on them for further details!
other popular finds?
+ emmadime knitted
+ coriumi
+ bloom
+ the glossy queen
Lei-Lani says
I love them all and I want one as soon as my wallet says yes.
Marie says
Your blog is beautiful ;) good job! I love your pictures of Lisbon ^^
xx
Marie lived in London