Dave Grohl Does Chelsea Lately...

We've been watching Dave Grohl hosting Chelsea Lately over the past week and it's been brilliant!
Thought we'd share a few funny clips to brighten your day...



For these clips and more you can visit E! online 



Enjoy!

DIY: How To Make Constellation Cards

As most of you will know, I'm pretty obsessed with space. With Valentines Day just around the corner I figured there would be no better excuse to indulge in creating a special DIY inspired by my love of constellations. This one is for all you star crossed lovers... get it?

This tutorial is really simple, cheap and it only takes a few minutes to make something really special. The best part is you probably have the things you need to make it already at home. Grab yourself a blank notecard (or fold a piece of card in half), a needle, pencil and some thread. I'm using embroidery thread as it'll stand out really nicely, but you can use just about anything.

The best way to start this project is to map on the card where your constellation stars will be. Using a pencil, mark out little crosses or stars for guidance. You could even join the dots to keep you right for where you're going to be stitching. 

Above is a quick guidance I made of 4 awesome constellations which you can copy / trace onto your card. You're welcome ;) You can google these if you wish to add in more stars (some of them are epic, these are simplified for ease and speed), or alternatively you could look through some Zodiac signs which would be amazing for birthday cards :D

The easiest way to stitch through card is to pierce the holes first. Using your needle, make holes in all the pointers of the star. I've started by creating Xs which is a simpler way to do things, but having 6 points instead of 4 is much nicer if you have the time...

Start by going through the inside of the card so your knot and 'messy' thread will be hidden till the card is open. Once you're done stitching, you could cover this up by sticking a little piece of paper over it; that'll protect your artwork too. Cross over all your stitches so each look like an x or *

To make sure everyone can make out the constellation, it's nice to add a little line of thread between each star. I did this as I went along, but you can always fill them in later if you're not sure you want to add them.

Oooh! Pretty! To finish it off you can use a silver pen to add in a few more stars to that beautiful night sky...

Beautiful! 

I think I'm going to make the whole set and pop them on my wall. Educational and pretty. Neat, huh! 

We hope you have fun making these starry starry night cards :)

Oh, and Happy Valentines Day when it comes! 

Vicky & David 

xox

Style Me Friday... What's In My Bag

Surprise weekend away!

Woohoo! We're going away for the weekend and I can hardly contain my excitement! We've been super busy here at Vivid HQ since the start of the year, so it's lovely to know we're going to have a little R&R treat :D
Packing for a one night stay can be rather tricky as you sort of need absolutely everything, but no one wants to rock up with a suitcase for a mere few hours stay. I like to save up little samples and testers of the products I love as they come in really handy for overnighters, or if I can't get those, I decant what I need into small pots and bottles. Miniatures are really expensive for what they are, so try and avoid them as much as possible. The only one I can't go without is mini hairsprays - they are my secret weapon!

So, what's in my mini-break bag ? My most trusted make up and Vivienne Westwood perfume; reliable is key for an overnighter as you don't want to be faffing! My pretty galaxy dress as I can wear it with flats. My plan is to go in my black ballet shoes as they can be dressed up or down and I'll save on the space. Some beautiful jewelry is the perfect way to make yourself feel more special~I'll be wearing earrings from Ediacara and a vintage locket ball necklace. Last but certainly not least, I'll be taking something sweet as a little surprise... I adore these Coco Chocolates - they taste amazing and each one has an awesome tattoo on it :D It doesn't get better than that!

Now all we need is the taxi...

Happy Weekend everyone!

Valentines Day - UK Delivery

Hello UK lovelies! 

We just wanted to give you a heads up on ordering from our shop for Valentines Day. Please place orders by Friday 8th February to ensure your goodies arrive in time.

Orders made after this date still have a chance of making it (we post everything First Class), but we wanted to let you know that we will not be dispatching products over the weekend. 

As the weather has been typically British, we advise purchases be made as soon as possible incase there is any snow related hold ups with the post man...

That also means there is only a few days left to snap up one of our special Valentines Day Gift Sets! There is three different card / mini print options available and the set includes one of our special wooden heart brooches and a "Wood You Be Mine" pencil. Because we love to love, this set is on special offer at only £12 too! They will only be available till the 14th Feb then they're gone forever...

Hit up our shop directly here for more treats n treasures and spread the love :)
Thanks peeps!

Paperman - A Paper Plane Short

As you'll know from our brooch and notebook, we're pretty much in love with making and drawing paper planes. When we saw this new (Oscar Nominated!) short animation from Disney, we fell in love... If you've got 6 minutes and a heart, you gotta watch this video.
Simply beautiful!

January Round Up! DIYs, Features & Awesomeness

Whoa there! We only just got into 2013 and it's already February! How do the days go so quickly? Well, it seems we are off to a great start at least :) Here's our first round up of the year...

DIYs:

Edible 'Glitter' Sugar

How to make a Book Clock

How to make freezer paper to create t shirt stencils

Turn vintage buttons into earrings

News:

Uncovet & Refinery29 featured our stationery
Our Pom Poms were featured on FNAC and linked on Design Sponge
We left Instagram

Made some new products
We did our first ever Sweet Treat Of The Month post
And shared inside my date night bag

And showed you a peek inside our studio


Features:

1 Second Everyday
Dance Like Nobody's Watching
Book Burning Party (aka: how to save a library)
Pride & Prejudice turned 200 years old

We hope you've been enjoying our blog thus far! Can't wait to see what next month has in store :D

How's your month been?

Style Crush: Cable & Cotton Lights

We have just discovered Cable & Cotton lighting and we have fallen head over heels!

Being a creative duo, we're constantly on the hunt to bring fun things into our home and Vivid HQ as we take a lot of inspiration from our surroundings. We've recently started experimenting with the wonderful world of lighting as we were feeling that things were getting a little bit flat (it is winter after all!). When we stumbled across Cable & Cotton online we fell in love; what more could you want than some beautiful coloured balls of light in your life? Customised colours, thats what!

On the site you can choose from their ready made sets of lights, and they truly have some excellent pre-made boxes (our faves: Mexican and Easter), but being the creative bunch that we are, there is nothing more satisfying than putting your own twist on things!

It's not often you find a site that's super easy to use, especially when any kind of variant option is available. It's this feature that's made us really happy as it works like a dream, and made it totally worth sharing with you! The process is so simple; you visit the 'pick your own' page and start by selecting how many lights you want on your cable. We chose 20; like us it's short but sweet ;) Then all you need to do is click on the colours you want to add to your string!

Whilst picking every single colour available is massively tempting, it's best to create a pallet that you know will fit into your home. We suggest you pick 5-7 colours that really compliment each other. For instance, you could pick out your favorite colours in the room you plan to hang them in, or if you're looking for a change, take the colours from your favorite picture or item of clothing. This will help you work out what you're looking for as it's always easier working with a visual.

So, on the site, click on the coloured balls in the pallet to add each one you want onto the string. Don't worry about the layout of the balls on the string as you'll receive them all separately, meaning you can set them up how you want to when they arrive... or mix it all up whenever you feel like it! If you want to see them mixed up, you can hit the 'mix' icon at the top of the box to switch everything around. Pretty handy if you ask me!

For our set of lights, I chose colours that I'm currently working with in the studio as they really pop! You might think adding hot pink and black to a set of pastel colours a little bit crazy, but the boldness of these tones really help bring the others out. We're pretty into funfairs and think this is spot on!

When you're happy with how it all looks, 'add to cart' and you can tweak the quantities of each colour if you want. For instance, we wanted more of the black and flash pink lights than anything else, so we amended that here. Brilliant!

*Ta*Da*
Don't they just look amazing? The next step is to decide on the right layout and pop each ball on by lightly pushing each light into the small hole. Simple!

Have a play around with the order of each light. If you chance your mind later on they're really easy to take off and switch around too. The lights are on a looped cable so you could hang them in a big circle or have them all bunched up or, if your more orderly about things like us, you'll want them lined up... and hung like bunting!

So pretty, right!
We're so happy to have found a handmade company that's friendly to the planet and ready to let us express ourselves without costing a fortune. We're such big fans that we've customized sets for gifts too :D

We hope you enjoyed the little peek into our studio and enjoy playing around on Cable & Cotton's site!