Hello friends! I had such a great time in Berlin this weekend! The weather, the hotel, the people, the party, even the Russian disco we went to later on for a little fun — it was all such a fantastic adventure. It feels great to begin a new week with such a warm heart – thank you to my many friends and guests for making my German interiors book, Lust auf Wohnen, launch party at the Soho House in Berlin such an amazing event but also to the many, many bloggers who attended – oh my goodness, what a crowd of stylish, warm and chatty people!

I thought I’d share some highlights from my day captured so brilliantly by photographer Sina Preikschat. The amazing Miss Sina not only shot photos at our photo wall, but she took all of the others shown below that I think came out super nice. I also loved how she managed to stay somewhat invisible as she worked and also how comfortable all of our guests felt having their photo taken. Thank you Sina, you’re a star…

Above you can see my guests arriving downstairs at the Soho House Berlin to check in and claim their goody bags sponsored by Etsy (with a special thanks to Emily and Matt) along with some decor8 contributions from my friends Snug Studio, Enna, luzia pimpinella, Formes Berlin via Sommerfugl and Ferm Living who supplied some items for me to decorate the room with and who sponsored our fun giveaway. Also in the bag, journals supplied by Callwey Verlag for taking notes.

Caroline Ditting (from Callwey) and I are shown above. She helped me enormously to plan this event and did a super great job. Thank you Caroline! Here we are preparing a table to decorate with shiny things, candles, balloons and eventually, cupcakes – yummy, delicious cupcakes.

Speaking before a very full house.

There I am with Ms. Luxat from Brigitte magazine. Brigitte was the official sponsor of my event at Soho House which was an honor… To see Germany’s top lifestyle magazine for women support me in this way is absolutely, positively wonderful. I love how they “get” the blogging community and how much they invest in reaching out to not just me, but the many fabulous people who author blogs.

My amazingly sweet guests made me laugh and put a smile on my face throughout the day. PEOPLE make any event and I’m so happy the “snob factor” didn’t exist here – everyone was warm, approachable and very smiley and open-minded and stylish, too!

Loot bags filled with goodies that have gorgeous pine trees screen-printed onto them.

We had some VIP seating so I made seat tags for those guests – mostly my sponsors, volunteers and very good friends.

A full house…

My guest book along with other goodies for guests to enjoy.

Caroline Ditting speaking for Callwey Verlag, the publisher of my book here in Germany.

Juliane

Oh the cupcakes were divine!

Sharmaine, me and Jack. They are both from Dialogue Books in Berlin. They brought some copies of the book to be sold during my event and helped me with some party planning, too. If anyone wants a German signed copy, you can email them and they’ll ship one to you. sharmaine AT dialoguebooks.org is the lady to ask.

Caroline with Steffi and my good friend Anne who not only helped me set up but who gave everyone either her illustrated postcards or rubber stamps from the Enna shop.

Lutz and me. He has enough charm and energy to fill an empty room. What an authentic, witty and caring person. So glad to know you, Lutz!

Clara, Anette + Gabi

Left: Marlene / Right: Steffi and Matt Stinchcomb from Etsy being silly. I was so honored to meet Matt in person after knowing him online for 6 years now.

Left: Kathrin / Right: Anna-Maria who owns Fraulein Wild, a lovely cafe in Berlin where we ate Sunday morning. She is so adorable and bakes wonderfully!

Left: / brigitte / Right: andrea +bettina

Need I say more? Nom nom nom.

Me and the Dialogue Books gang.

Steffi giving her speech about how bloggers can work with magazines like Brigitte.

The Brigitte magazine girls and Matt Stinchcomb from Etsy – all were my fab sponsors.

It’s fun to be silly at your own book launch, you know? Why be serious when you can live life and have a ball!

Left: Didem / Right: Laura

Every single girl had a crush on this guy after he spoke. He has tons of charm and is very intelligent and witty. I also think it’s the floppy hair, girls really dig that longish floppy hair. Matt sparkles when he speaks. People like to think Etsy is mega popular because it’s a great online marketplace but I think chicks just dig Matt. Don’t believe me? I had at least 10 people come up to me after he spoke and said, “I’m reopening my Etsy shop now that I saw Matt!” and the stars in their eyes totally spelled out: CRUSHING majorly on the Mattster.

When Matt spoke, people smiled, laughed and listened.

See what I mean? In blue is my co-author Joanna Copestick who flew in from London and in green is the adorable artist and blogger Stephanie Levy.

See what I mean about loving to hear Matt speak?

Oh yes, Matt worked the crowd.

At one point he asked, “Who thinks I’m totally dreamy?” and here is the reaction. No, just kidding. This was actually when I was speaking as I love to ask questions when I speak or else I feel like everyone will fall asleep.

 

Ladies bonding on a very sweet plush sofa that I wanted to carry home with me.

Oh yes, and the book. We came for that too.

Fun to see my guests peeking in on Lust auf Wohnen! Go book go! Work it!

Very sweet ladies that I felt honored to meet.

Lutz and me acting silly.

Oh hello pretty lady…

Brigitte had the sweetest personality and the most incredible red hair.

Left: Lenka + Nadja, Right: Rieke + Ricarda

Dorolos Wally from klienFORMAT magazine who not only flew in from Vienna but who so generously GAVE everyone a copy of her self made magazine seen chatting here with my friend Anne.

I didn’t get to meet this guest, anyone want to shout him out? I’d love to know!

Lovely Steffi.

Me, Jack and Sharmaine.

Caroline Ditting

Right: Valerie + Donna / Left: Marlene + Steffi

Maren + Lola

Left: Elizabeth Rushe who looks like a double of Florence and the Machine / Right: Anna-Maria Wild and Steffi

Hamburg girls

Left: Lutz, me /  Right: Stephanie Levy + Eleanor from EM Papers. These lovely ladies came all the way up from Munich, loved having them!

Eleanor and Theresa Neubauer.

left: ricarda, steffi, rieke / right: nicola

Left: Steffi and Lutz / Right: Andrea

Didem Strebe + Olivia Tänzer

I want to thank EVERYONE for coming out – I couldn’t believe how many people we had and to think we only could take 50% of those who RSVP’d – whoa, this tells me there is a lot of blogger interest here in Germany so Brigitte and I are putting our heads together for possibly another event this winter so stay tuned!

A big thank you to all who sponsored this event  – I’m so grateful to have all of you in my corner and to call you my friends!

To see many more photos in a slideshow, click here.

(photos: Sina Preikschat.)

Hello everyone! I’ve been a bit missing in action, I know, but next week when I’m back from my travels decor8 will be at full swing again with lots of wonderful things to share. I’ve been busy on my US book tour with Chronicle Books and Anthropologie, gave the keynote at The Creative Connection, and in the early morning I’m flying to London for design week but I’ll be back blogging full-time again on Wednesday, September 28th. I can’t wait – I’ve REALLY missed connecting with you here each day but a completely sponsored book tour is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity so I couldn’t refuse – plus I got to meet so many of you – yay! BUT it’s not over yet… NEXT UP IS LONDON!

This weekend I’ll be in London at ANTHROPOLOGIE on KINGS ROAD! I’ll be joined by Interior Design extraordinaire Abigail Ahern, Stylist/Photographer Leslie Shewring and Decorate co-author Joanna Copestick for a fun decorating party to talk about mood boards, show how they’re done and of course to meet everyone. Anthropologie is throwing a nice spread for us too with Bloody Marys and snacks, so RSVP if you’d like to join us: rsvp-uk [at] anthropologie [dot] com — it’s from 1:00-3:00 (I have to leave at 3 pm for another event) so please stop by to say hello to Abigail, Leslie, Joanna and I. We’d love to meet you and connect with other creatives, bloggers, etc.

And as you know, Abigail Ahern (shown above in her gorgeous home) is a total rock star in the design world so just having her as part of this event is a total honor and I’m certain you’d love meeting her and hear her advice about decorating, too. Abigail owns a gorgeous shop in London and is the author of a book that I love called A Girl’s Guide to Decorating. The event is completely open to the public, so do stop by – we’ll be starting promptly at 1:00.

See you in London!!!

xo,
Holly

Hello everyone! I’ve been packing and preparing and now the time has come… I’m heading back to the US for a week only this time I’ll be in St. Paul, Minnesota for The Creative Connection where I’ll give a keynote and do a signing and I’ll also be working with Anthropologie for another fun event and signing out there, too! If you want to join me at either event, please click here for more information on TCC or click here to learn more about the Decorate Anthropologie event in St. Louis Park, MN just outside of St. Paul. I’ll be in St. Paul this evening – I can’t believe I’m going back to America so soon after my US book tour (I thought) wrapped up! Not quite yet. :)

I’ll be blogging from the road so stay tuned… I have a 10 hour flight ahead of me so most likely I won’t be back online again until Wednesday. Can’t wait to tell you all about this week – I’m excited to see my friends again and make many new ones.

(image: tiffany kirchner dixon, taken of my materials when I taught last year in morocco.)