My friend Amy Butler launched a beautiful digital magazine today called Blossom and I’d love for you to check it out. Here’s a sneak peek below of some of my favorite pages. My only wish: that it was in print! Why? It would be so nice to tack these pages up on my walls and mood board. So, so pretty! This lady has such a great eye.

About Blossom, straight from Amy, “I am so excited to announce the release of my free, online magazine! This is a new journey for me and I want you to come along! “Blossom” is a visual journal that’s all about loving your life and living it fully and authentically. Filled with loads of creative ideas and inspirations, Blossom celebrates our creative expression and passions; our mantra is “Create Love, Be Kind and Express Beauty”. The magazine is a spirited voice for creativity, heart and soul. It’s my dream to support folks in getting in touch with the beauty in their lives and in themselves…to empower with love, and help people connect with the creative perfection of being who they really are while giving them support and inspiration to get in touch with doing what they love. I want folks to understand that being connected to what they love, it’s the greatest gift they can give the world and themselves.” So nicely said Amy and congratulations!

Amy and her husband David do such great work on everything that they touch – I’m so proud of them both for launching this inspirational and very pretty magazine. Hooray!

(image: blossom mag)

Sweet Paul JUST launched his holiday issue moments ago and it’s just beautiful and very inspirational. I also fancy Paul’s new website, congrats to him and his team! In addition to the mag, he recently pulled together a video showing how a story for Sweet Paul is made – a little behind-the-scenes actions which I think is very cool –  that’s Paul in the plaid with the tattoos!

In this issue of Sweet Paul, there are loads of stories from a vintage holiday meal spread that looks like it was torn from the pages of a 1940′s edition of Gourmet magazine, a Nordic winter food story, a Holiday Brunch collaboration with Matthew Robbins, a blue Christmas piece and a extraordinary Walnut story from Dietland Wolf – one of my favorite stylists in Germany! There are many more but you have to click here to see for yourself because I don’t want to spoil it for you.

For your copy, visit Anthropologie stores, Paul’s website and check out the newstands in Germany because it’s now over here in German, too!

(images: sweet paul)

I have TOTAL HOUSE ENVY right now. I mean, I’m super green. London is calling me in a major way and now this house is not helping me much. Just wait until you start scrolling down… Your eyes will pop out and roll onto your desk. You’ll salivate like a St. Bernard and feel all clammy. You’ll swear you’re menopausal. Yup, even if you’re a dude. Thing is, I cannot NOT show you this home despite the health risks so here you go… Drool.

London is consistently my go-to point for inspiration, in fact, if I ever earn enough money to buy a property there then I plan on doing just that so I can have a part-time crash pad in the city that sets my heart aglow [*dream on holly*]. I couldn’t live there full-time as I love Hannover and my life here too much, but I DO imagine a one bedroom with lovely sunshine and old world details within a walking distance to flowers and cupcakes and quirky flea markets… I thought also that it could be where decor8 readers could stay by renting through me when I’m back home in Hannover.

Wouldn’t that be a lovely idea? A decor8 pied-à-terre? Of course, it would be in total decor8 style – so you would be staying in “my blog”, experiencing all of the things that I love firsthand and being part of the whole decor8 experience. Now I need someone to read this post and make my dream come true – investors anyone? LOL. I’d even leave a beautiful guide to my favorite places for you on the table, stock the kitchen with my favorite teas and snacks, have fresh flowers delivered on the day of your arrival and make sure to include a list of local bloggers that you could connect with in case you felt alone. See, I already have a business plan for decor8 pied-à-terre. When I think of this idea, I get all tingle-y!

AND while I’m thinking of this for a future idea for now, I am still dreaming while looking at Light Locations, where you can pay to rent a space for a day (or longer) to use as a space for styling and photography, fashion shoots, etc., and imagining how I’d decorate the ultimate decor8 space.

In this post, I’ve included my most favorite home at the moment from the Light Locations website (Grove Way SW9)– because it’s a Georgian home first of all and because the decor style is truly unbelievable! I must know who owns this flat, I can only imagine very rich, very fabulous people.

I love all of the Designers Guild textiles and the color-washed vintage rugs and of course, the mismatched pieces from different eras and those amazing wall colors and the bedroom wallpaper, which looks like it’s also from Designers Guild, and and and gush gush gush… it is truly the best home ever. I think I feel a decorating moment coming on. I plan to introduce some more charcoal and black into my home for Fall/Winter and well, this home didn’t just encourage me to think about it but motivated me to DO IT. I’m already bringing in teal and mustard. I love when an inspiring interior has that kind of power – to motivate change – to kick your butt out of a rut. When you see something you click with, it’s the best feeling evah.

(images: light locations)

Hi everyone! How is your week going so far? I’m getting ready to go on Martha Stewart Radio – live on the radio and on the web – in a little over 3 hours from now and I’m so nervous but also excited because I don’t know what to expect – I’ve only done radio in Germany so far. (If you want to listen in, read this post for a little how to.) Ha! Okay, so as most of you know, I’m an American living in northern Germany for three years, in fact my 3rd anniversary just passed in August and I’m so impressed by the talent that I see here – there is always something new to stimulate me and I love that. You know how it is when you first relocate though,  you ‘think’ something will be amazing, you are scared to do it, but you do it because you know it will be good for you and then it turns out better than you had imagined. That’s my story.

Of course, relocation has it’s ups and downs… Happy turns to frustration for a while (usually after the first year) but finally this unbelievable will to succeed kicks in that just drives you forward. Can you relate? We humans are so adaptable, aren’t we? What we think may be a true test ends up being the best moment of our life. Good for us.

But yes, I feel lucky to live somewhere that has a lot of cool stuff going on in the world of art, design, styling, decorating, food, social media and blogging… My favorite things. I enjoy highlighting the talent that exists in other countries on decor8 simply because I think opening our eyes to outside influences  – ones we may not have a chance to interact with on a regularly basis before the great big internet took over – is thrilling, it’s the stuff that sweetens life!

For instance, I found out recently that German stylist, Peter Fehrentz, has a book, Made By Yourself, coming out soon and I can’t wait to buy it. He does stories for lots of the big magazines here and is quite talented. I wonder how it will be – if the cover is any indication then I think we’re in for a treat.

Perhaps he is one to watch… But this is what I mean, I’m always finding something fresh and new in such a small country (compared to the USA) and I’m inspired!

(images: peter fehrentz)

My long time artist friend, Samantha Hahn, is a talented Brooklyn-based illustrator who did the floor plans for my upcoming book and the gorgeous illustrations on my blog (see the birds on the branch in the upper right corner on decor8? That’s wonderful Sam).

Samantha has a ton of interesting work going on in her life from art shows in which she is the star to books and products and even notebooks that sold at Anthropologie and beyond. She is even the lady behind the gorgeous Daily Candy illustrations! To say she is a pretty big rock star is an understatement. She has accomplished so much and I’m very product of her. Her most recent creative accomplishment was to produce watercolor illustrations from NY Fashion Week and she did, and they are beyond gorgeous. Working with The Cut/NY Mag, Sam went backstage and then illustrated her take on beauty and fashion from some of her favorite shows – 85 total in only a single week!

My favorite is the illo she did for J.Crew. They need to hire her to do a line or something, imagine her watercolors on t-shirts, cosmetic cases, fabric belts or scarves? Oh my goodness. Anyway… Check these out…

You may view more of her lovely work here.

When I look at these paintings, I wonder how much of a challenge it was for her to do this work and what it involved because I cannot imagine nailing details like this in such a chaotic environment that goes by at such a startling speed. Well, however you mastered it Ms. Hahn, you rocked it! Great job!

(images: samantha hahn)