black

Blythe quarter sleeve dress by Lalatroop @ Etsy.

I have been quite busy this last week and really did not have the time to post, so here’s just a great and colorful dress for Blythe dolls as I love color so much…

Original Paper Collage, Abstract Works on Paper by Cherie Lester.

Cherie Lester is also a photographer, but I am not so fond of her photos as I am of those paper collages of hers. The first one is an original, whereas the second one below is an archival print.

You can also see some paintings on her website.

Archival Pigment Print of an Original Collage.

Black & White Dress for Blythe by Belgianwafel @ Etsy.

Those who read me would know that I am really a sucker for colors and Black and White does not often get my attention. However I really love that Blythe dress by Belgianwafel. This is really one of my favorites in her shop.

Baby wuth mum by Be Happy Now @ Etsy.

I discovered this great tool of Etsy only very recently and I’ve found a great artist today using it so it has inspired me to start a series of articles.

It’s called “pounce” and you can either browse through shops that have not yet made their first sale (the official line is : “Recently updated shops that have not yet had a sale”, so I do not know if it works with shops that have been here a long time and have not sold anything…) or else browse through shops that have just made a sale. I chose the first and stumbled upon Be Happy Now and I love her sense of color. She uses watercolors a lot, but not only for there is also this amazing carving painting that I absolutely adore :

Carving.

This particular one listed there is called “Original Carving Painting” and I was confused at first with the word “original” associated with “carving” so I asked Jenny exactly what she meant by that and she replied that it was the first one made with the metal plate. So more are to come, which is good news for of course just as I was writing this article, 4 items including the ones I put photos of had already been sold !

Her prices are unbelivably cheap and I think she could really sell her original watercolors and her other artwork for more…

She also has a Flickr.

My Sweet Dog by Yoshitomo Nara.

It seems artoyz has recently widened their range of products to wooden toys - not just any wooden toys mind you but a small selection from the Artists’ catalogue of Vilac.

I’m not so fond of the Keith Haring’s chairs or the “Raymond” pencil holder/pot by Hervé Di Rosa, but I discovered “My Sweet Dog” recently when writing my article on Nara and it is simply perfect.

Furthermore, Vilac is located in the Jura (France) where my family comes from (both my parents were born there) and the toys are manufactured with great care there, which are all good reasons to buy those toys…

Japanese Flower Fabrics by Karaku Tokyo @ Etsy.

I cannot think right now of anything more exquisite in terms of color and pattern than Japanese fabrics. They always seem so perfect ! In a sense they are the epitome of “A thing of beauty…”.

And I cannot thing of a more exquisite shop than Karaku Tokyo @ Etsy. All her fabrics are simply gorgeous and beautiful. They have amazingly nice colors, not to mention the patterns which are all superb.

Besides the flower patterns, you will of course find geometric ones like this one :

And she also has a lot of Japanese Papers. I absolutely love that yellow one !

I discovered her through her Flickr. She lives in Tokyo, Japan where she is an interior designer. Her company website Karaku Tokyo is about Japanese home decoration.

Noodle by A Small Fox in a Big World @ Etsy.

I’ve discovered some great and very artistic fabric dolls lately and will be writing about them but for the time being I’ll just post that lovely racoon by A Small Fox in a Big World available in her Etsy shop. I really like the black mask on that one !

And if you like her work but would like something really special, Sarah Day also has a listing in her shop for a Semi Custom Doll. You can look at her Flickr Gallery to see more of her creations.

A Small Fox in a Big World :: Blog
A Small Fox in a Big World :: Etsy
A Small Fox in a Big World :: Flickr

“Too Young To Die” Ashtray™ - Yoshitomo Nara

So this is Day One of “At last you won’t risk getting lung cancer from spending too much time in a café-bar-restaurant-nightclub-pick your choice here” in France and what with the big fuss around that and the so predictable reports on the radio - I don’t watch the news on TV anymore, I got spare the smokers vs non-smokers images - but what it really made me think about this morning waking up was this ashtray based on a painting Yoshitomo Nara made in 2001. (I wonder however whether anyone has ever used the thing as an actual ashtray…)

Anyway, besides the other well-known figures made from Yoshitomo Nara’s work, the PupCup™ and the Little Wanderer™ - my favorite one so far - I recalled that this year another figure in a Limited Edition of 300 had been released by How2Work. It’s called “Sleepless Night” (sitting), retail price was HK$7800 (around EUR 730 or US$ 1,000 at the time back in July), but even though you might have had the money it was still a tough job to get one. But the only thing that really matters is that it is amazingly and breathtakingly beautiful.

“Sleepless Night” (sitting), Yoshitomo Nara, 2007

However, if you happen to be interested in the financial aspects relative to art, while researching for this article - believe it or not I do research before writing - I found out that there has been a recent auction at Sotheby’s Paris about Contemporary Art and that number 276/300 of “Sleepless Night” sold there for 9,850 euros (14,415 US$).

Yoshitomo Nara @ Blum & Poe + Yoshitomo Nara on Flickr

Shopping @
Addict Galerie + Artoyz + Giant Robot + Inhabit [Canada] + Little Fashion Gallery + Museum of Contemporary Art [Chicago] + My Plastic Heart + Raw Space [Australia] + retromodern.com + unicahome

Seesterne
I love Sea Stars. They may well be my favorite shape of all and I found those gorgeous red ones on DaWanda in fleecefrau’s shop. Check out the price, just out of curiosity…

Black Polito by Rolito (Photos through Paradise Toy News)

So there was a party in Tokyo on August 28 to celebrate the birth of the Black Polito label - the “aperolito” - unveiling the first pictures of the Black Polito. For the moment there seems to be three versions of the toy but the official names have not yet been disclosed. So that beside a “shiny black” Black Polito, there’s also a “smokey clear” Black Polito as well as a “milky white” one.

What can I say ? It’s beautiful and I absolutely love the “black” and the “milky” versions.

Rolitoland
Black Polito

My first post on this blog was about Black Polito.

We don’t know much more about it, but you can now follow the project on a blog : Black Polito. And as you would have guessed, it is both elegant and beautiful !

And there are still the Black Polito Stickers Gallery as well as the We love Rolito pool on Flickr.
Two pictures I like among them : Red for Rolito by krysto_O and Rolitobleu by Shifty.

It is called BLACK POLITO and this is all we got to see of it for the moment !

But first I should tell you how happy I am to be able to write my very first post on this blog about Rolito because I truly think he is one of the greatest Toy Designers of our days. I love his work. It is subtle, poetic and there is infinite grace in his characters. I am not one of those collectors who need to have all the color versions of a toy, so I only have a couple of Rolitoboys, but my Rolitodream is standing right beside my computer as I am writing this post.

So of course, when I learned about this next project, even though we were told very little about the toy, I knew I had to have one. Especially since this will be a limited edition of 50. I then joined the list of the 25 happy people who were able to preorder the BLACK POLITO. There is already a great waiting list in case some people should ultimately decide not to get one, and if you know your maths, only 25 will be available upon release, so it will be really hard to get one !

But the great news is that BLACK POLITO is not only the name of a toy. It is under that name that subsequent projects by Rolito will be released.

Until now, Rolito’s toys were produced by Toy2r. I don’t know whether this collaboration will go on or not, but BLACK POLITO is Rolito’s first self produced toy in association with Vince, a well-known member of the Artoyz Forum. About 15 cm high, it is being made in Japan and is scheduled to be released this summer.

For more information : blackpolitoproject@gmail.com.

Also see on Flickr the Black Polito Stickers Gallery group as well as the we love rolito pool.