I've long admired all the pretty things at Anthropologie, but was recently shocked by a few items that I felt were...well...pretty wack. Turns out the retailer is collaborating with artists from around the world to bring limited edition pieces to their American stores. Some of the projects are rather good, others are major design fails. I'll leave you to decide which are which.
1-3: Textile-like porcelain bowls by Cape Town artist John Bauer
4-6: Watermelon bowls shaped around actual fruits and painted by Sydney's Samantha Robinson
7-8: Leslie Oschmann of Amsterdam reurposes paintings by applying them to salvaged chairs
9: Shakespearean wallpaper by Britain's Tracy Kendall
10: Glass vases are blown directly onto vintage wooden furniture by Pieke Bergman of Amsterdam
via Lucky
Weekend DIYs: 10 Wood Molding Projects for the Home
Monica & Austin's Charming Bungalow
Good Food to Share 
The Big Book of Small, Cool Spaces 
Apartment Therapy Presents 
The Eight-Step Home Cure 
Ercol Bar Stool
Why I Became a 1-Gallon Homebrewer
True Greek Recipe: Paximadi Bread Salad with Tomatoes, Feta and Capers
I didn't think much of the first 3 bowl until I read that they were porcelain. WOW!
I'll say yea to the watermelon bowl.
everyone needs a glass bowl topped ladder
Yeah, that's what I like to have around when I'm paint those 10 ft ceilings.
*painting
Why does the fact that it's in porcelain 'wow' you. I mean I love her work but if you know anything about ceramic art, you'll know that porcelain isn't the end all/ be all. It is beautiful and can be difficult to use but sometimes not that difficult at all, especially when using molds and slabs like Robinson uses.
I guess I'm curious why folks are so inclined to be wooed by porcelain when beautiful work can come from many different types of clay bodies... the quality of a ceramist's work doesn't depend on what kind of clay they are using but what they make of it.
jesse lu..i think what comicgeek meant when he/she said "wow" to the bowls being made out of porcelain was that they look so real as in not made out of crocheted or knit fiber that it was a surprise to find they were a ceramic ( not specific to which type)..i too had the same reaction.
oops, i meant.....as in MADE out of crocheted fiber...
I love your comments Jesse, but I expect only ceramicists will really understand them. I'm falling in love with the beauty of grog right now.
But, Comicgeek might have been expressing shock that they are not knitted and made of clay in general.
The way porcelain gets praised, a layman to clay might not know its just a special type of clay and think it is some cosmic substance!
i'm with comicgeek & mkw...
i'm LOVING the porcelain bowls!
I love the watermellon bowls, and the shakespearean wallpaper seems fun for a writer's office or a powder room!
I don't see any major design fails. I like seeing a big retail chain working with artists and taking the risk to sell less commercial pieces. The only item that's really impractical is the ladder/vase, but it's interesting.
I like all of them except the ladder/vase, which I don't really understand. I LOVE the blue/white vase and am kind of crazy about the Shakespeare wallpaper. Yes, please.
As a knitter, I'd love to have one of the first three bowls next to my favorite chair.
Ugh, the handwriting on the Shakespearean wallpaper is a fail in my book. Love the concept, but I wouldn't a dime for it unless the handwriting could beat mine (and not many can, I must say).
"wouldn't [give] a dime for it"
Sheesh, it's a Monday.
I love working in porcelain.
it is truely a wonder material
it has all the good qualities of glass and of clay but in one wunder substance.
even the most sofisticated metal casting processes could not get even cloase to the precition that porcelain allows.
suprise is all we have left.
i ordered the big watermelon bowl from an anthropologie store in DC. when it arrived it said, "made in china". it cost about $500. i returned it. i am all for artists not mass production.