Hygge Nook

Clutter control

This quote is something I ripped out from a magazine and just found on my bookshelf. It really does make me want to assess the dire clutter situation in my house (exarcerbated by seeing this 'typical Danish home' on Oprah. Clutter? What clutter?) I don't recall the magazine but the quotee is Suzanne Baker of The Holding Company.

I have yet to take control. There's endless toys, DVDs, books, stuff, stuff, stuff. It doesn't help that my OH has somewhat of a hoarding problem and the children seem wholly averse to tidying up (not to mention bringing home endless trees of paper from school) leaving me floundering somewhere in the middle. The key seems to be to have less stuff. I must learn to get to grips with getting rid of stuff (and always feel a burst of happiness following a trip to the chairty shop or recycling plant. Sad, I know) and not minding that it once cost X amount but is now just another piece of clutter. I'll start tonight by zipping through my teetering pile of magazines. Baby steps...

Koziol Taschelini storage bag at Colloco

"Have nothing in your house that you do not know to be useful, or believe to be beautiful." That's the William Morris quote that introduces us to Colloco's website and I couldn't agree more. Asides from that there are lots and lots of lovely things on this site be it need, lust or must have.

These sturdy bags have caught my eye. Suggested uses are as a lunch bag, desk tidy or somewhere to store all your electrical chargers with black, white, purple and red colours. They don't cost much either - £4.40!

Hygge Talk: Isabella Smith, creator of Maison Belle

Easy Living (January 2009, p178) have a great article featuring Isabella Smith's home. Isabella is the Danish creator of Maison Belle, a line of eco-friendly cleaning products that are designed to be as aesthetically pleasing as they are functional and she's got the idea spot on. Just look at all the beautiful things that you can put in your home then look at the amazingly ugly bottles of cleaning fluids that we use to clean it. Toxic yellow, dull green, obnoxious orange. Ugh! I wonder if there's a brain connection that sees us associating foul packaging with the industrial strength of the cleaner? After all, we might think, how can something so pretty by useful too?

But I digress. Isabella is noted as a 'lifestyle guru' with her own TV show, glossy magazine, mail order company, Maison Belle line... in short, the Danes answer to Martha Stewart. The pictures show her home to have a neutral backdrop with stripped wooden floors and the occasional splash of wallpaper and lots of colour from the woven blanket to the crammed bookcase and Chinoiserie prints. However, it's what she says about her home that interests me. "When I'm at home, I want my eyes to always fall on something nice,' she is quoted as saying along with, '...for me, it's really important to be surrounded by beautiful things.' And her motto reflects this: 'everything should be beautiful - not expensive, exclusive or clever, just really, really lovely to look at, whether it's a junk shop table or a teacup.' I couldn't agree more.