“Our lighting is hand-built in Japan from natural materials, including the hand-made paper (washi) of Eriko Horiki, the bent Japanese cedar of Toshiyuki Tani’s Wappa series, the coiled beech wood of the Bunaco Lacquer Ware Company, and the todomatsu pine slats of Takumi Kohgei. The lights are designed by Japanese architects and artisans who strive to create distinctive contemporary designs utilizing traditional materials and production techniques…Typically these lights provide ambient rather than functional lighting, creating that special mood or atmosphere which is best achieved through the use of soft natural materials.” These spectacular Japanese lamps are sold and distributed in North America by Vancouver company Kozai Designs.

I have one of these white heart pendant necklaces, and easily a hundred people have asked me about it. It’s by Toronto jeweller Tosca Teran, whose studio is alternately known as Nanotopia and Nanopod. Teran’s pieces, most of which look like a naturalist’s specimens, are classified according to her own funny hybrid proto-scientific taxonomy, viz.

Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Earring
Class: Gastropoda
Subclass: Orthogastropoda
Superorder: Heterobranchia
Order: Opisthobranchia

There’s something about these that distinguishes them from other objects that reference nature – they’re sciencey, but also not. Maybe it’s the rounded edges that give them a sort of mysterious personality. My own doctor noticed my heart pendant one day and mentioned its anatomical correctness. I said “Yes! But doesn’t it have too many blood vessels? What’s this one at the back?” And she said “no, that’s correct, it’s the pulmonary artery.”

The Nanotopia website is here, but the Nanopod Etsy shop seems to be the place to buy items. There are some amazing photos of the jewellery in her Flickr and if you just search for “nanopod” on Flickr you can see photos her students have taken of her very nice teaching studio.

Supposedly raw blonde is a trend for 2009. That’s great because we think one of us might be a raw blonde, based on this definition. Warm, but austere, and at this point pretty pale. This room somehow manages to be both sensual and monastic at the same time, so perhaps it represents the perfect refuge for a recession. It almost reads as anti-consumerist, even though it undoubtedly isn’t, and that makes it somehow comforting. See the whole Scandinavian trend forecast at emmas designblogg. All white is still going strong, maybe for the same reasons?