Production line

Just a small break from the production line... I will sleep again one day.

Alma Lusa

At 11.23 minutes you will be able to see briefly some Esquilo handbags, a special project collection for Alma Lusa. Ana Sousa Dias of Alma Lusa speaks of Portuguese products, young and old. And I am happy to say that by this Easter weekend Esquilo Handbags will be on sale at the Alma Lusa shops at the Lisbon Airport...hmm Easter weekend... maybe the good Catholic School education is finally paying off and all those Easter liturgies where I played Mary in the 12 stations of the cross were indeed not in vain. Holy Cross College, Woolhara, class of 92.

New Sample and something to uplift

Back in the day

Back in the day, streets were named after the main business activity there carried out. Today strawberries were being sold in a street corner down by the Rossio and in Praça da Figueira an old lady continued to sell the roasted chestnuts that are now going out of season. Another bag was completed. I met Dona Manuela, wife of the late Sr. Teixeira and owner of the shop where I buy my bag handles. Now in her 80s, she told me stories of when she was young. She would wake up in the middle of the night from nightmares where her bed was covered with boxes and boxes of bag handles. She was lovely.

A tattoo wish

I wish that Stephan Doitschinoff (aka Calma) would design me a tattoo. Stephan, if you´re out there and you have some spare time...consider it.

I hope it is just a phase...

...or a dream. No, not a dream or an illusion. It is most definitely happening. It is real. So it has to be a stage, or an era... an epoch... a time. Why this sudden fascination with collecting window displays? I am not sure.

Maybe I am trying to regain a sense of order in my life... I have come to question the difference between fantasy and reality and am truly afraid of what happens when they cross paths.

Defiantly is almost a misspelling of the misspelling of definitely definately. Or, maybe it is just early-onset madness.

Tom Robbins says it best... "Love easily confuses us because it is always in flux between illusion and substance, between memory and wish, between contentment and need."

...I hope it is just a phase.

Welcome to Lisboa, Sam.

Leaving the past

"Among other things, you'll find that you're not the first person who was ever confused and frightened and even sickened by human behavior. You're by no means alone on that score, you'll be excited and stimulated to know. Many, many men have been just as troubled morally and spiritually as you are right now. Happily, some of them kept records of their troubles. You'll learn from them--if you want to. Just as someday, if you have something to offer, someone will learn something from you. It's a beautiful reciprocal arrangement. And it isn't education. It's history. It's poetry."
— J.D. Salinger (The Catcher in the Rye)

RIP Alex Chilton 1950-2010

So many afternoons spent in my bedroom listening to Alex Chilton records. I couldn´t have done anything better with that time.

Cookie on Bunnies

My friend Peter Cooke was right. Bunnies really are the best people. No bunny I know has ever hurt my feelings.

Beatrix Potter would have agreed with Cookie on this. She is pictured above with Peter Rabbit I presume... I hope this was a one off set up for the photo as I am not sure that the bunny looks so happy there with the rope leash.

I love her drawings of the little squirrels paddling across the lake. This is a page from a series of picture letters that Beatrix wrote and I like this story...

...
Little squirrels came down to the edge of the lake and paddled across over the water to owl Island to gather nuts. Each squirrel had a little sack with him, and a large oar, and spread out his tail for a sail. They also carried with them an offering of 3 fat mice for Old Brown, which they placed upon a stone opposite his door. Then Twinkleberry and the other squirrels each made a low bow, ...

Why is it that we find beauty in similarity and why do flies choose to die in cups of fizzy lemonade?

This weekend there was time for so many things.

Coffee and Flowers: Flower Power, Calçada do Combro, Lisboa

The week/ends

The purses are coming along nicely. I feel like the kid that plays soccer alone every afternoon after school.
Victorious.

Fine, Fino, Finito

Quercus Suber

Last year just before Christmas acorns dropped to the ground en masse. What a joy it must have been for all those little squirrels out there. Now, I am no squirrel but I have to admit that I like to collect stuff, and it was logical that I take a few acorns home. Soon they started to germinate and I knew that I had an oldschool project on my hands. Out came the cotton wool and a small glass jar, add water. A root spiraled out of the acorn tip and twisted itself comfortably into the cotton wool guided by the walls of the jar, keep moist. More or less a month later there were the first signs of a sprout, a leaf or two. With great care the baby tree was transplanted into a small pot, add dirt. And now 3 months later I have my own cork oak tree. 25 years from now the first cork will be harvested, then again 9 or 12 years after that, after that, after that...

250 years from now, the little tree now a 20 meter towering mass of branches and its hidden mirror of roots, will die.

Watching things grow is just one way to see time.

Take deep breaths...

...and you will live longer.

Lisbon is distracting me and I have so much work to do. Feeling footloose and fancy free is just an illusion that does not further the cause and when the sun shines I go into a trance. A supposedly quick trip to the flea market for inspiration turned into a huge mission and a basket full of fabrics later I just managed to get to work. I am putting together a small collection of purses for sale on Portugal, mon amour and I really want them to be soooo super special. I am frozen.

Windows

Walking about with head full of Lisboa

If you are considering coming to Lisboa... why aren´t you here? Did I mention the barber shops. And by the way just between you and me...this is just a little slice of dare I say... "heaven". PS. Good for lovers and broken hearts alike.