as you know i like to take you with me as much as possible when i am traveling. and on one of my recent trips, I came up with this idea – snapping a photo and recording some of the city sounds where the photo was taken. Starting in Paris, this one was captured while i was sitting in a cafe one morning, sipping my tea in the 6th. There were some men sitting by us, talking about what Parisien’s love to talk about most: food.

So welcome to my first post of this special series called soundscapes…

To listen, just press play below the photo and come with me to Paris, for the moment. Enjoy…

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

Rachel’s chilled pandan soufflé, recipe in the kitchen right now…

It’s been a quick shuffle in the kitchen as the two cooks exchange the (blog)house apron and hand over the inaugural wooden spoon. As we say our goodbyes and thank yous to sweet Laura (merci Laura! au revoir! à bientot!), we welcome our wonderful new friend and fabulous food stylist, Rachel Khoo. She and friend Andréa have been busy in their new venture, la cocotte – a wonderful bookstore/mini café in the 11th arrondisment of Paris. Check out some of the books on the la cocotte shelves here.

Rachel aptly calls herself “the London girl munching her way through all things delicious in Paris”. She works with such publications as Elle à Table, and Galeries Lafayette Gourmet, and has kindly created a sweet tooth menu for the (blog)house. It includes that delicious chilled pandan soufflé above, plus her almond milk panna cotta , and scrumptious biscuit poppets! What’s a biscuit poppet you might ask? Well, go in the kitchen and find out! And click here to read her very funny post about biscuit poppets.

I will tell you more about Rachel in the coming days but for now, please make her feel very welcome.

Take it away dear Rach, have fun in the (blog)house kitchen , and make as much mess as you like (Alfred really loves cleaning up!)!

……………………………..

Rachel’s little blurb about her chosen menu…

“I would happily eat 3 desserts and just skip the starter and main. I’m definately a “pâtisserie-a-holic”. What I love about sweet things is the reaction they get. Mention to someone you’re making some sweet treat and you’ll see their eyes light up immediately. Desserts are meant to be shared. Bake a cake, wrap up some pieces and pop around to your neighbours and you’ll have no problems borrowing that extra cup of sugar whenever you want. So here are several sweet treats which are perfect for sharing but also just as good for curling up on the sofa and eating all by yourself…”

click here to view the menu.

maybe just a little piece of it still lingers in the old paris abode. well, you can see for yourself, it’s made it’s mark.

I love meeting new people.

It’s one of the things I love about my job – I am always working with different people, and although sometimes it can be a bit trying on such intense shoots, most of the time it is heaps of fun. And this is one of the things I love about being a blogger too. I’ve made so many new friends, all of whom I hope to meet in person one day. And some of which I am very lucky to have already met in person.

You already know I’ve met Danielle, from the ever popular Style Files, who I’m very looking forward to catching up again with in coming days. And just recently I had the pleasure of having drinks with gorgeous Mary-Laure and the oracle Benjy, from Aurea, and her sister Celine who has just moved to Amsterdam. Thank you Mary-Laure for posting about your visit with me, it made me chuckle and blush. And while in Paris I met the very talented Rachel who I will be writing more about very soon.

Josephine from Red Thread recently came to Europe as a 3 week birthday treat for herself and we were able to hang out in both Amsterdam and Paris while she was here. If you catch her now, she is writing some awesome posts about her time in Antwerp, she has already written about Stockholm, and she has just finished posting about Amsterdam, all complete with photographs. Click here for her floral fixation post (oh Josephine, I wish you were able to see my tulips in bloom!), here for Amsterdam’s gorgeous chinatown which I frequent often, here for her design and art walk, and here for her post about her time with me. Apparently she thinks I’m funny, and I couldnt be happier about that, someone who actually laughs at my humour! We had a fun time, both of us pipelette-ing away, the boys couldnt get a word in unfortunately. Tough luck boys.

And soon I’ll be introducing you to one of my friends who will be arriving in the guest quarters any moment now (he’s a bit late, he’s a very busy boy). But I can tell you this much – he makes me laugh, he loves my little piano concerts, and he is a hit on the dancefloor.

But here are some links I’d love you to check out in the meantime from my new blog friends. Also, please check my blogroll for new links as I always put new ones in but sometimes don’t have the time to write about them in a post.

Danielle just posted about Taschen’s new seaside interiors book here.

Felicity posted an AWESOME interior spread here.

Yoli continues to inspire me daily with her beautiful blog here.

Tiny K posts some really inspiring interiors here.
__________________________

All photographs are from the “Subaquatic Beauty” spread shot by Alix Malka via Nyla and Yoli

wow, i’m wrapped with the response from the before and after, thanks guys! And a BIG thank you to Grace for posting it. I love how the story looks on her blog (well, I love everything on her blog!), it really shines – but poor French Boy, he is a little embarrassed… I did warn him to close his eyes!

There were quite a few questions in the comments on design*sponge so I am going to try to answer them all here. I have linked to each commenter so you can easily find the answer to your question within this post. I love questions about my work, so don’t hesitate to ask more in the comments if you have them.

(Click here to read more…)