Lampshades

Lampshades for Interior Designers

A lot of my lampshade orders come from clients who find me on Google searches but I also have a few local Interior Designers and curtain makers that have been ordering from me since I started gilhoolie. It works really well and I love having a relationship with them (must try and grow this in 2021!) – I can advise them on fabrics as well as shapes and sizes of lampshades (see my guidelines if you need help with this). It’s also a great way for them to use up spare fabric that would otherwise go to waste or sit gathering dust in their workshops.

2020 has been a strange year but I have felt blessed that many people have taken this time to update their homes by ordering bespoke lampshades. The gilhoolie Design Assistance service that was going so well up until Covid has suffered a lot as designers have cut back but I hope that will pick up again sometime next year.

Anyway, I thought I’d share with you some of the orders from Interior Designers this year and give them a little mention at the same time. The main orders have been from Niki Schafer, Samantha Johnson and The Silk Road, thank you to all of them! And thank you to Sarah Wooldridge who lives along my road and is very kind helping with ordering fabric and samples for my clients, I really appreciate it!

If you are an interior designer who would like to discuss ordering bespoke lampshades with gilhoolie do get in touch, I’d love to hear from you…

Decorating Projects · Interior Design · lock-down

Welcome to my studio!

We were incredibly lucky to have our kitchen/dining room (which is also my lampshade workshop) decorated just before lock down and I have been meaning to share it on here since then so I’m sorry it’s taken so long. I adore this space. It’s so light and airy but also very cosy in the winter. I can step straight into the garden for a stroll and look at the flowers or make myself a cup of tea whenever I need a break. The only down side is that I have to tidy everything away at the end of a day and everyone obviously gravitates here when they get hungry (which is quite often when you have two teenage boys living in the house!) It’s been accentuated during lock down for sure with four of us living here. So I am seriously considering building a workshop in the garden where I can really get away from it all and absorb myself in making. But for now I’m very happy and grateful to have this space.

I have been busy working on my own machine embroidery designs which I will be adding to my Etsy shop. These are all botanical themed so far and I have used them to make cushions and lampshades. I’d like to come up with a collection that I can sell eventually but it’s early days as I’m trying things out and having fun experimenting. One good thing about lock down, I have plenty of time to do this and seem to be quite inspired! Yesterday I spent all afternoon coming up with a design and started cutting fabrics to stitch on.

Anyway, back to my kitchen/dining room/workshop… Here it is. The walls are painted in Little Greene china blue, with a slightly lighter tone in the kitchen area as it can be a bit dark in there at certain times of day. The wallpaper is also from Little Greene and is called Fern in sage blue. It wraps around two walls and makes a cosy seating area in one corner. I admired this wallpaper in one of Samantha Johnson’s designs in Taplow – see her gorgeously clever interior design work here.

We already had the two seater sofa which is from Made.com. And my favourite velvet Calvin armchair is from Atkin & Thyme. Glass pendant over the dining room table is quite old but I still love it (from Next). Lampshades by gilhoolie. Glass cabinet from Ikea. Anglepoise original 1227 dark blue ceiling lights from John Lewis. Dining room table and benches from Habitat.

So you see, what a lovely space to be creative in. Next project, our master bedroom! I have ordered new furniture but we need to get on and decorate before it arrives, I’m off to get paint sample pots…

If you would like to order a lampshade for your own house please get in touch. I can help with sourcing fabrics to fit in with your scheme. Check out my instagram account for lots of images of previous makes.

Artwork

Chuffed…

That’s how I felt when I met up with a friend of mine last week – Samantha Johnson – who is a very talented Interior Designer with nearly 20 years experience of designing amazing homes. Sam recently moved house to a lovely cottage in Buckinghamshire and asked me to draw it for her so that she could use it for her business materials. Well, I wouldn’t class myself as an ‘artist’ so whenever anyone asks me personally to draw something for them I am over the moon. Big smile inside… I love drawing but really struggle with what to draw so this takes that worry away!

As I drew Sam’s cottage last year sometime I had totally forgotten and assumed it wasn’t good enough to use – so was incredibly chuffed when Sam showed me her new business cards and postcards with my design on the front – cool or what?!

Here they are – in a gorgeous grey with a thin stripe of yellow around the edge of the cards. Since then I have decided that drawing buildings is the way to go for me – I’m always obsessed with every little detail, from brickwork around windows to pretty chimney pots. So I’m starting to put together a collection of drawings of my favourite buildings in Maidenhead and the local area. More on that coming soon…

Ta dah!