Illustration

Year of the Goat with Hello Pretty!

Year of the Goat with http://hellopretty.co.za

So 2015 is the year of the goat - not that I need any particular reason to buy new things!

Celebrate with some of the cute goat inspired products on the site:

Clickitty click!

#WDC2014 Desktop Wallpapers! - part 4

Guys. No but guys. Look at these yellow cats. Are they not the best?

Fathima, fellow cat lady from Happiness Is... has done this most amazing illustration for this months #WDC2014 inspired downloadable wallpaper, and we LOVE it. Can you tell?

Download this bit of tech sunshine for free over HERE.

Talented right? She's so brilliant. You should all go visit her Hello Pretty store right this second!

Check out our past wallpapers over here.

Hello Pretty x Nespresso: Interview with Jean de Wet

Here at HPHQ, we've never met a cup of coffee we didn't like. So you can imagine our delight when Nespresso invited us to check out their beautiful new space in Canal Walk. They'd decided to do something special with this new store; and when we got given a sleeve with three boxes of their famous pods to take home, it took a while for our delicious coffee haze to let us register the design on the sleeves.

On closer inspection, the front and back are two panels of an illustration by the extremely talented Jean de Wet, done exclusively for Nespresso. I promptly made myself a cup of one of my favourites (the Rosabaya), and sat down to examine it. It's quite different from his usual style, and is made up of bright, colourful illustrations of iconic buildings around Cape Town.

I had so many questions to ask - Nespresso put us in touch and a couple of emails later he very graciously answered them!

What made you decide to choose architecture as a means of characterising the city?
Besides being a fan of architecture, I wanted to make the Cape Town recognisable without using any specific natural landmarks, i.e. Table Mountain. So I ended up drawing the view from Table Mountain instead of Table Mountain itself. Each region of the city also has its own recognisable architectural character, which made it a really fun and logical to represent the city in this way.
Do you have any favourite buildings in Cape Town, and where are they on the sleeve?
I have way too many favourites! In fact, all the buildings represented in the illustration are ones I could remember off the top of my head, or ones I searched my memory for. I wanted to show the city based on my own personal knowledge, in order to instill a spirit of spontaneity. I decided to restrict my research no further than what the facades of actual buildings look like. So, in some way, they all have a personal connection to me. But if I had to choose one in the illustration, I’d say the "Block House" on Devil's Peak, because I hardly know anything about it - which makes it kind of creepy and mysterious. I also refuse to Google it, or participate in any discussion pertaining to its origins!
The sleeve is a bit of a departure from your usual style of illustration - what made you decide to go that route?
It was important for me to be able to identify the buildings easily - and a large part of the identification process has to do with colour. The Bo-Kaap area for example is famous for its colourful exteriors, and I really wanted to be able to show that in this illustration. So in a way, my need for "character in colour" allowed me to bend my own rules a bit, and so the rest of it fell into place after some initial test drawings. Since there were so many buildings I had to include, I tried to stick with stylised facades that made it easier for me to place and assemble them. Other than that, I still used my usual process for creating an illustration.
How long did the design process take you, and what medium did you do it in?
From start to finish, it took me just a little over a week. I started with schematic drawings of the city and where each region should be as best as best I could remember. Then made new sketches of the buildings in those regions, figuring out which ones to include. Then a final large pencil sketch (but still slightly rough) of the defined buildings in their places. After scanning that drawing, I started working over it by hand with my Wacom tablet, drawing each building on a different layer in photoshop. Although there are many different colours in this illustration, I tried to re-use as many of the existing colours as possible, going for a large, but unified palette.

For those of you not familiar with Jean's work, you can see more of his phenomenal illustration here and here, and stay in touch on Twitter. In the meantime, enjoy the full illustration in all its glory.

Hello Man Staff Picks: Scott

It's our final staff picks day! And to round it all off, our dev genius Scott is at the wheel with all of his favourite things:

"I don't usually shop. But when I do, I do it online. While Hello Pretty primarily has a strong female focus, there's more than enough for selection for any guy with a bit of style (and in my case, without style as well!). My list covers everything that would add a bit of class to my day to day life. For the flat, an amazing bookcase is a must and Hello Pretty / Hello Man is actually full of them, but my personal favourite (love their simple design) are the illusion bookshelves from simpli decor. I'd round that off with a nice wall clock from Louw Roets, a side table, and a lamp.

A bench for the patio to chill on coffee breaks, and the slippers, because the only thing better than no-pants-friday is no-pants-friday with a pair of warm slippers. especially in these wintery months.

Out and about:

Despite being a techie, I still always carry around a pen and a paper notebook, for that I prefer to use moleskins and the moleskin leather cover from Savior Brand takes those notebooks up a notch (as if they needed it). And then a nice, simple belt (probably several) is a must for any guys' wardrobe. You need to have a great selection of cufflinks for anything a bit more formal, and Hello Pretty definitely doesn't fall short on cufflinks. Though I'm not from there, I love the jozi skyline, so Duke and Dutch's cufflinks are perfect."

There you have it folks. Now you have no excuses come Christmas time!

Hello Pretty Staff Picks: Ads

Staff picks time! Today we have the lovely and talented Ads, and what she would like you all to gift her with this Christmas:

"Having to choose these was simultaneously ridiculously easy and incredibly hard. I've got a list as long as my arm of things I want from Hello Pretty, so finding items was a piece of cake - narrowing that list down to a mere ten was torture!

I just moved into a new apartment that I got to decorate from scratch, and it's been really interesting seeing which recurring themes and colourways emerge. I tend to gravitate towards neutrals and then throw in a fun print, or a pop of colour or gold. These things were chosen because I already know exactly where I'll put them in my new place - and don't worry, they'll feel right at home with my already sizeable collection of other items from the site!"

Stunning! Which is your favourite?

This guy's carving beats your carving.

I'm an impatient person. Like, flips out in traffic kind of impatient. And then I see something like this, which makes me want to be a better person.

Paul Roden and Valerie Lueth from Tugboat Printshop are two crazy talented humans, who undoubtedly tested the strength of their relationship during the two years that it took to carve this ah-MAZING forest landscape.

From BoredPanda:

"Paul Roden and Valerie Lueth, a Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania-based artistic duo, has unveiled their “Overlook” woodcut print, an epic work of art that they spent the last 2 years (on and off) designing and making.

The dedicated duo, which runs the Tugboat print shop, painstakingly cut trees, leaves, grasses, rivers and mountains into a board measuring 28 in x 46 in (71 cm x 117 cm). The dizzyingly detailed vista is then printed with three colors. “A panoramic infinity will be suggested by the print’s ability to eventually meet itself seemlessly at the edges,” explain the artists, “expanding like an eternal ‘wallpaper’ into an ever stretching vista!”

The piece will be sold as a single piece, diptych, triptych, or as an endless wallpaper."

I mean. Incredible. Checkout the fantastic behind the scenes pics on their Instagram over here.

Hello Pretty Staff Picks: Sara

It's staff picks time! You should all be getting to know us quite well by now - well, well enough to know what to buy us for our birthdays.

Today we have numbers person Sara picking out what she would most like you to gift her with:

"Much like our fellow Pretty, Lee, I too love the geometrics and the monochromatic. In complement, I of course love any clean, contemporary living space with peeks of warm neutrals and untouched wood. But to keep things comfy, I like to splash specks of crazy colour in the form of quirky decor and illustrations. As for my fashion pieces, I like it simple and smart paired with cool accessories."

Naaice. What would you pick?

Hello Pretty Staff Picks: Sam

We're doing staff picks again! This time our lovely designer and bosslady Sam is at the helm with her Hello Pretty Lust List:

From the horses mouth (For the record Sam, you are nothing like a horse):

"All of the items on my list are simple in their designs, but with a lot of personality. And I appreciate how difficult it is to make something "simple."

That bed is an item of great beauty. Just look at it. And given my propensity to have more things than space, I just love that their underbed storage actually looks beautiful rather than utilitarian.

As for that cat cushion, well, it's a cat. What more reason could one need?

The Civetta Spark bracelet I want so that I can wear it and feel like one of the first-class passengers in the Titanic (but without the deathly ending).

I no longer need to covet the wine rack because I just went ahead and bought one last week. Yay. It is yellow, and fun, and superb quality.

I have a fixation on creative and beautiful bookshelves (I dare you to try and drag me away from http://bookshelfporn.com) and Simpli Decor's shelves are unlike anything I've ever seen. Even on the internets. One day when we move out of our shoebox and have high ceilings and sweeping open spaces I'll fill a wall with them.

Sandy's plates I fell in love with from the moment I first saw them. Just look at them! They're incredible! All of her work is.

I hate walls being wasted with emptiness when they could be filled with beautiful things. Lynsey-Anne's photo is so delicate and lovely, and Lillian Fairall's balloon dog is the cutest, quirkiest thing ever. I must have him."

There you have it! What are your favourites?

Hello Pretty Staff Picks: Lee

I adore all things geometric and monochromatic - for a chronic hoarder with the ability to have a room look apocalyptic within minutes of arriving, I have surprisingly minimalist tastes!

Just excuse me for a second, I have to wipe the drool from my keyboard.

#WDC2014 Desktop Wallpapers! - part 3

Yayayay! It's that time again - and this time, we have the artistry of Terry Angelos for you all to pretty up your various tech with.

Download your free wallpaper over HERE, and visit Terry's Hello Pretty store over here - you won't regret it!

At the Miss+Meisie Showcase and I Heart Market in Durban - gorgeous right?

#WDC2014 Desktop Wallpapers! - part 3 with Terru Angelos

In the Homeology and D&M Made With Love DIY and Styling ebook, available here.

Stunning! And the best part is being able to own a piece of Terry Angelos art free and gratis. Get downloading, and tag us in pics of you and your new fancy computer wallpapers!