Mitchell & Dent's Tittle Tattle

So exciting, our mesdames Angela Mitchell and Leah Dent were invited by Lomography Australia / New Zealand to contribute to a leg of the Diana World Tour 2011. We may have given you a sneak peek, do you remember? Along with inspirational artists including friends and faves such as Gemma Jones, Beci Orpin, Cat-Rabbit, Ghostpatrol and Eveline Tarunadjaja to name a few, our bunnycam will be one of 25 shown in Sydney, Melbourne and Auckland as part of the Customised Clones Exhibition. Importantly – and listen up now  – they will all be auctioned online to raise funds for See Through Me and World Child Cancer. Bidding starts February 3rd, we’ll be sure to keep you updated.

lomography.com.au

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Allira Tee is from Melbourne and makes me giggle. I like these brooches (of course, because I like all brooches), but she is also an expert in the art of tea towel snapping. Not many people can say that with any authority.

alliratee.com

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OK, so a little bit of a departure in subject matter for us, but as two aunties-in-waiting (not long now), Mitchell & Dent can’t help but occasionally dip our toes into baby-world. Especially when we were so fortunate to meet the very delightful Natasha and Daniel Dumais at Life InStyle, Melbourne-based designers of Ubabub. There were lots of reasons to stop and chat – brilliant brand design, incredible artwork for little ones, and THESE AMAZING COTS. And then I bumped into Natasha on Pinterest last week and if you want more eye candy, go take a peek at her pins.

ubabub.com

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OK, OK, enough about Melbourne already. I promise this is our last post about our jaunt to the east. We spent a day at the overwhelmingly huge Life InStyle trade show and were amazed by the goodies available to people with shops. Almost enough to make us wish we had a shop. Geez Louise, Australians make some good things. And what really surprised us were the number of Perthonalities who travelled across to exhibit. See, we can do things other than dig stuff out of the ground in this state.

It was nice to catch up with our favourite felt folks Jess and Jayden from Bug and Megs. Have you been to their shop in Fremantle yet? You should.

Tú are a local fashion label and we loved seeing their Mary Lou for Tú jewellery range. Sweetness.

Antigone has her very own House of Antigone and combines her graphic design and photography skills to make art objects for the home.

I bet you know Freo-based jewellery designers Loop already. Danny Sheiner makes amazing things and has a new studio in Margaret River to boot.

Cate Blanchett, Toni Collette and Miranda Kerr wear Sophie Kyron jewellery and you can too. If you like crazy carved beaded over-the-topness.

Pure Linen are all about pure linen, oddly enough. Designed in Australia and made in Europe and Australia.

We’ve bought these Mattiske map bangles and never knew they were designed and manufactured by Perth’s  Sharra Art. Well, whatdoyaknow?

Of course, Pigeonhole. The one-stop-shop (well, four little shops and an online store now) for cute and quirky. So much goodness.

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Our Melbourne morning ritual was coffee from the little bolthole Brother Baba Budan (above), take-away toast from some place whose name we can’t remember, oopsie (marmalade on sourdough for Madame Mitchell, butter on multigrain for Madame Dent) and onto the tram to the Malvern Town Hall for the Magnolia Square markets. Drop in to 359 Little Bourke Street for the creamiest of cremas, the chirpiest of earlybird baristas and to count just how many lovely-looking Melbourne boys wear navy pea-coats and striped scarves (thank you Breakfast Out for the image).

brotherbababudan.com.au

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Pip Lincolne from Meet Me at Mike’s is super ace. When Miss Gem and the mesdames rocked up on her doorstep unannounced, instead of telling us to sod off, she invited us in for tea and brownies and a sneaky peak at Project Yellow Box. That kind of kindness deserves to be paid back in kind, so we heartily recommend you visit the Meet Me at Mike’s shop in Brunswick Street, Fitzroy in Melbourne. Or Pip’s blog if you haven’t stumbled across it already (and if you haven’t, where have you been hiding yourself?!). We also love her first book of crafty projects (pictured above) and are excited to hear that her second book Sew La Tea Do is not far away.

meetmeatmikes.blogspot.com

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We have tittle tattled about Miss Gem here before, but oh my, it was so nice to spend some time with her in Melbourne. We don’t know how Gemma Jones can possibly be just the one person, given all the creative wonderfulness she does. See her art here, her blogs here and here, her shop here, her day job here and her writing here. I suspect she doesn’t sleep. She can’t possibly. Or maybe her work-a-day has an extra hour in it?!

So, where did our guide Gem take us for the most perfect of days out in Melbourne? The Camberwell Sunday Market (be sure to ask Madame Mitchell just how many vintage dresses she bought), lunch at Seven Seeds, a cup of tea with Pip and Cam from Meet Me at Mike’s, a mooch about Gertrude Street and a dip into Lost and Found (former home of Ray Cook ramekins – more – later). Could life be any sweeter?

Thank you Gemma.

gemmajones.net
kaotickraftkuties.blogspot.com
craftcitymelbourne.blogspot.com
paintergirl.etsy.com
outregallery.com
thevine.com.au

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I know I know, that title doesn’t quite work, but I needed to get into the guts of this post quick smart. No time for tweaking the twee, as there is an awful lot to tittle and tattle about. If you’ve been living under a rock, you may not know that Mitchell & Dent went to Melbourne last week to hawk our wares at Magnolia Square (we did go on about it a bit). And omigoodness, there were so many good things there by good people that impressed our good selves. Here is a little taste of the goodness (from top to bottom)….

Melbourne’s A Skulk of Foxes make crazy good silver, timber and acrylic jewellery.

Angus & Celeste make jewellery and homewares, but we most loved these porcelain bottle vases decorated with botanicals native to Victoria’s Dandenong Ranges.

A treasure trove of vintage papery goodness from Green Olive – prints and stationery items made out of rescued children’s books from days gone by.

More midcentury-meets-paper wonderfulness, this time from South Australia’s Delilah Devine. Love the flying duck plaques covered with vintage wallpapers.

The mesdames must confess, we ate a whole host of Michel’s Fine Biscuit Co‘s wares. We heartily recommend the hazelnut shortbread and the ginger and almond buscuit with a lemon myrtle-infused white chocolate filling.

And finally, having just driven by the old Skipping Girl Vinegar sign in Victoria Street, it was really nice to see her emblazoned on homewares by Make Me Iconic. Swoon-worthy souvenirs.

We want to say a giant thankyou thankyou thankyou to our lovely friend Michelle who helped us out so much in Melbourne – our guide, our taxi, our handyman, our tea-lady, our support and our cheerleader. You’re tops, Shells.

And to three ladies who made our day by coming to say hello – you know who you are Belgian Nancy, Tanya from T&J and Sylvia. Very nice to meet you.

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Oh lordy, where to start?! Be prepared for lots of tittle tattle about Melbourne in the days to come as Mitchell & Dent recently popped across the Nullarbor to say howdy-do at Magnolia Square and introduce our bits and bobs to folks in the East.

Where to start? How about the morning we arrived after a damn red eye flight (did I say damn already, damnedy damn)? We have AIX’s blood orange and burnt sugar crepes and Chris from Corky Saint Clair to thank for kick-starting our jaunt in the jolliest of ways. Chris is nice. He told us lots of ace places to visit and I bought the bestest Sarah McNeil brooch from his shop in the subway between Degraves and Flinders Station. Of course, we then checked in early and promptly fell asleep. So sad.

corkysaintclair.net
corkysaintclair.blogspot.com

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You might have noticed that Mitchell & Dent have been a little quiet on the tittle tattling front recently. That’s because we’ve been beavering away, making damn good goodies to take to Melbourne next week. If you want to take a sneaky peek before they hit our online shop, just trundle on down to Magnolia Square at the Malvern Town Hall on August 5-6-7 and come say hooroo. We’d love to see you.

magnoliasquare.com.au

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