PHOEBE’S POINT People come and go but mother’s remain

Make it a Papier d’Amour Mother’s Day on Sunday May 8 – Ribbons & Notions, stationery boxes, plus a new shipment of must-have Kate Spade. Phoebe’s favourites below…

]]> http://www.phoebegazal.com/save-the-date-%e2%80%a2-sunday-8th-may/feed/ 0 http://www.phoebegazal.com/mum-magic/ http://www.phoebegazal.com/mum-magic/#comments Tue, 26 Apr 2011 00:43:02 +0000 Phoebe Gazal http://www.phoebegazal.com/?p=723 “I am often asked what it was like to have a famous mother.  I always answer that I really don’t know.  I know her first as my mother and then as my best friend.  Only after that did I understand that she was an actress and, with time, that she was a truly exceptional actress.” Luca talking about his mum Audrey Hepburn.

Not so very long ago when I was young I used to prick holes at either end of an egg and blow as hard as I could to get the egg out, then dye them and cover them with stickers. Since then I’ve become a little more sophisticated thanks to ‘Martha’ . The egg has been a symbol of fertility since the Romans – no fools them – figured it out. Easter is named for Eastre the Anglo-Saxon goddess of spring, which is where the bunnies (originally a hare) and the eggs come in. I’ve cornered the market in rabbits, and their relations, in every shape and form. In Christian faiths, as I’m sure you know, Easter is more significant than Christmas as it marks the resurrection – but I’m going on here, you can Google this yourself.

images care of Martha Stewart

Every country has it’s Easter tradition, America’s Easter Parade with its hats being one of the more popular – if you’re still looking for ribbons and notions to trim an Easter bonnet, I have to say I have a heart-stopping selection at the store, not that I like a show off. While on the subject of over-exuberance, I hope you’re all aware that the connection between your child’s hyper behavior and a sugar hit is just so much nonsense and myth, otherwise mothers country-wide would act crazy every time they snuck a few Tim Tams from their secret stash. So do me a favour and let everyone enjoy as many Easter eggs as they like.

Tallulah’s easter hat parade

In the middle of my Easter table I’m having a parade of multi-coloured plastic chickens and roosters, who look as though they’re wearing Missoni, and they do make me laugh. My only concern this holiday is my daughter Tallulah’s horror when she found out Robert and I are flying to Hong Kong on business on Easter Sunday; she cursed me as a bad parent. I only hope I’m there to see the look on her face the day it dawns on her just what peas-in-a-pod she and I are. That will be Easter, Christmas, and a couple of birthdays, all in one.

PHOEBE’S POINT  I’m the go-to girl for Easter bonnet ribbons and Easter table decorations and, for goodness sake, eat as many Easter eggs as you want.

moss bunnies from Papier d’Amour

Why plan for weeks, creating a beautiful invitation and fretting over the food, only to neglect the ambience? What guest doesn’t sing better for their supper when they notice the trouble you’ve put into making the occasion a celebration of friendship? And believe me, people – especially men – notice effort.

Dress the table with the intention of delighting the eye (and a useful diversion if you’re no Masterchef). Decide on a theme that flows from the invitation to the food to the table. Do I need to nag about linen, glassware and cutlery being spotless? (White cotton gloves from a pharmacy are the trick here.) Try popping the place cards in a fork’s tines to give that detail a bit of a modern kick. If the guests aren’t all known to each other, put the name on both sides as a helpful hint.

Plot the seating so the conversation hums – separate couples so they sparkle rather than play out their dreary routine. Do you light tapers or tea lights or bask in the glow from a muddle of candlesticks? Flowers, while I love, often interfere with the palate’s appreciation, so consider setting about ‘objects’ that relate to your theme instead (I have a shop full of things that would be perfect).  Don’t, whatever you do, neglect the space above the table, which bring us to my passion of the moment: delicate, floating tissue paper pompoms.

Learn all this and more from me at 12.30 on April 29 at 30 Days Live House at the Hordern Pavillion EQ, Driver Ave, Moore Park.

PHOEBE’S POINT –  Dress your table for a party as well as you’d dress yourself.

Anyway the only downside of these exercises is the photos that you really like are usually the ones you never see – well not this time… here they are…

The rest are in this months Australian Harper’s Bazaar

Talitha Getty, a style icon of the 60s died at age 31

Shirley MacLaine and daughter Sachi

Jackie Kennedy cutting and pasting

Vietnemese mother at work with her children

Each Tuesday morning we have our Papier d’Amour staff meeting, aimed at ensuring that we maintain the best customer service and a great product range for all of you shoppers out there. Amongst all the inspiring and positive topics that we cover, the girls also report on any customer complaints that may have been received. I don’t often find it necessary to justify myself to customers, but when someone complained last week that we had put our Mother’s Day window in too early, I simply could NOT hold my tongue.

As a small retailer in Double Bay, Sydney, we pride ourselves on our original and creative approach to retail. So when I go about my responsibilities as a store owner, I don’t just do things on a whim. Monthly purchasing budgets are carefully set and adhered to and staffing is based on customer traffic and store targets, calculated from previous years’ sales.

Also, I set a window dressing schedule for the year, taking all these factors into account with the timing of seasonal occasions. And because I often do the window myself, it is based on when I can actually get the time to physically do it (we also run a graphic design studio out the back of the store, creating unique invitations, where the workload is often unpredictable. And to top it all off, I have a family to consider that includes a husband (yes, an extremely helpful one), two busy teenagers and a very active 9 year old.

So this year Easter ended on 5th April and Mothers Day is on the 9th May, which is 5 weeks apart. Replacing the Easter window with an interim arrangement would mean having to change it 2 to 3 weeks later and as a time-poor small retailer, this is just not economically viable. More importantly, many customers purchase items such as personal stationery for their mothers, so we are constantly trying to educate them of the need to get organised early to avoid disappointment. I know we live in a very instantaneous world however we are not a one hour photolab.

It is very annoying when the large department stores put in Easter displays in January as soon as Christmas is over – I do get that. But no one seems to complain when a sale window goes in. No one says “It’s too early for a sale window”.

Anyway, my point is that I would love to have the time to change the window every two to three weeks or the financial freedom to pay someone to do it for me. The reality is, I don’t. And if we did turn over the windows in such a short timeframe, some of our customers would never see some of our creative displays that hopefully inspire them.

So, on Easter Monday, while many of you (I am not saying all of you) were relaxing and enjoying the holiday, I enlisted the services of my sister Samantha and together we created this Mother’s Day masterpiece.

Sometimes you do have to give yourself a rap!

So I would love to hear your comments – is it too early? Comments from shoppers and retailers would be VERY interesting…

The workshop is all about creating the perfect atmosphere for your guests’ entertainment experience. Everybody can set a table, but how do you make it look amazing? So amazing that your guests will be taken aback when they enter the room. It is the small details that can make a guest’s experience so much more memorable.

Products used in the workshop like the lanterns below will be available to purchase at the traders market. I have included an image that 30 days of home and entertaining is using to promote the event, which we just love!

To book a place at the workshop or see what else is happening have a look at www.30daysofhomeandentertaining.com.au

It has been a long time between blogs and it is really time to get more diligent so I have decided to make them short and very very sweet. If you wander the streets of Double Bay at the moment you will encounter over 80 mannequins painted, decorated and embellished by local artists. It is such a fantastic way to get children and the more uncultured beings we know interested in art. The festival runs till this Sunday 28th March. If you come to Papier d’Amour you (or more importantly your children) can help Amy decorate our mannequin. It is like having a childminding service while you shop – what fantastic service.

The mannequin photographed is by artist Megan McGlip who is training in illustration. I haven’t met her but we loveeeeeee the mannequin. My other favourite mannequins are retired hatmakers Isabel Klompe’s, which is mainly covered in meticulously placed ribbon, Stephanie Tetu’s ‘Miss Congeniality’ and ‘Inner Beauty’ by Adam Long. Come and vote for your favourite!

Who or what  is Tuesday Designs you may well ask – well, when in one of my favourite stores in Melbourne a year or so ago I came across these most divine embossed works on paper and we all know that I have always had a fascination with paper and age old paper printing techniques. Since subsequently acquiring the pieces, I would have to say they are one of our single most popular items.

Tuesday Designs is a collaboration between sisters Taryn and Elise Eales.

The  girls have created, in their paper and textile works, a world of whimsy that belongs to childhood.

Each work borrows from fantasies of dress up and play. Dresses are meticulously pieced together from pieces of antique fabric while birds peer from cages of embossed paper or out of pear trees that look like clouds. Skirts hide the blackbird in the rain, a hot air balloon ball-gown is perfect for that windy Sunday picnic and the bluebird of happiness dress must always be worn for birthday parties… Each wing is painstakingly pieced together after perhaps hours of sifting through piles of tiny off-cuts searching for the perfect piece. Most are sourced from the remnants of vintage kimonos… marks and darnings are intrinsic to each piece revealing its history, …a geisha’s undergarment… if only it could speak, oh the stories she might tell, and how might we blush…

“We describe our work as much about our relationship and closeness as sisters as it is about anything else. “We have always been close, always held hands when crossing the road and always finished each other’s sentences. Perhaps that is an appropriate way of looking at our artwork… as a sentence or thought finished by the other.”

“Our work is a collection of birds that inhabit not just the parks and gardens of childhood but our present sleeping and waking dreams. They peer shyly from the skirts of freshly ironed frocks, proudly from the tallest trees, and our paper cages will not hold them long… they are free to come and go as they wish. Don’t imagine for a moment that they will be silenced as is the fate of many behind glass… their songs will lull your children to sleep and colour your blue and red days.”

We would love you all to join us  to meet Taryn and Elise on Thursday 22nd October 6.00 to 9.00pm for a drink or two and see their amazing collection of works. We may also have  sneak peak of chrissy instore. If you could let us know if you are coming that would be wonderful store@papierdamour.com.au or 9362 5200.