Diedododa

It’s downstairs you go into the rabbit hole.
And this isn’t just being cute. It is a place to find weird but awesome pieces and gifts. Like a pillow that has a photo of a cat, in the shape of a cat, so that it really seems like a cat is sitting there when you first look at it. Or a small white desk lamp made from a cast dog’s head. Or animal teeth jewelry-​probably casts as well, but I didn’t want to know.
They have redone some furniture into unique and totally enviable center pieces. Lounge chairs, side tables, bookcases, coffee tables… probably more and I’m forgetting. Some looks like découpage, but they find really creative ways to do it. Oh! My favorite was a set of small mirrors that were all scratched up and had been written on in erasable marker «you look great.» Seriously, you don’t need to look in the mirror, you’re beautiful.
The art is bizarre, sometimes cartoony though strangely fitting, but you know that when you leave this shop you will remember back and think wtf? It’s good. I like when people who visit me see something and have to stop and wonder 1. where I got it 2. why I got it 3. what it tells them about me if I am just strange or just like to mess with people. I change my mind on this one a lot. When it’s just me at home, I am the strange one with questionable art. When people are around I am messing with them. See-​two for the price of one :)

How has this beautiful, tucked away beauty not been reviewed? An FTR win. Another ‘hidden gem’ that very much deserves the title. I actually love the outside of the shop. As you go up East Preston Street (which I do often on my bike) there are only houses, apart from this one light-​blued coloured wall, which on closer inspectation is a wall that is bare on the other side — no building. And yet the door is open! And you can go in! It’s an optical illusion, a feat of a magician.
So you go in, and realise it leads you down to a basement. Not actually that great a magic trick, but it’s eye-​catching enough that it lured me in. And I was so happy it did. A beautiful studio-​like shop that is full of reclaimed and upcycled furniture, with the owner and artist in the midst of updating and finishing some pieces she’s working on in her workshop behind the till.
Old Victorian pieces with twists like wallpaper on doors. I can’t even begin to describe how beautiful piece is in here. There’s jewellery and cards too.
I came away with a wooden barstool, with a back, that had been painted a turquoise blue but had that ‘worn’ effect. Upcycled but still looking recylced. I loved it.
Whether you’re looking for a piece of furniture or not, I guarantee you’ll come here and begin having grand design visions of how you can totally make over home to fit these handmade-​with-​love pieces.