Cute Vintage Gift Tags for Spring

One of my favourite shops on Etsy is called Brandywine Designs, run by stay-at-home mom Brandy Faulkner of Texas. Her specialty is handmade stationery and gift-tag sets, usually designed with gorgeous vintage imagery she has collected over the years. Brandy often embellishes this found imagery with her own designs using advanced printing techniques to create something unique. Her Halloween collection of gift-tags and stationery is what first seduced me, but her Spring offerings are just as enticing, repleat with imagery of the season's best: birds and their eggs, roses and butterflies. Her little package of vellum specimen tags (bottom) is also sweet, perfect for attaching a pressed flower from your garden, or a few choice seeds, to attach to an Easter or Mother's Day gift.

Measuring Cups by Michele

When I was first hired by Anthropologie (exactly two years ago today!) I knew I was going to meet some extraordinary people. One such person was Michele Costa, who is the display coordinator at our store in Toronto. She, along with my friend Cindy Ha - the apparel manager at the time - trained with me at the Anthropologie stores in Detroit for a week. It was an exciting time and the three of us shared frequent (and tearful) laughter. Not long after we were hired, the company held a contest for all of its employees: who could design the best and most-creative set of measuring cups? I submitted an entry, along with five others from our store, as did Michele. Out of the hundreds of entries, Michele's design was eventually chosen as the best! Along with a series of great prizes, Michele's biggest treat was seeing her design manufactured by the company. Just last month, the measuring cups arrived at our store and were made available for purchase online as well. I got myself a set, below. Congratulations, Michele! And Happy Anthroversary!

Michele Costa (designer of the measuring cups) is the display coordinator at our store in Yorkville, Toronto. Each measuring-cup set has her signature on the bottom.

Lace Bowls by Hidemi

While it's too fussy for my windows, too elaborate for my table and far too feminine for my wardrobe, I have always loved and admired things made of lace. The intricacy and whimsy of the openwork fabric (usually created when a thread is looped, twisted or braided to other threads independently from a backing fabric) may appear grandmotherly from a traditional standpoint, but its modern applications are limitless. Japanese ceramicist Hidemi, who now lives and works in New York, sees lace as the perfect embellishment to her delicate creations. I discovered these small bowls on her Etsy shop and loved not only the employment of the lace details but also the versatility of the pieces themselves; As decorative votives they create a striking design; a set of three sold in spring colours (with matching spoon rests) is utterly sweet. The handmade bowls are food-safe, although they are not microwave- or dishwasher-safe.

Polaroids by Elizabeth Soule

Photographer Elizabeth Soule still uses the old Polaroid 600 film, which was completely discontinued two years ago to take most of her pictures. Given its limited supply, you can imagine the careful planning that goes into each and every single one of her Polaroid photographs, which are whimsical vignettes involving plastic toys, flowers, found objects and - occasionally - human beings: "I will sometimes wait a couple of days, or even a couple weeks, before photographing, thinking through what it is I want to create. I will take quite a bit of time setting up my lighting and composing the scene before I'm ready to take the picture." But when she does take the snap, the results are timeless, adorable and perfectly unusual. Visit her blog for more.

Lisa Wood's Curiosities

Lisa Wood is the friend of a friend: my compadré Fernando Aguayo-Garcia who lives and works in San Francisco. While she and I have never met, our shared love of the imaginative diorama unites us. As a child, dioramas were a favourite passtime for me, especially ones that involved my plastic dinosaurs. I had no hesitation bringing some outdoor elements into the scenes either, including a caterpillar or two! When I first saw Lisa's curious dioramas, which create wondrous worlds inhabited by personified (albeit dead) bugs, I knew we were kindred spirits. You can see more of Lisa's work on her Facebook site, or buy her Blurb Book, Insects at Home here, which features some of her best creations.

The Genius of Elsa Mora

She is 40, Cuban, wife and mother of three living in Los Angeles. Her nickname is Elsita and she is a genius, but she is likely far too humble to ever admit to such a thing. I first discovered her work through her shop on Etsy and have been overwhelmed by the beauty of her papercuttings ever since. (Visit her blog to see more inspiring work.) It is not only the precise perfection of her cuts (which must require oceans of patience) that draws you in, it is the imagination and the inspiration behind the work itself that sets it apart: fantastical flights of fancy, surrealistic compositions restrained inside colour palettes that keep the work classic. It is truly magical. This is not merely craft, it is art: "My work is about human nature," she writes in her bio. "It is about the way we are and the way we interact with each other, with ourselves and with the rest of the world." Behold the vision:

Irma Gruenholz

Spanish sculptor and designer Irma Gruenholz has worked as an art director in the daunting world of advertising but finds the adventures of freelance work far more stimulating. She is not a trained artist but there is no denying her capacity for brilliance, which is evident in her work. Incorporating photography, composition, precision in the execution of her models (which are made of plasticine and polymer clay) and the whimsy that can only come from an artistic soul, her miniatures tell stories without issuing a sound: