Art & Home Accessories

Our friend Clark and his family have turned what used to be a hobby into a full-time business. In their Longmont studio, they make delightful cast beeswax candles that come in a variety of shapes and sizes, including several designs that are cast in on traditional European holiday season candle molds.

Amber Lights candles are highly decorative, wonderfully detailed, naturally endowed with a heavenly honey scent, and burn clean and smokeless.  

Amy Mundinger of Pine Tree Studios is truly a gifted craftswoman, with a keen eye for color and design, and well-honed skills in fiber arts from crochet to embroidery on upcycled felt, and free-motion quilting with hand-dyed 100% cotton fabrics. Amy is an active and prominent member of the Handweavers Guild of Boulder, which has been forced to cancel its fabulous holiday show ans sale this year.

This year, in addition to wonderful felt ornaments, flowers and needlebooks, and collaged and stitched cards, she has designed and sewn some very comfortable, effective and attractive face masks for us.

Blue Peacock’s vibrant indigo table linens, towels, bags and accessories are entirely handmade by our new friend, Susanne Kianicka, in her small artisan workshop in Boulder, CO, using a centuries-old fabric design technique called INDIGO BLUEPRINT to create timeless one-of-a-kind pieces of cloth. Carefully prepared white linen, cotton or silk fabric is hand-printed with a dye resist, using her own handmade printing blocks or silk screens, then dipped repeatedly in an organic indigo plant dye bath. After washing, the resist printed areas appear as crisp white patterns contrasting perfectly against rich indigo blue background. Finally, the fabric is cut and sewn into the final shapes.

Susanne’s work is influenced by the richness of European folk art and crafts. Growing up in Switzerland, her family’s Slovak heritage stimulated her study of the Central European technique of indigo dyeing and the region’s textile designs. Knowing that Indigo Blueprint has become very rare motivates Susanne to try to keep alive this crafting tradition, drawing on her training as Cultural Anthropologist and her diverse handwork skills.

Susanne uses only high-quality natural fabrics and organic plant dye. Her “Global Boho” style celebrates cultural heritage while blending ethnic patterns with modern trends to create fresh designs. Inspired by principles of the Slow Fiber movement, she makes each piece with great care and consideration.

Blue Peacock’s meticulously crafted fine indigo textiles creations are thus labors of love and exceptional quality! We will have her bandanas, shoulder bags, microwaveable personal warming pillows filled with cherry its, bracelets nd face masks, and we hope, some table linens.

Our customer and friend Diane Patterson makes these wonderful ornaments, called Temari, which date back to ancient Japan, where Temari was originally a handcraft of upper class women. Intricate designs were embroidered on handmade balls using silk threads from kimonos. The balls were used as toys.

Temari are unique, beautiful, colorful gifts. Attractive hanging as a single ornament, grouped in a bowl, used in a centerpiece, given as a housewarming gift, or simply to hold and admire, they will be treasured for many years.

Nationally known fiber artist, Annette Kennedy from Longmont, has been creating her award-winning quilt art since 2003, with her award-winning pieces in the National Quilt Museum and in private collections around the country.

These artful magnets, trivets, and coasters are images of her art quilts that will bring the spark of inspiration wherever they are placed. They are durable and easy to wipe clean when needed.  Nature is Annette’s focus, with flowers, plants and landscapes being the central theme in her work.

Erin Huybrechts Davis says she has been a painter for as long as she can remember. She grew up on the east coast, has her degree in painting and printmaking, and a masters degree in education. She now lives here in Longmont, CO, where she is a freelance illustrator and teaches art to young people.

We were struck by her flowing, stylized and poetic depictions of the natural world. She is inspired by patterns and imagery from Asia, where she has traveled, and this influence is evident in her work as well. We are delighted to offer Erin’s cards, prints, and original paintings again this year!

Years ago, Julie and Eve were classmates at the Boulder Potters Guild. Her passion for clay subsequently led her to create her own home studio in Longmont, where she applies her hand-building skills and sense of whimsy to making delightful decorative and functional pieces.

Now a Guild member and a teacher there, Julie says “I am drawn to texture and find my roots coming through in my work. I am inspired by nature and by the patterns of repetition: the simplicity of a house, the design formed by bicycle gears, the delicate texture in a leaf, the rolling rocks in a rambling stone wall, and the ridges on a sea turtle’s shell.”

Shari Moraga is practically our neighbor in Boulder. She calls her work ‘illustrations in thread’ and uses her sewing machine to ‘draw’ and ‘paint’ her light-hearted illustrations of vegetables, honeybees and hives, bicycles and more, on sturdy cotton tea towels, aprons for gardeners and cooks, and zipper bags.

Lois Edgar is a longtime member of the Boulder Potters Guild. She has been exploring techniques with clay for many years and has developed a style that is both earthy and charming.

This year we feature her porcelain wares, and salt-fired pieces. We will also have her elegant hand-made embossed greeting cards and holiday tree ornaments.  

Our dear friend Lynn Mattingly is a renowned fiber artist, and has been practicing and teaching quilting for decades.  An exceptional sense of color-combining, a fabulous collection of fabrics and a mastery of design and craftsmanship combine to make Lynn’s work really special. We love seeing her beautiful pot-holders hanging on our stove, and they have held up in our kitchen for a very long time. Sturdy and machine-washable, they are not only gorgeous but also practical.

This year we offer her Baby Quilts, Quilted Pot-holders and Table-Runners, and Peace Garlands. Lynn lives just over the hills in Paonia, CO.

We met Nicole at an art festival last summer, where her work stood out as gems of elegant, practical, original design and superb crafting. Working on the wheel, she often alters her pieces by removing areas of clay to create forms with movement and flowing lines. Her shapes and surface decoration are contemporary and playful, and most of her current work is fired in the soda kiln that Nicole recently built herself. The current pandemic has complicated Nicole’s ability to conduct soda firings, so she is producing her delightful high-fire pieces in a conventional kiln.

Nicole lives and works in the lovely mountain town of La Veta, CO, where she also founded a gallery, and has taught art since 2006 at CO State University in Pueblo. For three years Nicole traveled with a team of ceramic artists to Port-au-Prince, Haiti to teach pottery-making skills to employees of an art-based, socially conscious business called Papillion Enterpises.  Her high-fired porcelain bowls, mugs, olive oil dispensers, herb-strippers, etc. are durable, dishwasher and microwave safe and a delight see and to use!

For decades, our friend Tom Theobald of Niwot Honey Farm has been nurturing bees, harvesting honey, and crafting the finest, most elegant, romantic, hand-dipped taper candles you’ll find anywhere. They are naturally dripless and smokeless, and infuse the room with the gentle, warm fragrance of honey. They go perfectly with our Traditional Majolica candle holders. Available in pairs, either clear-wrapped or gift boxed.

Our friend Fred Hall is a dedicated ‘rock hound’, with a special passion for meteorites and petrified wood. His expeditions in Utah have yielded some wonderful specimens from the Jurassic era, including segments in which the exterior bark texture has been preserved, and the interiors have been replaced with vividly multicolored agate. Fred has polished the top surfaces of many of the specimens to reveal the beauty of the agate.

Each piece comes with an identification tag and a text explaining the process by which petrified wood was formed. Sizes will probably range from 1” to 5” in height, varying widths. This year Fred also offers sparkling crystalline mineral specimens! 

Artisan Renée McDougall of Longmont became interested in crafting with glass while working at the Stained Glass Supply Company.  She works mostly in fused glass, a process that can take up to 11 hours from start to finish. Renée uses her home studio for crafting many different glass pieces, from jewelry to bowls and hanging art.

We think her cast glass hanging Green Man faces will make a lovely addition to any gardener’s window or porch!

We are fortunate that Theresa Haberkorn, woodcut printmaker, has made Boulder her home for more than two decades.  Her masterful woodcut prints are found in exhibits and collections nation-wide, and she teaches her artform as well.  Theresa brings her art to household items as well, hand-crafting a collection of beautiful block-printed cotton tea towels, a charming wall calendar, hand-bound journals, and an assortment of cards.

To find out more about the process of woodcut printing, visit Theresa Haberkorn Artist | Printmaker | Designer.

Our friends Thea Tenenbaum and Raffaele Malferrari have for many years been well known around Boulder and beyond for their charming tradition-based Italian majolica pottery. Since Thea’s sad passing, Raffaele and their daughter Gelsie have been working together in the studio to continue the family’s tradition.

Majolica is a process requiring multiple firings and great skill with the paintbrush. Their exquisitely detailed mugs depicting local animals, birds and insects, and tradition-inspired abstract designs will be treasured by anyone lucky enough to receive them!

We’d been looking for some finely handcrafted small wood products for the home, at affordable prices, and finally found Wooden Images. Located in Missoula MT, the workshop was founded in 1980 in John Bakula’s garage. In 1981 his brother Mark joined him, and they’ve been designing and creating intricately patterned items that are original, functional and beautiful since then.

“We pride ourselves on meticulous craftsmanship and attention to detail and feel it shows in the beauty and durability of each piece we make. There are no computers doing any of the work, just two guys, with imagination and decades of experience, and some power tools.”

The pieces we will feature this year include some great gift items – magnetic knife-racks, business card holders (pictured above), and bookmarks. 

Zink Metal Art is the collaborative effort of Charlotte and Ben Zink, who have made their whimsical and flowing designs of metal for home and garden for the past 15 years in Berthoud, CO.

Their steel garden sculptures are graceful, original, very easy to install, and affordable, and similar designs are available as smaller garden ornaments, indoor wall-pieces and as pendants on necklaces. Charlotte also makes wonderful cards with similar free-flowing designs. All make great gifts!