The thing about going on holiday is that when you return home you tend to look at your house with fresh eyes. Sometimes you look and think “I love my little house”, sometimes you just think it needs a bit of a spruce up. I often return home with a head filled with visions of shimmering blue oceans, hot sands and inspired by the culture I’ve spent the last few weeks visiting.
In my case, though you may not feel it exotic, we’ve just had a glorious fortnight in Cornwall. The sun shone and we spent our days pottering around fishing villages, relaxing on the beach and eating al fresco. When I got home I wanted to recreate a little bit of the coastal vibe in my suburban home and bring a bit of the seaside sunshine back with me.
On my return home I checked out Culture Vulture Direct, a lovely little online shop full to the brim of beautiful things for your home and garden, inspired by and sourced from all over the world, including New England, Scandinavia, India, Greece and Morocco, amongst many others.
Having returned from Cornwall, I wanted to fill my house full of the beautiful blues of the sea, they don’t have a Cornish section, but they have the next best thing, Greece. I was immediately drawn to the beautiful hydra jug, a gorgeous chunky water jug, with an interesting and practical design, perfectly blue and only £24.99, it really jumped out at me. It’s now in regular use at mealtimes, it’s possibly my favourite thing on my dining table!
The unofficial symbol of Cornwall these days seems to be the mackerel, it’s everywhere. We already have some fishy themed things in our kitchen to remind us of our Cornish adventures, so we decided to add to our existing collection. I chose a useful fish trivet (£14.99) which will be great for everyday use, as well as for when I need to plonk a hot casserole dish on the table, as well as a shoal of (fridge) magnets (£12.99). The magnets are hand carved and painted in shades of blue, they look lovely on our fridge and they really fit in with our fishy theme.
Lastly I bought these beautiful shantou bowls (£22.99) from China, they come in sets of five and have been hand painted. I loved them on sight. We eat a lot of Thai and Chinese food so these will be used for our takeaway and fakeaway nights.
Wherever you’ve been on your travels, or if you’ve been inspired elsewhere, then Culture Vulture Direct is a lovely, easy to use website with reasonably priced products for your home and garden. They also sell clothes, jewellery and accessories. I enjoyed shopping with them and I’ll be dipping in and out throughout the year, buying treats for me and presents for others.
Written in collaboration with Culture Vulture Direct.