Whoa! Wait!! It’s THURSDAY already?! Did anyone else just blink and find the week almost gone??? I was meaning to post this on Monday (well, longer than that actually) because this is something kind of BIG!

A few months ago, we received a request for a bunch of stencils from our Moroccan stencil collection from Better Homes and Gardens for a possible feature in their July issue. They had actually chosen stencils to use from another company already (not sure which one), but when they saw ours they decided to make a switcheroo. They “hinted” at  a possible cover shot, but couldn’t say for sure, and we waiting patiently with fingers drumming….

You can imagine how THRILLED we were to see our Small Chez Ali stencil used on multiple pillows on the cover, as well as some great interior shots! You can imagine that we are cutting a LOT of Endless Circle Lattice stencils these days with this beautiful blue wall stencil application to showcase it!

There is even more great stenciling shown on another page where they used our Moroccan Inlay stencil on even more stenciled pillows, and the darling Chicken Stitch stencil on some curtains. As you would expect from Better Homes and Gardens, they did a fabulous jot with the styling and photography, and we are so appreciative to see our stencils put to such gorgeous use!

More stencil excitement! Just yesterday, a friend turned my on to this “Decorating Rules You Can Break” feature on the Better Homes and Gardens website that shows our Japanese Kyoto stencil cleverly used as a feature panel between two curtains on a wall. How cool is this! A lot of times you don’t necessarily want to stencil an allover pattern “allover” and the coordinating curtains provide a nice frame. I could totally see this idea working on a bed wall, with the stencil pattern acting as a “headboard” that is softly framed by the fabric!

But wait! There’s even MORE to this stencil tale!! One of the bloggers featured in the July Better Homes and Gardens article is the talented designer, Lauren Liess of PureStyleHome. While I was enjoying perusing her delightful blog yesterday, I stumbled upon a great stencil project that she did for her nursery.

This clever canopy is actually a canvas dropcloth that she stenciled with our Small Indian Paisley stencil motif in a repeat pattern to create a damask effect. Notice how she repeated the same motif on the front drop of the canopy to create a stenciled border. Simply. Brilliant!

Lauren has some other smashing stenciling in her home, via a classic Ralph Lauren stencil pattern.

Isn’t this a great look?? I love the color and, even more, the fact that her sweet husband actually did the stenciling for her. Good man!!

Well, that’ s my big stencil news for this week. Pretty exciting, huh??

You know that saying, “everything old is new again”? Unfortunately, that doesn’t seem to apply to the aging human body, but it sure seems to apply to the popularity of stenciled pattern through the ages. After falling out of favor in the early part of the 2oth century, stencils enjoyed  a major resurgence following the Bicentennial celebration of America in 1976.  I became heavily involved obsessed with stencils in the 80′s as I spoke about in this recent post, and watched stencils as an elegant wall decorating choice grow exponentially through the 90′s and early 2000′s.  As fashion trends come and go, so too do decorating trends, and wall stenciling gave up ground to other types of surface treatment options such as Venetian Plaster, gilding, and various other mediums, and eventually gave way altogether to that awful trend of JUST plain, unadorned paint.  Phew! Glad THAT seems to have passed quickly!

Well…..stencils seem to be BACK in a very BIG way these day (happy dance!) as a whole new generation of young designers and home decorators are discovering stenciling anew! Case in point: this lovely post recently on our Royal Design Studio stencils by Brittany at A Daily Dose of Harri Ette. (I am reposting her photo montage above) Brittany is not alone! I see bloggers worldwide now ”discovering” stencils as an outlet for creativity and personal design expression in their own homes. Another example is Angel Li’s post on 77+Love. So, if you hang around long enough you can be be “trendy” all over again!

Angela Perrone of Divine Rooms has a wonderful blog post today on how she used our Royal Design stencil Corsini Damask to “rescue” a tired Venetian Plaster finish with softly blended metallic pattern.

Under normal circumstances, you can’t rely on wall stencils to “save” a bad finish, but this venetian plaster treatment just needed a little more pleasing color and some pattern action, and Angela’s “fix” worked beautifully! You will enjoy following Angela’s blog as well; she is a lovely soul with a heartfelt “voice”. It was a great pleasure to have Angela along on my last painting trip to Marrakech and I’m looking forward to her company again on my June painting adventure to Barcelona! There are still 2 spots open for this trip if you’d like to join us!!

PS You can find the Corsini Damask Stencil here.

I am super excited that the upcoming Design Bloggers Conference will be held in Los Angeles (Feb28-March1)! It’s a quick drive up the coast from San Diego, which makes it affordable and POSSIBLE for me to go. I’m really looking forward to hearing and learning from the design blogging pros, networking, and socializing with some blogging friends!

They offered registered attendess a chance to guest post on their blog, and so I sent off a little bit about little old  me, and WOW  there I am!! Anyone else going??!

Have you heard of Papaya? 

If you haven’t, you’ve surely seen their colorful array of products including cards, giclee prints, journals, totes, etc. Their style, which layers whimsical imagery, global cultural influences, decorative pattern, and inspiring typography is QUITE recognizable and memorable. Creative abandon, indeed!

You might note that I feel a strong creative kinship with the ladies of this company if you notice HOW PERFECT this imagery looks on THIS blog, LOL!

So, you can imagine my delight that they chose to use Royal Design Studio stencils from my Moroccan stencil collection in their current trade show booth.

I love how the graphic black and white pattern “grounds” the space, provides continuity, and provides the perfect compliment to their colorful product mix!

Note the shift from black on white to white on black to help distinguish the different product lines. Brilliant!

You can keep track of the goings on of this talented team of ladies, led by Anahata Katkin, at the Papaya Blog. The yare currently in the process of designing and decorating their new flagship shop in Ashland, Oregon  (a Lux Boho Boutique), where another one of the Moroccan stencil patterns will be used on a 23′ high ceiling. I’m DYING to see that and only wish that Ashland was closer to San Diego.

P.S. Coincindently, I just saw some Papaya art feature on my friend Angela’s new blog. Check out THIS lovely and inspiring post!

I am in the process of planning yet another (my fourth!) Moroccan painting adventure to Peacock Pavilions in late October, 2011, so thought to revisit the results of our last trip where we focused on a VERY fun fabric stenciling project: turning an ordinary canvas tent into a special space for dining, dreaming, and entertaining.

The inspiration for the series of Moroccan stencils based on class Fez-style embroidery that I developed for this project came from this lovely book. The graphic patterns seemed to just beg to be translated into stencils! So, I created a whole series of designs that could be mixed and matched and layers in different ways, depending on the needs of the project. We didn’t get a chance to see the tent “all dressed up” while we were there, but could imagine all the possibilities that can arise from a basic black and white color color palette. You can see how Maryam has been able to style and decorate the tent in multiple, beautiful ways and various color schemes.

Such as the beautiful Moroccan blue colors this post….

…my favorite pink accent color in this post…

 …and your basic, elegant black in this post . So chis! Note the stenciled paper placemats! What a fun idea!!

All stencils are from our Moroccan stencil collection at Royal Design Studio.

Stay tuned for my next post, where I will show you this same series of stencil patterns used to create an amazing backdrop for a most deliciously colorful product display….

 We’ve been getting lots of  lovely links and mentions. It’s just SO cool and SO appreciated! I am a little late in getting this posted, as usual, but what the hey!!

Two weeks ago Regina at Fauxology ran a wonderful weeklong series on Groin Ceiling Decoration. She was so sweet to devote one whole day to how Modello Designs decorative masking stencils have been used in amazing groin projects, and I was happy to share the talents of our customers!

Emily at Good with Style did a post on Moroccan stencils and organic poofs and created this lovely montage of the stencil project that we did for a dining tent in Marrakech last May.

Savvy Housekeeping shared how inexpensive it can be to get the look of Moroccan tile in a bathroom with stencils from our Moroccan Collection.

Soul Pretty has Morocco on her mind as well, and just purchased one of our stencils to decorate the wall behind her bed. Looking forward to seeing that! Meanwhile, she has a delightful Etsy shop as well!

Danielle at Style Files is “loving” the idea of stenciling stair risers with Moroccan patterns, as we did on another Marrakech painting adventure to Peacock Pavilions. Lots of people seem to be loving this lately. I think we started something!!

Darling Kelly at Back to Domestics mused that stencils are SO more creative and economical than wallpaper. I couldn’t agree more!

And, it’s a Fauxology bookend! One of our very bestest customer couples at Modello Designs, Anna and Scott Sadler, were featured last week on Fauxology along with some great shots of amazing interior projects that they had done with……you guessed it! Modello patterns! Thanks to all for the mentions AND the backlinks!!

When someone shines a nice, bright light on your business in a blog post, such as Petra Voegtle did for me here, it is good form to return the favor. Now, this is neither a chore or a difficult obligation considering the scope and artistic skills represented in her beautiful work.

Petra began her artistic journey with wood carving, which led to explorations in painting and art photography. Her current medium of focus in painting on fabric, mostly silk, and going back to her “roots” her recent work features highly textural treatments with the fabric which she calls “silk carving”.

She is particularly inspired by the overwhelming ornament found in temples and other places of workshiop in Southeast Asia.

You can find the portal to Petra’s work through here main art website, Vyala Arts.

I especially love this portion of her artist’s statement.

Our whole life is surrounded by magic and this is what I want to make the viewer see. Ancient cultures inherit magic. Sometimes we fail to interpret ancient pictograms and images but we feel a certain affinity and similarity in modern symbols. This is pure emotion that speaks to our secret wishes and hopes. There is magic in all living creatures but seldom enough we care to see it. And there is magic in each and every landscape on this planet – sometimes quite obvious and sometimes only after a second look.

The two paintings above feature imagery created with stencils and wood block printing. Besides her art website, Petra has multiple blogs including Art and Interior and a fabulous photography and color blog,  but I think that the best way to view her original and beautiful artworks (the silk painting are to die for!) is on her Etsy site.