Blomster

As I mentioned in my last post, when I was in Norway I was blown away by the wild flowers. They were in such abundance, lining every roadside and every path, popping up at the edges of the gardens, covering waste ground and generally making their pretty faces known wherever you went.

One day Anne, Jan and the gang took me to visit an artist called Einar Sigstad. 

He lives in the countryside at the end of a bumpy lane (need I say lined with flowers?) and in this peaceful setting he has his house, his studio and his gallery. How lovely is that!

Einar is a prolific painter well known in Norway and they knew I would like him because as well as his huge portfolio of work he has written and illustrated a book on Norwegian wildflowers and is famous for a painting which translates as 'Alter to the Roadside' where he painted every single wild flower in the county.

I was so impressed by his obvious passion and his attention to detail.

He was a lovely man and we bonded over our love of the flowers. I asked him where I could find the best meadows. 'You mean here?' he said 'I have a meadow. I'll take you'. 

So after he had finished wrapping some paintings for some customers (he was having a busy day) we went to see his flowers and skipped about excitedly at the edge of the meadow exchanging flower names in Norwegian and English.

Daisies. Scabious. Lesser Stitchwort, Harebells. Sorrel. Shepherds Purse. Yellow Rattle. Vetch. Speedwell. Ribwort Plantain. Cow Parsley. Clover. Yarrow. So many grasses. 

Daisies translate as 'Prestekragg'. Priests Collar. I can see why that is but the local name for Cow Parsley is 'dog biscuits'. Wha????

I was sad to leave Einars place and grateful to him for sharing his enthusiasm and allowing me to express mine. He felt like a kindred spirit.

The visit inspired me to draw so I continued my foraging in the lanes near the house. There was even a 'Flower Road'.

Then I sat in the garden in afternoon sun with Anne knitting and the cats lolling, and I drew and drew. Happy was I. 

Thankyou Norway for your flowery inspiration. You have given me much pleasure and a head full of ideas!

Norway

I've just returned from a little trip to Norway staying in a town about an hour and half north of Oslo called Gjovik.

These lovely people Anne & Jan have a holiday home on my street in Hebden Bridge and last time they were here they wanted to buy my fabric to take home and make curtains with, but my fabric was late arriving so they weren't able to. They jokingly suggested I hand delivered it and they would show me around where they live. I decided that I would take them up on their offer!

So I went to stay in their beautiful house with their handsome boy Simba,

 this sweet girl Isobel

and their lovely friends from Trondheim, Inge-Johanna and Svanhild.

Their house overlooks the 100km long Lake Mjosa and we spent long evenings on the veranda taking in the view. This was taken at 12.30 at night. I commented on the beautiful sunset and was soon corrected...it is in fact the sun rising. It just doesn't get dark at this time of year! 

We took a trip on the Skibladner, The White Swan of Mjosa. which is the oldest Norwegian paddle steamer. 

She was quite a character. 

We chugged all the way up the lake to Lillehammer ( i just love that name)

picking up af ew extra folks on the way.

Push!!!

We visited Stenberg, an open air museum and saw lots of traditional old buildings.

Quite a contrast from our day in Oslo walking on the rooftop of the Oslo Opera House.

I haven't yet mentioned my favourite thing about Norway. The wild flowers! They were EVERYWHERE, lining every roadside, ever verge, every garden, every bit of waste land. Profuse, colourful, abundant. I have a whole blog post about them but that is for another day :)

Radiance is for sale!

Big news!  I am looking to sell Radiance, as a business. 

I love my  little shop BUT over the last couple of years, since moving my studio out of the premises and adding wallpapers and fabrics to my collection I have become distracted. It's become one thing too many and too much to manage well...and you all know I'm a bit of a perfectionist so I hate not being able to keep up and be able to really give Radiance the attention that it needs. All I really want to do you see is concentrate on my own work and develop my collection. That is where my passion lies.

Radiance is ten years old this September (I hope you'll come and celebrate with us when the time comes) and it is a thriving little business. It is a big part of the community of independent shops in Hebden Bridge. It has loyal and excited customer base and a strong mailing list. The website is fab and accounts for more than a third of our sales. We post parcels all over the country and often beyond. We have great relationships with our amazing and talented suppliers and it is THE best selling outlet of Hannah Nunn products in the country. We've had loads of great press. Sometimes when people walk out of the doors and think I can't hear them, I catch them saying it is their favourite shop in the world. How nice is that! There actually aren't any more shops in the UK specialising in artisan lighting. Radiance is completely unique.

So I'd be crazy to close it right? 

What if I could find the perfect person to buy it? Someone who could give it their full attention. Someone passionate about design and craft and lighting. Someone who wants to work in a beautiful, glowing environment and sell products that light people up and make them happy :)  And what if I could use the proceeds from the sale to develop my products and grow my Hannah Nunn business, which is what I am so excited to do? Sounds like a plan to me!  (b.t.w I always kept Hannah Nunn and Radiance as two separate businesses). 

It's taken a lot of grappling and soul searching to be here at this point writing this post but I feel absolutely clear that it is the right thing to do so here I am setting the wheels of change in motion. I'm not going to put it on sale with an agent. I'm hoping that between us we might be able to reach that perfect person. Please note, it's just the business that is for sale, not the building itself.

Do you know anyone who is looking for a new and exciting venture? Would you spread the word? I've been poised, waiting to set this whisper free onto the grapevine.

If you do know anyone, or even anyone who might know someone (!) please forward this email or ask them to email me at hannah@hannahnunn.co.uk and we can discuss it further. 

Or perhaps that someone is you!?

Whoever it might be, I'm looking forward to stepping aside on and seeing it flourish. 

Thanks so much for reading and I hope you will share my excitement.

Hannah x

Meadowland

I have been reading the loveliest book called Meadowland by John Lewis-Stempel. Anyone who knows me and my work knows how excited I get about all the wonderful flora and fauna in the fields so they will share my joy in finding such a book.

John Lewis-Stempel has a meadow of his own and he knows it intimately. He knows every grass, every flower and every birdsong. He knows which creatures are nesting where, from families of tiny voles to the foxes and the badgers. He knows which moth caterpillars he will find munching on a moonlit night, he knows how many species of beetle he might find wallowing under a cowpat!

The book takes us through the year of his meadow from bleak January snows, to the absolute bursting beauty of high summer and then back to winter again. I am so glad I read it in June when our meadows are in their full glory because I realised it is so fleeting. Soon it would be time for them to be mown and I needed to get out and enjoy them while I could.

So I have been out up on the hills with my camera, enjoying the long evening shadows, getting down at floor level and enjoying all the shapes and textures.

I won't ever know the fields as well as the author (well maybe if I plonk my house in the middle...I can dream) but I was very pleased with myself when I knew exactly where to find the patch of  my absolute favourite grass that inspired my latest wallpaper design. 

It is so exquisite and delicate.

I have a lovely friend called Belinda Norrington who is a jeweller with a business called Wild Acre. We have followed each others work and our mutual meadow love for a number of years but have never met. Yesterday she came to stay with me on a fleeting visit to Hebden Bridge.

The day before she arrived she emailed to ask if I had read a book called Meadowland and if I hadn't she was going to bring it for me! How funny. I had been thinking I needed to buy a copy for her before she arrived! The mutual meadow love continues.

So last night we took a meandering walk in the fields over looking Hebden Bridge. 

We had SO much to talk about. Life, inspiration, business, yoga, our growing children, dreams, plans and how to capture the delicate beauty in the meadows in our work.

I've always hoped that one day we would get together and have a meadow walk. Such joy to have it actually happen on a beautiful summer evening.

Reading Meadowland has made the fields even richer. Now they are full of stories, folklore, new smells, new sounds, new names for things. And I have had many blissfully happy evenings, content in perfect present moment awareness, soaking it up, not wanting to be anywhere else.

As John Lewis-Stempel writes 'Eternity would not be enough to contain all the summer eves one could enjoy if it were like this'. So true.

Earlier on Belinda text me from her train home saying she just heard it was the inaugural 'National Meadows Day' so I thought that tonight would be the perfect night to pull together this blog post and share some photos.

Happy Meadow Day x