No, these aren’t the latest celebrity baby names.
I love melamine and enamel. Let’s begin with melamine. Now, I get pretty excited by the old school dinner crockery or the cups and saucers sometimes used at fairs and fetes, but what really floats my boat is the contemporary colourful stuff. Even better, it seems to be more and more widely available as a material of choice these days. Paperchase or Cath Kidston are great places to find pretty bits and pieces and, in the summer months, a lot of other high street shops sell it in the form of picnicware. I think you’ve got to love its unbreakable, practical beauty and the fact that it’s so versatile. I’m totally in love with these babies right now and need to find an excuse to buy them.
Moving on to enamel which I like just as much, but find less easy to come by. The really nice enamelware tends to be the vintagey stuff like the cute blue teapot that I bought from an antique fair years ago. Having said that, I did pick up some lovely bowls from the aforementioned Cath Kidston recently. I also love those utilitarian type enamel mugs and pie dishes (my mum has several of these which date back to my childhood and are still going strong!). Currently on my ‘to buy’ list are these gorgeous Orla Kiely planters - the combo of enamel and Orla Kiely is a sureifre winner in my book. I think I like enamel for the same reasons as I like melamine – it’s sort of got a tough but pretty quality about it.
Are you a sucker for a certain material? What is it?
