The laziness of the indolent

OK, so its been a while since we updated here.

Thats a result of a number of things - some would say all excuses, I claim reasonable causes.

First was winter.  That means snow, which means snowboarding.  For us that also means Otaihape Alpine Club  at Whakapapa, Mount Ruapehu.  If you are looking for a great simple family oriented club with no pretensions, this is it.  Membership and subs are reasonably priced, and yes, you can ski in, ski out.

Winter also means rain in Auckland. As you know we mostly work outside, so rain means no working.

And we got a bit lazy.  The truth will out.

we are all clever barstards...

ok, so the site title is a little irreverent, but the content - oh wow, the content!

cleverbastards.co.nz features some just great stuff from independent New Zealand artists and craftspeople.

Everything from $11 tea towels to a transportable bach, the quirky and iconoclastic sit next to useful and iconic on this great site.

Go have a look - you'll love it!

...and rattan for dessert!

Parker. We think. This four-seater sofa-bed and single chair are at the least Parker-esque low lean and ludicrously good-looking!



Cool eh? Hard to add anything that will make this more appealing, so we will leave you to looking - get in touch if you want it though!

Kiwi a la carte...

So, in line with the post below, here's a true Kiwi suite from the late 1950's early 1960's.




As you can see, this three plus one plus one is pretty darn cool. The chairs are a mum and dad pair - one is high-back, the other mid-back. In our imagination, it would be refinished in kiwiana style - fern motif or the like - perhaps something with jandals :-)

The timberwork is all in great original condition including the legs with their metal ferrules and swivel feet. Notice the semi-oval sort of line on the arm-rests? Doesn't it just remind you of watching Apollo moon rockets on a 19 inch black and white TV????

Again, this is suited to a medium to small size lounge space. I'd love to see it in an Omaha Beach or Waiheke sort of "statement" location where it could ground the designer pretensions and excess with some basic retro style.

scandinavian a la carte

We are going to be trying something a little different for us over he next few months.

Up until now we have bought stuff, refinished it to our own tastes and then tried to sell it.

The new plan is to sell pieces in their raw state and provide options for finishing to suit the buyer.

We have no idea how its going to work out!  We started this last week and had one item sell (a Don sofabed) and one client who has some work under consideration.

The advantage to the buyer is they get to choose fabrics and finishes to suit their aesthetic.  The disadvantage to them is its a bit of a leap of faith - they are trusting that we can do what they want.

The advantage to us is that we have pre-sold the piece.  The disadvantage is we are committing to the buyer's timelines!

Its all going to be interesting...

Meanwhile, heres some stuff that is on offer. The first is a NZ four-seater sofa.

WARNING! "Clicking" on the images takes you to the relevant source files which are large-ish.  Feel free to do so, but if you just want to re-run the slideshow, click the little icon at the bottom right of the image, then click the play icon that presents after that in the bottom right of the message panel.



As you can see, it is presently "fairly ruff" but it will come up nicely. The timber is relatively blonde and has only light grain figuring in it. At just over 2.05m wide, it fills a lot of space but is quite light on its feet.

The arms have an interesting angular flare to the rear and overhang quite significantly at the front. The seat has the typical radial spring system and the back is sets of horizontal springs. Oh - its a low-back version too so its got a great looooong loooow profile.

We have a stubby Morgan high-back two-seater that came to us from Hamiltron along with one of the Larsen tables we told you about earlier.



This is real "old lady" stuff at the moment - a brown velour fabric just screams out for doilies on side-tables and antimacassar cloths on the backrests! But the bones are good.

The size would suit an apartment or even a larger bedroom. We also have three low-back chairs in hte same Morgan style that could each be matched to this piece.

More soon!

Got a Parker suite!

It was just an atypical situation for us.

A listing on Trade Me for an original Parker teak lounge suite, start bid mumble mumble dollars - not high, not low.  So we laughingly slapped on the opening bid thinking "Fer sure it will end up double that..."  Six days later, we own it!

The seller was an architect with a great home - not flash, just clean simple style - in the heights of Taupo.  Recently widowed, he is moving out of Taupo and "cleansing" himself of various possessions.

We drove down on a blue-sky autumn day to collect it and thoroughly enjoyed the trip.  Breakfast in Tirau, then on to Taupo and met with the seller.

He tells us that he has owned the suite for almost 50 years so that makes it an early 1960's piece.  The cushions have been recovered on the chairs, but the material on the sofa was original in a dusty pink for both.  The frame has marks of its history including the typical Parker backrest breakout which had been sort-of repaired.  The rattan backrests are in excellent condition though, and the rubber suspension system has been replaced with a modern webbing alternative retaining the original fixing system.

Probable finished look is similar to this.  Lots to get through first though!

We would love to hold onto this for ourselves.  We recently sold Peggy (a Parker sofa in the same style) and kind of regret doing that.  If it wasn't for our riotous daughter Alice, we would definitely hang on to this elegant, curvey, delicate suite.  However, practicality will likely dictate that this suite moves on to a more suitable home.

Ebonising and advertising

ok - been a busy week!

Jos comes from a marketing and advertising background and her sis-in-law sells media for a crust.  She is to blame for targeting you with stuff you don't need but feel you have to have when you see it during your favorite hour of TV.  The reason you feel that urge is that SIL is VERY good at what she does...

Anyway SIL is moving office, and they are going with the retro 60s-70s theme.  Ta-daaaaaaaaah!  Lounge Lizards to the rescue.

SIL breezed in on Friday 10 days ago, pointed at various bits cluttering up the house, made wild exclamations of delight as we draped fabrics over furniture, approved a budget, drank wine and left.

She chose a Frank Lowen / Morgan sofa with sled legs, a pair of Don low back chairs with the spear shape uprights on the rear legs and a pair of wire frame arm chairs.  Catch?  She wants them ebonised - thats the black finish that still allows the grain to show through.

Irony alert - check out what we had to do to go the other way (black to brown) on the black sheep suite...

Mild panic.  Spent that weekend trying various approaches that didn't look like cheap acrylic paint drooled onto timber, or a nasty accident with mascara.  Got it right after a while with the help of test panels donated by a dead-on-arrival wall unit.

Got the approval from SIL on the look and shade, then looked around for a piece to test it on.  Up jumped this orphan.  We got him recently and we are a little baffled as to what his pedigree is.  But for this purpose, it doesn't matter.

He is a sapele mahogany frame with a rock/recline mechanism that uses a NZ native timber subframe.

Cool - everything we needed, and three days later, the change of colour was complete.  What do you reckon?  He's up for sale now so check for him on Trade Me.