Velskoen are Namibian desert boots sewn from two pieces of kudu hide. Usually shortened to vellies, the boots were worn for centuries by the Khoikhoi tribe of the south-western desert of Africa. British colonists looked to the tribes for their local knowledge for surviving harsh desert conditions – desert boots were one of their many… Read more »
Charlotte Linton is a London-based illustrator and textile designer. She creates beautiful wool delaine scarves printed with her illustrated representations of whimsical far-off lands, including Greenland, Java, Tibet and Madagascar. Each collection of scarves is based on the adventures of her alter-ego Ermantrude, an early 20th century zoologist. This season she travelled to Greenland, where “under… Read more »
After admiring all of the hand painted signs of India we recently discovered a site that is working to preserve the art of Indian street painters. Many sign writers and street painters are rapidly going out of business with the development of desktop prints. Hand Painted Type works to collect the original font sets of… Read more »
Here are some photos from our trip to India taken on 35mm, medium format and Polaroid film by Eleanor Ackland.
While the craft of traditional sign writing has virtually disappeared in the western world, it is nice to see the practice very much alive in India–even if it doesn’t always make sense.
Six years ago Capucine left her home in Paris to work for an NGO in India. After she finished her work she went to Jaisalmer–a desert city enclosed by a sandstone fort in western Rajasthan. There she met Pabu, a camel guide from the Bilu people of the Thar Desert. When they met she had… Read more »
There are some cultural differences to be expected when traveling in India: waste disposal and working sewers are not a priority, cows are an integral part of street traffic, it takes more than one person to book a train ticket and motorcycles are an adequate mode of transport for the whole family (at one time)…. Read more »
Our first stop in India: the Pushkar Camel Fair. Pushkar is a holy town by Lake Pichola, in the northern state of Rajasthan. Thousands travel to the fair to buy, sell and trade camels, horses and cattle in tents lining the desert dunes behind the town. The animals are decorated to look their best with… Read more »