Kate McLelland

Kate McLelland is an illustrator and graphic designer based in Edinburgh. She recently came runner-up in the London Transport's Skyline competition with this design.

Kate loves nature, myths and legends. Her Rabbit and Reindeer has just been selected as one of four winners in the V&A/ London Design Festival Christmas card competition and will be on sale at the V&A shop during the Festival and onwards.


Animal Farm is my favourite. You can buy it from her Society6 shop, along with all her other prints, T-shirts and skins.

à bientôt !

Calling all Culture Vultures

Bob and Roberta Smith Blocks - Tate

If you've been following you'll know that my kids love art. We have a wonderful museum in Montpellier which runs art courses for adults and children all year round, including school holidays. Dylan and Savannah went on the Emil Nolde course at Easter culminating in a huge chalk fresque, mostly drawn by Dylan in the heart of the city. I love to see my children at ease in art galleries and museums. Savannah's very receptive to this environment in particular.

If you're looking for new ideas for gifts and are short of inspiration, why not shop in online museum and gallery stores? I always find unusual birthday and Christmas presents at the Tate, the V&A, the Design Museum and MoMA, but there are so many other great addresses across the globe. I intended to show you a few of my favourite objects from museums and galleries in Great Britain, before searching in other places across Europe and elsewhere. However, I've been pipped to the post - a group of four men in the UK have also seen the potential in this museum market and recently created an online culture lover's dream called CultureLabel. This has to be one of my best finds in 2009.

The new CultureLabel website aims to bring together over 20,000 culture-related products curated from museums, galleries and cultural institutions in Great Britain. These four cultural entrepreneurs plan to trawl the rest of the world in the future. What can I say? A culture shoppers dream, thousands of amazing, original, artist-designed products and a chance to visit - at least virtually- hitherto unknown places such as Baltic, the Royal Armouries (fantastic place) and the Lighthouse all via one platform. I love it!!!
Spread the word, but before you take a peek, please be warned, time flies when you're on this site, there's so much to discover!

Iggy Peck, Architect, - IKON

What's inside - by Hazell Nicholls - Keep Calm Gallery

Build a Taxi Kit - Museum of London


London in a Bag - Museum of London

Wake Me-Up Tube Stickers - Museum of London

Clifford Richards Fairy Wings - the V&A


Milko C Backpack - The Lighthouse
History Timeline Lunchbox - English Heritage

My Sweet Dog -Baltic

Samourai Magnetic Armor set - Royal Armouries


Making Stuff for Kids - The Lighthouse

The World Beach Project

Be creative! Whoever you are or wherever you are, why not take your family down to the beach today and do some artwork? The World Beach Project, devised by artist Sue Lawty in association with the V&A, is a global art project open to anybody, anywhere, of any age and builds on the experience many of us have had on holiday of making patterns on beaches and shorelines.

Porth Nanven near St Just by Neil

All you have to do is take a camera, find a beach, choose some stones and make a pattern. You are only allowed to use stones, the aim being to work with different colours, sizes and textures.


Owen Beach by Kim Reidelbach

To take part in the project you will need to take three photos:
1) The Whole Beach (showing where you made the pattern, the weather, the environment)
2) The Process (showing how you searched for stones, sorted them and set them in place, etc.)
3) The Artwork (before it's washed away).


East Wittering by Oliver Hopkins

Southwold by Kally Davidson

What a simply brilliant way to get people interested in the environment, spend some time in the fresh air and be creative. Once you've submitted your photos, I'm sure your kids will love seeing their contribution on the interactive global map too.