It’s the season for florals in the fashion and interiors worlds.  Eye-catching florals are popping up all over trendy pieces like peplum dresses, feature walls, soft furnishings and iconic furniture.

Here at Brabantia we’ve released a floral Cherry Blossom ironing board and I’ve BIN Romantic limited edition bin by Dutch stylist Gerda Elzenaar.

Gerda said: “My work is characterized by fresh, bright colours and lots of my inspiration comes from nature, especially flowers.

“When designing the new retro bin I continued with the floral theme and style of my Brabantia ironing board cover and wanted the bin design to have a romantic and playful feel with fresh colours. I wanted to create an atmosphere that would conjure up images and the feeling you get when the door is open in the Summer – fresh, fun with flowers, creating a romantic feeling, hence the name ‘I’ve BIN Romantic’.”

Let us know what you think, please send us a Tweet @Brabantialife or leave a comment in the box below.

There’s less than a month to go to take part in our competition to find an aspiring designer to create a new design for our 2013 Retro Bin range. So far we’ve received a staggering 534 fantastic entries from all over the world from Belgium to Brazil, China to Chile, and the Netherlands to New Zealand!

The Design Your Bin competition is open to all budding creatives throughout the globe – age, experience and location are no barriers.

Anyone with creative flair can submit a design – it could be a favourite photo, a piece of fine art, urban graffiti street art, or a detailed illustration or textile.  The winning design will go into production in 2013.

There are six categories: Modern art, Street art, Photography, Illustration, Textiles and handmade and Montage. Any medium will be accepted as long as it can be uploaded and reproduced digitally.  Designs need to be uploaded via www.designyourbin.com in JPG format by 10 June 2012.

As well as getting to see their design produced and on sale as part of Brabantia’s range next year, the overall winner selected by Brabantia’s international design panel will also receive a bin featuring their design and 1,500 Euros worth of Brabantia products. Here’s some of the entries so far:

Visitors to the Design Your Bin site are invited to vote for their favourite design. The designer with the most votes will win Brabantia products worth 1,000 Euros.

The winners of the six individual categories as selected by Brabantia’s design panel will each receive their choice of either a London or I’ve Bin Romantic Retro Bin.

Are you ready to join the ranks of the Brabantia designers? You can enter as many times as you like, so get creative and good luck!

Find out how to take part here.

Thanks to:
Competition Hunter

The finalists have been announced in the third annual MAD Blog Awards - the best British Mummy and Daddy blogs.

Here at Brabantialife we are sponsoring the Best MAD Food Blog category, celebrating brilliant family cooking, whether it’s baking, menu planning or blogs that get kids cooking for themselves.

As huge fans of home dining and creating an authentic home restaurant experience with fun and delicious food, on a budget whilst still keeping on trend, we love to follow our top foodie bloggers who inspire us with new ways to dine.

More than 50,000 nominations were received in the awards, making the MADs the biggest awards for parent bloggers in the UK, but just 70 finalists will be invited to attend the gala awards ceremony to be held in London in September, hosted by awards sponsors Parentdish. 

Parent bloggers represent a hugely influential online community, and the finalists have a combined audience of more than 500,000 readers a week!

The finalists in the Best MAD Food Blog Category are listed below, why not take a look and let us know what you think, we feel very inspired!

Bangers and Mash
The Crazy Kitchen
Frugal In Cornwall
Maison Cupcake
Relentless Laundry

Have you seen all our product and How To Customer videos on YouTube yet?

• Are you wondering which is our best bin to help you organise your recycling?
• Are you looking for a space saving devise so you can dry your laundry outside?
• Are you unsure how to change your new ironing board cover?
• Are you thinking about updating your gadgets and don’t know which products to select?

We’re delighted to be sponsoring Meet the Blogger and we hope you managed to book a place on our workshops!

Our first workshop (SOLD OUT), is with designer and artist Joran van der Haar winner of the 2010 Iron in Style, who has designed the striking Limited Edition ‘London’ Retro Bin, a must-have for street and urban art fans. He will be joined by our CEO Tijn van Elderen and together they will explore what makes Useful Design Beautiful from a product design perspective.

The next workshop discusses product photography with Yvonne Eijkenduijn from the amazing Yvestown Blog. She will then style and photograph some of our products; and the Brabantia team will be crowd sourcing feedback about ‘What Makes Useful Design Beautiful’.

We’ve got one free ticket to giveaway to this SOLD OUT event! If you’d like a chance to win this free ticket please Tweet @Brabantialife and let us know why you should be selected! Good luck!

Follow us on Twitter and like us on Facebook for live feeds throughout the event and information on trends, designs and competitions.

And, if you are feeling creative why not enter our Design Your Bin competition – open to all budding creatives throughout the globe. Anyone can submit a design – it could be a favourite photo, a piece of fine art, urban graffiti street art, or a detailed illustration or textile. The winning design will go into production in 2013.

Designs need to be uploaded via www.designyourbin.com in JPG format by 10 June 2012. Good luck!

Well known for fusing beautiful design with innovative functionality we’ve now introduced two unusual and elegant new designs to our stylish range of ironing table covers – Cherry Blossom and Gecko.

And, with research showing that the average person in the UK spends almost six years [1] cleaning the house and dealing with household chores, it seems only right to bring a touch of glamour to the ironing!

Hitting the production lines is Dutch stylist’s Gerda Elzenaar’s striking yet feminine ‘Cherry Blossom’ design. Crowned the international winner of our 2011 Iron in Style competition for her floral design, Gerda said: “The delightful scent of clean linen inspired me to a fresh painting with spring blossoms. Iron your laundry springtime fresh!”

The second new design ‘Gecko’ offers a sharp, contemporary look, in subtle blue, grey and black. Its creator Liz Roques has used a stylised gecko motif to symbolise the coming of summer. It’s available on both the ironing table covers and rotary dryer covers.

David Slater, Sales Director at Brabantia, said: “At Brabantia we wanted to make ironing a more enjoyable experience. Animal prints and florals are a big hit in the fashion and interiors worlds this year – so why not accessorise your home with the latest trends too?”

Both covers are 100% cotton. The Cherry Blossom ironing table is 124 x 38 cm, with a solid steam iron rest and ivory frame.

The Gecko ironing table is available with a solid steam iron rest or a solid steam unit rest; in the dimensions 124 x 38 cm and features the new metallic grey frame.

Brabantia products are available from leading retailers, including high street department stores, superstores, quality independent housewares and kitchen product specialists.

For details, please contact the Brabantia sales department on 0845 602 4877 or visit www.brabantia.com.

[1] http://www.cleanerconfessions.com/

Here at Brabantialife we love to follow the latest news in design, interiors and household trends.  And, hashtags (#) used on Twitter, are a great way to research the latest design topics and network with like minded design gurus to inspire your next project or build relationships.

Twitter chats use hashtags too and are an event or ‘chat’ that is planned on a regular basis around a theme, so people can join in, hang out and chat!

Here are our Top 5 design hashtags:

• #Design
• #Decor
• #InteriorDesign
• #Color / #Colour
• #decoração

Here are our Top 5 design chats:

Interior Designer Chat

Tweet for more info: @NoirBlancDesign @IntDesignerChat

Interior Designer Chat is the international community of Interior Designers, Interior Architects,  Kitchen and Bath designers, and professionals in the Home Decor Industry. We have met the uber talented @noirblanc and @andrewdunning (UK moderator) via this chat and they have Guest Blogged for Brabantialife too!

• When: The weekly twitter chat has international attendance every Tuesday at 6pm EST.
• Hashtag: #IntDesignerChat
• More info: http://interiordesignerchat.com/

Design Business Chat

Tweet for more info: @lesliefineint

A monthly chat to discuss different aspects of running a design business. Open to all interior designers, architects, vendors, manufacturers and anyone in the residential design industry.

• When: On the second Wednesday of each month at 10am EST.
• Hashtag: #DesignBizChat
• More info: http://lesliefineinteriors.com/blog/

Design Chat

Tweet for more info: @designchat

DesignChat is a weekly video and text-based conversation between and for creatives. Video chats start at 8pm CST on Wednesdays and last about an hour. You can continue the conversation before and after on Twitter.

• When: Video starts at 8pm CST.
• Hashtag: #designchat
• More info: http://designchat.info/

Design TV Chat

Tweet for more info: @abcddesigns & @jonathanlegate

Jonathan Legate & ABC Dragoo are the founders of #DesignTV, a lifestyle chat on Twitter. #DesignTV is not just about TV, it’s about living a well-designed life!

• When: Weekly chat on Twitter from 5-6 pm. EST every Thursday.
• Hashtag: #DesignTV
• More Info: https://www.facebook.com/DesignTVChat

Color Chat

Tweet for more info: @funcolors

Chats are one hour long and they discuss all things color and design. The latest example chat topic: “Grey — the hot new neutral”

• When: Every Wednesday – 7pm EST.
• Hashtag: #Colorchat
• More info: http://twittercolorchat.com/

We recommend using Twitterfall or Tweetchat for following hashtags and Twitter chats in real time. If you have a hashtag or Twitter chat that you would like us to add to this list, please Tweet @brabantialife or add your details in the comments below.

At Brabantialife we love working with mums and domestic goddesses, and it’s always great to hear their feedback on our products too! This week we welcome Chelle McCann from Brighton Mums, who agreed to road test some of our Get Together Range.  Here are her thoughts:

Why not follow Chelle McCann on Twitter too to find out more of her views?

If you would like to find out about being a Guest Blogger, please do get in touch with us.

As the warmer weather arrives it’s time to start thinking about drying laundry outside.

Knowing how you like to stay on trend and how important functionality and aesthetics are to our consumers, we’ve decided to accessorise the WallFix with a durable protective cover in the same fashionable colours as the Clothes Peg Bags: Black, Mustard, Aubergine, Turquoise and Purple.

The new and improved protective cover is made of super tough weather and UV-resistant material.

Also for our Rotary Dryers we’ve launched an on-trend black cover too, made from the same solid materials as the popular Clothes Peg Bags: a high-quality canvas combined with corrosion resistant materials. The solid zip fastener along the entire length ensures easy handling and removal.

Rotary Dryers with the new protective cover come with a free Clothes Peg Bag too! This handy accessory keeps the pegs within easy reach. With its hanging hook, it is easy to attach to the Rotary Dryer, drying rack or belt.

With such a selection of colours, what’s your favourite colour, please vote on our Facebook poll today!