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An end always leads to a beginning

November 14, 2010

The moment has arrived where we reveal our final products from our studio and as Jan from Daisy Janie put it, it is bittersweet.


When I think back to a year ago, it was all but still an idea in my head. It simply came to me one night when I was lying in bed redecorating our bedroom in my mind for the millionth time. I kept thinking that the headboard is a piece that anchors the room and sets the tone of its design so why couldn’t I find one that wasn’t either made of micro-suede or upholstered in velour. I wanted more.


I began my quest to make it happen on my own with the continued help and support from my willing husband and business partner, Conrad. I started sketching and not long after found a local silkscreener and upholsterer. These two women, I soon found out, truly shared my vision and had the same high standards as I did. It was a match made in Montreal heaven. The process was incredible and I learned a great deal throughout it all, a definite success in my eyes.

However, with any process comes realisations during them and I certainly made a few here. I’m in a place now where I don’t have to be as worried about where my feet will land. They are firmly planted and in the next few weeks and months to come they will be wearing several different shoes as well.


Holley & Gill will be embarking on a new venture and path in the decor world! I am excited, motivated and really and truly happy. So before I can move on, here are our cushion covers as an ode to the very first headboards designed by H&G.

(They will be up on my Etsy site this week, couldn’t wait to share them with you here first.)

About us, Process, Provenance • Comments { 24 }

Speaking about passion

June 11, 2010

Throughout this journey that Holley & Gill has taken me on, I’ve found myself with several newly acquired passions. For me, a passion is when you are suddenly no longer aware of what time it is, what you need to be doing and where you need to be.


It’s happened before when I’ve been blogging or planning designs, the times escapes me and I’m not bothered one bit about it. But this specific passion made my heart race and my creativity soar to heights I’d never felt before. It began on a simple sunny morning, our bedroom became our make-shift studio for the day. I began to style our shoot for our very first catalogue and the rest became a blur of giddiness and excitement.


Interior styling is what creates and evokes that emotion. A ray of sun coming from an open window, a chair slightly turned towards the lens, or even a “just tossed there” item can intensify an otherwise ordinary room. It creates a persona, you begin to see the story and it leaves you wanting to know more. It definitely left me with wanting more.


It is truly astounding when your original vision can branch out to create so many other outlets to explore and learn from. I’m extremely grateful for this ride and cannot wait to see what comes next.

What new passions have you discovered and how did they come about?

Images from, holley&gill, jakob solgren, happy place, happy place, agent bauer, design*sponge, decor8, arent&pyke

Creativity, Inspiration, Process • Comments { 6 }

Our process

March 3, 2010

Since process is taking center stage these days and becoming more and more important, we’d love to share ours with you here today.

To begin with, all of our products are designed and prototyped in our small studio giving us the opportunity to step back and look first hand at how the fabric design and hardware behaves and interacts with its surroundings. Our designs can sometimes sit in our studio for months just being observed and pondered over day after day before we make that final decision to either scrap and start over, or move on to making production samples.

We then drive across the city to our silk-screen printers and finalize the layout of the design to have the printing acetate and screens made. Once the final screens arrive the intense test printing stages begin. We are not interested in pressing buttons on vast printing machines that spit out fabric that is identical in repeat, lacks raw uniqueness and doesn’t present challenges to us and to our printer. We never pre-print rolls and each cut of finished fabric is allocated to a specific piece of furniture. Our printing process involves 3 people and takes many hours to print just one length of cloth for one individual piece.

Once dried, the printed lengths of cloth are walked through the corridors of an old warehouse building, now converted to small studios, to our upholsterer. All our furniture is made with what we encourage and call the “stand back” approach. Everyone involved in the making of our products is granted the right to stand back and visually review the piece through the craftsmanship process. If we, the printer or upholsterer aren’t completely satisfied with the finished product then it’s scrapped, simple as that.


Using handed sanded wood on the inside, our upholster molds and folds the fabric by hand around what becomes the final product. Each piece is scrupulously inspected for any oddities that are not “individualistic” to the product. We pride ourselves on telling our customers that “no, your piece of furniture will not look or feel exactly the same as anyone elses.” That’s the amazing thing about our unique design and production beliefs.

We hope you’ve enjoyed this post. Please feel free to link up to your process in the comments field below, we would love to hear from you!

Printing, Process, Provenance, Upholstery • Comments { 4 }