Today we are chatting to Jacqui Vidal, one half of IVY MUSE, the queen of creative greenery and purveyor of the perfect indoor plant.
Photography Annette O'Brien, Styling Alana Langan x
We love that IVY MUSE so successfully combines the beautiful green of the outdoors with interiors. Is your heart in the garden (secret green thumb?) or was it homewares that was your calling?
Both! Nowadays I would definitely fall into the green thumb category, but it wasn't always like that! Like most people out there, I've had my fair share of green casualties in the early days...Especially when it cam to Maidenhair Ferns! Luckily, Alana and I are both in the fortunate position of being surrounded by lovers of green, plant enthusiasts we meet in our Botanical Emporium and the greater green community throughout Melbourne and further afield - whose we share knowledge with and learn from in return.
The Botanical Emporium is a really peaceful, beautiful space. What was the interior design process like for this delicious store front?
It was so much fun! Alana and I had various mood boards going on and basically lived on Pinterest! We had a pop up space in Prahran for close to a year before opening the Armadale Botanical Emporium. The design of the shop embodies many of the design principles you see in our collections - flexible, simple and functional. Nearly every piece of fit out in the Emporium is free standing, allowing us to move the shop around and create new looks. Even our feature wall has been built to be fully flexible, with shelves of various widths that can be interchanged and moved about!
We love that you have been able to create a gallery space in the Emporium. How do you go about finding artists to feature?
Art has always been a big passion of mine, and I was very fortunate to have founded galleries in Melbourne prior to co-founding IVY MUSE. Many of the artists I've represented have turned into friends, many of whom we've featured on our Art Wall to date.
What's been your favourite collaboration to date?
Our hand blown glass NEST vessels by Amanda Dziedzic would have to be at the top of the list! NEST, our petite tabletop stand has always been a standout in my eyes; so having the change to combine our classic NEST silhouette with Amanda's glass vessels was a dream.
Any hot tips for people looking to start a small business?
Do you research. There's no point starting a business unless it's an improvement on a product / derive out there, whether that be the product design, branding, marketing reach etc. If you are going to bring something to the market, you want to ensure that it will blow all the competition away which means doing it better than it's ever been done before.
Favourite part of your job?
Working with my bestie of course! Even though it means we waste a lot of time talking about what we're having for lunch!
What are you most looking forward to for the rest of 2017?
Well, we are very excited to say that we have a book coming out later this year...we can't share too many details at this stage, but watch this space!
We love that IVY MUSE so successfully combines the beautiful green of the outdoors with interiors. Is your heart in the garden (secret green thumb?) or was it homewares that was your calling?
Both! Nowadays I would definitely fall into the green thumb category, but it wasn't always like that! Like most people out there, I've had my fair share of green casualties in the early days...Especially when it cam to Maidenhair Ferns! Luckily, Alana and I are both in the fortunate position of being surrounded by lovers of green, plant enthusiasts we meet in our Botanical Emporium and the greater green community throughout Melbourne and further afield - whose we share knowledge with and learn from in return.
The Botanical Emporium is a really peaceful, beautiful space. What was the interior design process like for this delicious store front?
It was so much fun! Alana and I had various mood boards going on and basically lived on Pinterest! We had a pop up space in Prahran for close to a year before opening the Armadale Botanical Emporium. The design of the shop embodies many of the design principles you see in our collections - flexible, simple and functional. Nearly every piece of fit out in the Emporium is free standing, allowing us to move the shop around and create new looks. Even our feature wall has been built to be fully flexible, with shelves of various widths that can be interchanged and moved about!
We love that you have been able to create a gallery space in the Emporium. How do you go about finding artists to feature?
Art has always been a big passion of mine, and I was very fortunate to have founded galleries in Melbourne prior to co-founding IVY MUSE. Many of the artists I've represented have turned into friends, many of whom we've featured on our Art Wall to date.
What's been your favourite collaboration to date?
Our hand blown glass NEST vessels by Amanda Dziedzic would have to be at the top of the list! NEST, our petite tabletop stand has always been a standout in my eyes; so having the change to combine our classic NEST silhouette with Amanda's glass vessels was a dream.
Any hot tips for people looking to start a small business?
Do you research. There's no point starting a business unless it's an improvement on a product / derive out there, whether that be the product design, branding, marketing reach etc. If you are going to bring something to the market, you want to ensure that it will blow all the competition away which means doing it better than it's ever been done before.
Favourite part of your job?
Working with my bestie of course! Even though it means we waste a lot of time talking about what we're having for lunch!
What are you most looking forward to for the rest of 2017?
Well, we are very excited to say that we have a book coming out later this year...we can't share too many details at this stage, but watch this space!
