So many of you are liking the elephants in the current giveaway, I thought today that we could discuss the elephant in the room. Or, the many elephants …
Do you ever look around and suddenly notice a recurring theme? One day I noticed lots of big ears and stocky bodies around here. Not on the people, on four-legged creatures!
Here’s a bejeweled beauty on a frame from Z Gallerie. We’re shown in a happy vacation photo:
Peek inside this frame in our guest room, and you will see elephants on that map of Siam there:
On a Thai silk pillowcase from Jim Thompson in Bangkok. It sits on a chair in our bedroom. The chair is also upholstered in a heavy woven silk that we found in the Jim Thompson outlet in Bangkok:
I made this pillow cover with a wide elephant ribbon, below it a thin brown ribbon with beads, brown suede and gold silk chenille:
The big wood elephant is one of a pair of bookends, gifted by some business associates during a trip to Bangalore; the small bronze elephant is one my husband brought from India decades ago:
Erm, please excuse some dust on some things. I’d much rather blog than be a perfect housekeeper, wouldn’t you?!
Here, elephant drawer pulls from Anthropologie lay on a shelf in our guest room. With them are a tall raku vase from a ceramic show in Royal Oak, Michigan, a copper batik printing tjap found at Arhaus and a candleholder found at HomeGoods:
A stuffed elephant wrapped in Thai silk from Jim Thompson:
More elephants made of Jim Thompson silk:
I took a closer look at the textile covering our kitchen bar stools. And there, I found … little elephants:
Many of these elephants are from travel. And very appropriately, I have a few more elephants on vintage hotel stickers:
These were applied to a faux crocodile suitcase from HomeGoods.
Lot of elephants, both Indian and African, in my heart and home too. I also paint ellie icons every now and again. I’ve got a collection of ellie books too. If you haven’t got this one – you really, truly, have to get it – Sacred Elephant by Heathcote Williams – ah!
Thank you for the tip about Sacred Elephant. I will check that out. I have such mixed feelings about things like the elephant shows in Thailand — how they’re trained is heartbreaking but what happens to them without things like these shows? We watched a show in Thailand once and brought home a painting made by one of the elephants, and thought it was so cool at the time, until I looked into it more. I also met a baby temple elephant in Chennai — they said it had just come there after leaving its mom in Assam. I know it’s supposed to be revered, but I just felt so sad about it.