“Have you heard of Juju hats? I must have one for my house! You must blog about them!”, a friend wrote to me earlier this week. Of course, I googled them, not knowing what they were, but presuming they were some type of archaic medicinal type of voodoo device, that was worn on the head to scare away the bad guys.
Up popped these wonderfully whimsical, feathery concoctions hanging on beautiful, large walls. I knew why she loved them. After seeing the price (originally handmade in Cameroon), we instantly started wondering if we could make our own, what color we would use and where we would put them. Eternally optimistic, we added it to our wish list.
Later that night, I was flicking through a magazine, when I came across an entire line of accessories made from Shagreen. Again, I hadn’t heard of this. Apparently, years ago, the skins of sharks and stingrays were used to make cigarette holders and the like, giving an exotic appeal to something quite ordinary. Now, it is being reinvented in a kind of faux way (with the assurance that they are no longer being made from real shark or stingray). A strange, pebbly texture, it seems a bit like suede, and is now being used for all sorts of things, but mainly decorative items like picture frames and vases.
Not sure if the Juju and Shagreen will be a long-lasting trend, but the point is to continue suggesting something new; trends make us stop and think, pass them by, or fall in love with them. It's up to us.
Gorgeous, gerbera type Juju hat picture from the Brown Button blog (who, in 2010, was further ahead of the trend than I was).
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