The Krzentowskis are directors of Parisian furniture store and art gallery, Galerie Kreo.

And on their wall of their apartment that looks out over the Eiffel Tower is a simple piece of typographic artwork by guerilla banner artist Marc-Antoine Léval. In red lettering it reads “Please, Francois Pinault, Buy My Work”.

But who’s François Pinault? And why is he so important?

• He’s super-rich
• He’s French.
• He owns one of the biggest collections of contemporary art worldwide.

He also owns…

• Gucci
• Yves Saint-Laurent
• Bottega Veneta
• Sergio Rossi
• Boucheron
• Stella McCartney
• Alexander McQueen
• Balenciaga
• the French premiere league football team
• Stade Rennais Football Club
• Théâtre Marigny in Paris

And he controls…

• Château-Latour vineyard
• news magazine Le Point
• daily newspaper l’Agefi
• the auction house Christie’s

You see, he really is super rich.

At the Venice Biennale last year, at the opening of Pinault’s latest art gallery Punta della Dogana, Marc-Antoine hung a giant banner suspended from a palazzo across the canal, which read, ‘PLEASE, FRANCOIS PINAULT, BUY MY WORK.’

So what’s this got to do with Coulson Macleod I hear you cry?

Well, that would be telling, wouldn’t it?

‘Wilde Grey’. Coulson Macleod’s handmade typographic art on reclaimed wood.

‘Wilde Blue’. Coulson Macleod’s handmade typographic art on reclaimed wood.

‘Wilde Red’. Coulson Macleod’s handmade typographic art on reclaimed wood.

‘Napkin Not Serviette’. Coulson Macleod’s handmade typographic art.

‘Lunch Not Dinner’. Coulson Macleod’s handmade typographic art.

‘Pudding Not Dessert’. Coulson Macleod’s handmade typographic art.

‘Helvetica’. Coulson Macleod’s typographic art on Victorian roof timbers.

‘Futura’. Coulson Macleod’s typographic art on Victorian roof timbers.

‘Times’. Coulson Macleod’s typographic art on Victorian roof timbers.

‘John Lennon’. Coulson Macleod’s handmade solid oak framed art.

‘Bob Dylan’. Coulson Macleod’s handmade solid oak framed art.

‘Keith Richards’. Coulson Macleod’s handmade solid oak framed art.

]]> http://www.blog.coulsonmacleod.com/2010/09/03/two-twos-are/feed/ 1 http://www.blog.coulsonmacleod.com/2010/09/01/coulson-macleod-gift-vouchers/ http://www.blog.coulsonmacleod.com/2010/09/01/coulson-macleod-gift-vouchers/#comments Wed, 01 Sep 2010 15:23:23 +0000 Macleod http://www.blog.coulsonmacleod.com/?p=1762 Launched today, the Coulson Macleod Gift Pack.

We’ve designed it so it doesn’t look like a last minute purchase. Or a ‘I haven’t got a clue what to buy. Oh a voucher will do’.

A Coulson Macleod Gift Pack is more than just a gift voucher. What you’re in fact buying is a little work of art. A Coulson Macleod handmade work of art. Simple, distressed, typographic… just smaller than usual.

We send our Gift Packs in a simple, brown, but utterly gorgeous Coulson Macleod-branded gift box. Made from recycled paper. Of course.

And inside is a unique Coulson Macleod artwork.

• Unique as it’s handmade from reclaimed Victorian roof timbers.
• Unique as it’s white-washed by hand.
• Unique as it’s printed by hand.

Of course, each of these stages brings its own slight variations.

• Each piece of wood has its own knots and cracks.
• Each paint stroke carries a different amount of paint.
• Each hand-inked print is laid on to a different surface texture and a different amount of pressure applied.

Resulting in a one-off piece of art. Which is what makes owning a Coulson Macleod so special.

Then of course we add your Gift Voucher. You can add your own personal message.

Then your special someone can use their Gift Voucher as payment, or part-payment, for any of the artwork on our website.

Well, that’s your Christmas presents sorted then!

Handmade. Hand painted. Reclaimed wood. Distressed typography.

So very Coulson Macleod. Unique. By design.

Handmade. Hand painted. Reclaimed wood. Distressed typography.

So very Coulson Macleod. Unique. By design.

Handmade. Hand painted. Reclaimed wood. Distressed typography.

So very Coulson Macleod. Unique. By design.

Why do we love Norway?

Actually the question should be, why does Norway love Coulson Macleod?

We’ve just taken an order from our fourth stockist there. Coulson and I are thinking a trip to Norway is in order. We can visit our gorgeous-looking stockists in Oslo, Bergen, Gjøvik, and Nittedal (pictured)…

and this gorgeous looking country…

SheerLuxe, who say they are the definitive guide to luxury online shopping (and we agree), feature such established and cool new brands as Liberty, Space NK, Astley Clarke, and Browns. And SheerLuxe invited us to join. How honoured are we?

One of the features of SheerLuxe is that members can create a Lust List. Back in May, we saw that we’d been added to Laura Colonnese’s Lust List. Laura, who is the Brand Manager at English luxury goods brand Thomas Lyte, had also added Louis Vuitton, Solange Azagury-Partridge, and Jimmy Choo onto her Lust List. Now that’s my kind of shopping spree.

Then in August SheerLuxe sent out one of their Luxe Mails to all their members. The email newsletter, called Home is Where the Heart is, was only about Coulson Macleod.

We’re absolutely delighted to be part of SheerLuxe.

Victoria creates personalized enchanted portraits from your own photos. And they really are quite charming.

In particular I love her Family Tree…

You could have real fun posing your family. I rather like the idea of having Great Granny swinging in the uppermost branches.

Well folks, we have beaten our sales record. We have sold more prints in August than in any other month in the entire history of Coulson Macleod. And we’ve been up and running for almost eighteen months.

We have a whiteboard on our office wall. Every time we make a sale we wipe off the old number and write up the new one. I say we, but actually I usually do this, partly because my handwriting is neater, but mainly because it gives me a huge amount of pleasure. Every month we write down how many we’ve sold, whether they’ve been sold via Not On The High Street or through shops or if they’re bespoke and how many came via one of our adverts in Elle Decoration or Livingetc.

We love our whiteboard. We quite often catch each other staring at it fondly. Because every month the figures go up. And that is super exciting.

And this month, only half way through August I might point out, we’ve notched up the biggest number since our records began. To let you into a secret, we only started recording this on the board since November, which was when we started selling in serious numbers and the idea of a whiteboard sprang into our heads.

So ladies and gentlemen, tonight we may clink our glasses and say a little toast to our little booming business that we love so much.