Dressing up the great outdoors!
September 17, 2019

Watch as Jana and her faithful assistant pimp up a poolside and get the spring vibes a-flowing...

There's absolutely no reason for your outside areas to look drab and uninteresting this spring when you've got the Darkie Designs team in town. So if you're tired of your stoep looking like a dumping ground for pool toys, power tools and a graveyard for white plastic chairs, then get with the DD programme and dress to impress!
Make your pool area look like a place you really want to hang out, rather than just wading through noodles, half-inflated lilos and threadbare towelling. Get your loungers up to scratch with new cushions, scatters, throws and colourful towels. On your stoep, go for mood with hurricane lamps or candles, planters, armchairs and comfy couches with a nice rug to hold everything together. Pot plants are a must. No! NOT weed! Lovely, lush greenery and colour in a range of interesting planters, pots and receptacles is what we mean. Use some nice lamps to create soft lighting for evenings out on the stoep and a fire-pit for the ultimate bush experience. 
Most importantly, don't forget the gin and tonics. Served on a really nice tray. With swizzle sticks. The Darkie team is happy to help test these for you.
Give us a call or pop in for some more outdoor living ideas.

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By Kyra Harper August 15, 2023
Back in March of 2020, Bianca and Jana were dusting off their Fez’s and grabbing the pashminas out of storage in preparation to Rock the Casbah! However, as we all know and vividly remember - with March, came the eventual Covid shutdown, and instead of frolicking down the Moroccan streets, we all shut ourselves inside and watched the days tick by… 3 Years later, and now we can finally say - with conviction - that they’re going to Morocco at the start of September! This blog, filled with excitement and curiosity about all the weird and wonderful curios they might find, and endless sourcing they’ll do, stays as a reminder that sometimes plans change, things go awry and there’s not much you can do about it other than persevere - and that we did! So, here’s Bianca and Jana’s innermost thoughts about the trip, 3 years before it came to fruition, enjoy :) We've got our passports out and Jana has already picked out what she's going to wear each day… Come March [September] we'll be heading north with Air France to the Kingdom of Morocco, bright eyed and bushy tailed as we make our base in the ancient city of Marrakesh (also known as Marrakech to the French, but we're not French, so we'll go with the English version until all that fuss about Brexit is sorted out) - This turned into a year long negotiations trade, and now us outsiders would pay nearly double what we used to if we visit the UK - thankfully our flight is direct!! We'll be looking for inspiration and will be investigating what's there that we could possibly bring back to The Hoed. We can't wait to experience the atmosphere and afro-arabic influences of this amazing place as we visit the celebrated souks and off-the-beaten track artists and craftsmen that make Marrakesh so special. We're desperate to see the beautifully hand-crafted furniture, textiles, fabrics, rugs, carpets, objets d'art, accessories, lighting… anything that catches our eye and could possibly be brought back south. Berber mats and rugs are definitely on our list, as are the kind of furnishings you might find in a gorgeous Bedouin tent. If you think about it, the Bedouin refined the art of "glamping" into an artform - fabulous carpets on the ground, soft, billowing fabrics hung here and there, plump cushions spread on the ground, intricate leatherwork and carved wood, patinated metal… Total Glamping vibes! We just love all of it and will be tracking as much of it down as we can. We'll also have an eye or three out for wonderful ceramics and glassware and wonderful lamps that give off soft, filtered light.  For us it's about workmanship, so we'll hopefully be finding the people who make furniture and ceramics using techniques that have been passed down over countless generations meaning that everything we look at will have its own, and its own special story. Our mission is to share those stories with you and, if it's feasible, bring some of that special workmanship home to the Rainbow Nation. We're most definitely inspired and are sure this is going to be a truly special trip! Counting the sleeps till then! Less than a month to go now - we will be keeping the updates going on our social channels as well as another few blog posts to explain in detail our wild adventures - Stay tuned!
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