I’m going to continuing 2011’s theme of The Pretty. January is pretty grim so we all need the good stuff to look at, lust over and spend our last remaining pennies on.

Despite the fact we have decided buy our own flat this year; B and I are decorating our current flat, which calls for lots of shopping for new furniture. I love shopping for house stuff, I think it’s a sign of age, or more worryingly, nesting.

(I know we are going about things in the wrong order, but the housing market is pretty flat here right now and we are looking for a particular type of flat – main door, ground floor flat with access to a garden – its all about the kitties after all – so it may take a while, we might as well live somewhere nice in the meantime.)

Anyways, we’ve grown bored and slightly (actually more than slightly) ashamed of the cat scratched sofas and 10 year old Ikea sideboard that currently grace our odd shaped, but roomy, living room so have been hunting around for a few new pieces to call our own.

I’m a huge 50s and 60s fan; in particular of the living room furniture my mum, aunty and every other family used to have – Scandinavian inspired low sideboards, spindly spider legs, glass topped coffee tables, lots of teak and walnut. Check out this 1959 living room (from retrorenovation.com) as an example.

But shopping for this kind of furniture is expensive as even though, teak went out of fashion in the 1980s and most of it ended up on the scrap heap when high gloss black MDF was all the rage, following the success of Mad Men its becoming increasingly popular to go retro.

Websites selling classic G Plan furniture are popping up everywhere (Try vintageretro.co.uk, or just search for teak on eBay). Even Heals have jumped on the bandwagon with a £1900 Orla Kiely designed sideboard, way out of our current price range, but seeing it gave me inspiration. Can you take a classic piece (some would say this is debatable) of 1950s/60s teak furniture and do something different with it?

This is where my new favourite discovery comes in (it helps having a boyfriend who works for a style magazine; you get to find all the goodies first!) – a designer who takes the bog standard and gives it a personal, quirky, one of kind twist.

Trash Furnishing is the brain child of interior designer Caroline Key based in Leith, Edinburgh. Caroline ‘up-cycles’ vintage furnishings for well, the noughties – check out this nest of tables or this Ercol chair. Gorgeous huh? My favourite piece of hers however has to be this bureau. Unfortunately it was sold before I could get my grubby little hands on it.

But, on walking into Caroline’s studio yesterday afternoon, B and I happened on exactly what we were looking for – excitingly we will soon be receiving our  our ‘edited’ new/old 1960s teak sideboard. Very cool photo’s to follow…

Caroline can be found at:
Web: Trash Furnishing
Twitter: @Trashfurnishing

P.S I have not received any compensation for this post – I just love her stuff!