I have admired Irina Graewes style for many reasons. The interior stylist and set designer is known for her use of bold colors and geometric forms softened through plants, natural stones and feathers borrowed from nature. She also creates stilllifes of fragile beauty.

Without even knowing her personally, I felt inspired by her visual vocabulary and the words she chose to complement her images. When I read her answers, I knew I had found another beautiful soul – even if only online for now.

“If there’s one thing that I learned this year it is to going with the flow. ”

Irina spends most of her weekends near the sea where she has a small place

3 Places I want to travel to

This is a tricky question, as I assume that travelling won’t be the same anymore. I’m really longing to travel to faraway places and am dreaming of going back to Japan one day, but this definitely won’t happen next year. If it ever will, who knows – as we should probably all change our travel habits and try to fly as little as possible.

Anyway, I haven’t made any plans so far, and if there’s one thing that I learned this year it is to going with the flow. But hopefully, the next year will all be about seeing and visiting friends and family, wherever they live. And spending a lot of time at the sea and in nature, where we have a small weekend place.

Also looking forward to hopefully going to Milan and London in September, if the fairs will take place.

3 Things I want to learn

On a skill- and knowledge-level:

improve my ceramic skills, which are still super-basic;

learn more about neuroplasticity/neuroscience and the human brain, which I find very fascinating;

dive into garden design, especially into the style of Piet Oudolf, whose work I deeply admire. We have a small garden at our weekend place, which hasn’t been touched and designed yet, so I want to look into that during the next year.

On a personal level:

learning to let go more often;

trusting the universe and developing my spiritual journey further;

putting my phone down more often

3 Books I want to read

There are many books I want to finish reading first - but, once I have, these are on my waiting list:

Joan Didion: The Year of Magical Thinking

RZA: The Tao of Wu

Hisham Matar: A Month in Siena

3 Things I want to save for

Actually, there is only one thing on my list at the moment. It’s a kiln for firing my ceramics. I have quite a lot of unfired pieces in my studio, so I’m thinking of finally buying a kiln for my work. Other than that I really try to consume less and simplify my life.

… and some of her ceramics waiting to be fired