Hi, my apologies that there will be no Blog updates next week from me at Lello as I will not be around next week.

Please log on again on Monday 8th March for the latest news!
Karen x

True to my word I have found 2 this week!

The first is a really lovely light weight, leather ‘peachy coloured’ ‘effect ‘zip jacket £45.00.  I just love this and may have to nip and buy myself one for the Spring.

Very on trend for Spring Summer with all the muted shades, looks great with jeans.

To match the jacket I also picked up this pretty scarf with lace flower trim, £12.00. Both by Warehouse.

My second choice was this gorgeous dress, which if I wore it I think I’d have to wear a little black cardi with, but if I was a size 10 or an easy 12! I think I’d snap it up and not hesitate. The top half is black and white stripe jersey (sleeveless) with a slight frill round the drop neckline. Then a lovely big satin bow with embellished coral coloured sequins on the skirt, not too short. It looked fabulous on the rail and ideal for any party or wedding and a snip at only £40.00. I think it’s good enough to wear to a prom! By Miss Selfridge.

Jacket and Scarf by Warehouse

Dress by Miss Selfridge

Placing orders today for the lovely new stock we are buying to fill our gift shop with.

As well as Lello jewellery, cards and albums we have chosen some beautiful table top gifts to sit along side our own products.

Shop due to open in about 3 weeks!

As you can see from the photos I took this morning, the space is set out but empty apart from a few vases which have arrived. I think it will look lovely when all the stock is in.

All our jewellery out on display.

It’s down to me again today! and you will have to excuse the pose! but we are having to get creative to show off the jewellery otherwise all the pictures start to look the same, we might as well have a laugh doing it!

I do ask all the other girls if they will pose for me but as time goes by they become reluctant to as they know how many people read my blog each day!  But I am older and ‘perhaps’ wiser and don’t mind putting myself for up for it as we don’t take it too seriously.

We have quite a large range of blue jewellery and it’s all great to wear with jeans and one of the season’s up and coming ‘nautical trends’. To match my blue check blouse today I am wearing a blue and white ceramic bead necklace, Willow, with a ceramic butterfly bead attachment, matching Willow bracelet, royal blue classic glass pearl earrings and matching royal blue glass pearl bracelet.

We like ‘colour on colour’ here. We don’t tend to match too many colours all together, as a company and personally my sister and I like to wear and design jewellery and clothes which all sit within the same colour palette, not that it’s for everyone.

Apologies first for Friday and not up loading our fashion find of the week.  I was feeling rather poorly on Friday hence the blog was not updated, so I will try to make up for it this week and come up with 2 finds for Friday.

Secondly I wanted to report that we would be opening our own shop here at Lello within our factory. It is still a few weeks away but we will be selling our jewellery, handmade cards and albums together with some lovely gifts and all sorts of craft items.

The shop will be open Mon to Fri (not at weekends) from 9am to 4.30pm. Once I have an opening date I will let you know.

We have started to get quite a few people popping in to buy our jewellery and simply were not set up for it, but we will be soon. So watch this space!

It couldn’t be easier for our customers, jewellery cards and gifts all under one roof with more than adequate parking!
Karen

We are having a mass clear out at Lello today. This factory of ours has steadily filled up with stuff which is best suited to a skip. So it’s all hands on deck and my job is sorting out the dispatch area with the help of my colleague Karen.

We plan to open a jewellery and gift shop here to the public in the next few weeks as we have started to get a lot of calls and enquiries from members of the public wanting to buy our jewellery.

So today is ‘clear out and move around day’ everyone is taking one day off from packing and picking orders and design projects (all urgent ones will still go out as usual) to rearrange the new space. It’s not something we do very often but we know if we all work together it will get done properly!

We are all dressed in our ‘scruffs’ and once I have written this blog, I’ll be knee high in bubble wrap, boxes and mess!!
I’ll upload some pics of us ‘busy at work’ later today.

Lastly we had a bit of a Lello night out last night. Four of us all went to the cinema to see ‘Chick Flick’ Valentines Day and I have got to say, we loved it! Very girlie and full of very attractive men, what more could you ask for! If you haven’t seen it and like a bit of ‘easy watching’ not too taxing on the brain and a bit of escapism, it’s for you! Karen
Log on tomorrow for our ‘fashion Find of the week!

I know we haven’t had summer yet, but our work load at the moment is directed at Autumn/Winter 2010.

I thought I’d share with you some of the trends for later in the year and an idea of what we will be producing in terms of jewellery.

We use the forecasted trends available to design companies such as ours in a loose term and as inspiration because many of the actual trends would be too severe for our customers.

Big for Autumn/Winter ’10 is military style jewellery and accessories. Stars and air force style badges/clips with a metal feel, stars, stripes, wings and war time logos. Safety pins look to be used in some way, but I would imagine this would be a detail we would not use in our jewellery.

Pom Poms and pom pom hats are going to be big this year so there will be a slight hint of this in our new ranges. Together with leather straps and chains and quite grungy looking jewellery.

A current Spring Summer line of Lello’s which will be in stock in March echos this trend so it would be a good buy for Autumn/Winter as well, it comes in white and black, ‘Onyx’ black bracelet shown below.

It will also fall well for our Halloween range of jewellery we will be bringing out with skull ring & bracelet and spider bracelet and necklace, all on trend not only for Halloween but on trend for Autumn/Winter.

Pictured below are a couple of our Halloween lines which will launch in August and also one of new Spring Summer lines made from leather straps and jewels, ‘Pewter’ lightweight chain necklace and white leather strap £14.99

Aut/Winter

Skull ring – Halloween

Spider bracelet – Aut/Winter

Skull bracelet – Aut/Winter

I thought I’d be the guinea pig today. I am wearing an assortment of our jewellery.

My Russian doll necklace is something I wear quite a lot and it’s great just with navy or white.
The Russian doll necklace has just this week sold out, so I guess I shouldn’t have worn it for the photo! But it does come in black and white, £13 for the necklace and £7 for the matching bracelet something for those women who like jewellery which is a bit ‘quirky or individual’.

My red 3 strand bracelet with diamanté and heart detail is £6, available in other colours. My white leather and large stone effect wrap around bracelet (Diamond) is NEW for Spring Summer and costs £7.99, this design also comes in black and I think I will be wearing it a lot when the warmer weather arrives.

I am also wearing our red classic pearl earrings which come in a multitude of colours and cost £5 per pair. Please note they have sterling silver backs!

All new stock arrives in March. If you’d like a copy of our new jewellery brochure please email me your address karen@lellodesign.co.uk

After several attempts I just had to go with this pic, sorry it’s a bit staged!
I think you can tell I am a bit ‘under the weather’, managed not to sneeze during this picture.

It’s been a long time coming but we thought we ought to put this building of our ours to good use and open our own shop here to the public. ‘ A sort of a Lello Lifestyle shop’!

We have opened the doors a few times and customers have bought jewellery from us but we aim to offer a few more lines besides our own jewellery and accessories.

Hoping to open at the end of March! Mon to Fri, 9am to 4.30pm.

It will be a great opportunity for local people and those who live in the area to come and buy our lovely jewellery and some other selected items we have chosen to sell alongside it.

Watch this space for more news.
Karen

It’s our last day at the Spring Fair at the NEC in Birmingham today, something we have exhibited at for the past 10 years! No one year is like the next and you just can’t tell how it will go for you.

Rushed off your feet for hours or sat on your bottom for hours with the odd person walking by. We seem to have had a mix of the two but more of the rush which we are very pleased about.

It’s a long five days but very worthwhile as you just don’t know who might walk past your stand.

We saw Linda Barker the ‘changing rooms’ star no doubt looking for new product to add to her mail order brochure. The lady off  ‘Ladette to Lady’ came on our stand and loved all our pearl jewellery which came as no surprise and there were no doubt countless others.

We are busy typing up all the orders we have had in from the show to get our stock out to waiting customers.

Lello is actively seeking an agent to sell their jewellery in and around London! if you know anyone who might be interested please get in touch, karen@lellodesign.co.uk or call me on 0116 2601004.
Karen