Jewelry Design in Prague

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Today on the tour, we had two nice guests, Khobe and David, and Khobe runs a great jewelry studio in California. As huge fans of Czech jewelry, we thought we could share some tips with Khobe, David and with you all. Just like Czech glass, Czech jewelry’s always been sought after. The tradition is really long and almost any traveller visiting Prague knows about garnets and amber. We admit garnet jewelry (please look for stores selling genuine pieces) is very elegant, but if your exploration of Czech jewelry stops there, you’ll be missing out.

The growth of modern Czech design is apparent, and young Czech jewelers creating unusual, award-wining designs, shine with special brightness. Let’s have a look at some of our favorites (clicking on the title takes you to designers' websites detailing where you can buy their jewelry in Prague).

Zorya

The Zorya label, the result of fruitful cooperation between jewelry maker Zdeněk Vacek and designer Daniel Pošta, has already made its mark since its inception in 2011. The winners of the Designblok '11 Editors Award for the best collection of jewelry create high-quality, hand-made pieces that are unusual, yet elegant.

Věra Nováková

The popular designer transforms dreams, fantasies, and visions into the form of wearable jewelry. Věra Nováková uses traditional techniques and materials, but chooses less traditional procedures to produce comfortable, wearable pieces.

Antipearle

As the designer, Markéta Dlouhá-Marová admits, her pieces occupy the space somewhere between punk and luxury. The designer hand picks river pearls and combines them with precious metals to create visually startling creations.

Ja.Ne

You can see that the person behind the simple geometric creations is an architect. Jana Hamrová uses the minimalist approach to jewelry making. Her preferred material is silver, at times combined with less precious materials such as plastics.

Belda

This family run business collaborates with many young Czech designers to create an extensive portfolio of jewelry with prices ranging from very reasonable to… well, less reasonable. They use silver and gold, but also titanium, steel and plastics. We also like their little, cool showroom at Mikulandská Street near the National Theater.

Janja Prokić

Jewelry by this Serbian-born designer is extravagant and bold. Inspired by her wild dreams, the creations often borrow from the world of animals. Her last collection, Superpowers, earned her a nomination for the Czech Grand Design award in the jewelry category. Together with another great young designer Nastassia Aleinikava, they created the praised Lure collection.

Markéta Richterová

Inspired by organic and inorganic structures, Markéta Richterová creates hi-tech jewelry from materials like corian, perpex or carbon. Although her creations have a precise, industrial feel, each piece is hand-made with lots of handcraft. Joining forces with fellow designer Zbyněk Krulich, she crated the Blueberries line of jewelry made entirely on a 3D printer. Both her collections  were nominated for the Czech Grand Design award in the jewelry category.

Trudi for Dolls

One half of the Belka fashion label, Martina Malá also creates highly ornamented jewelry designs. Her pieces are very colorful and feminine.


St Matthew's Fair Is Here Again!

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Matejska pout, or St Mathhew's Fair, is a cultural institution here in Prague that celebrates its 50th anniversary this year. This annual spring fun fair attracts enormous crowds every single year, especially on weekends if the weather is nice. The fair has everything: plenty of rides (from modern to very old ones), food stands with cotton and hard candy, sausages and beer. We think it's a great venue when you have kids, and not only just because of St Matthew's Fair: the surroundings offer plenty of activities, too.

The fair is held each year on the old Holesovice Fair Grounds, just a short tram ride from the centre. The centre of the grounds is occupied by the old Fair Palace, one half of which burned down sadly a few years ago when someone forgot to put the kettle off during a dentistry trade show. The grounds also include an ice-hockey arena, a swimming pool and a famous fountain. The grounds are fairly empty throughout the year, only to come alive during St Matthew's Fair.

After you've enjoyed the rides, we recommend that you leave the fair and have a stroll in the adjacent Stromovka park, the biggest public park near the centre of Prague. It's one of our most favorite walks in Prague: you start from the fair grounds and walk into the park past the observatory to the "central circle" with a pond, benches and many joggers, families and lovers. We recommend you walk under the train tracks towards the river and cross it using the elevated bridge.

You enter Cisarsky ostrov, a lovely island in the river that accommodates an equestrian centre with a parkour pitch and stables. Parkour competitions sometimes take place there. From there, walk to the other side of the river using the pedestrian bridge and turn left. In about five minutes, you will enter the Troja Chateau - a big villa that dates back to the late 17th century with an impressive garden. Take a few snapshots and walk past the villa on the left. There, you have two choices: either the Prague Zoo, said to be one of the top ten zoos in the world by many, or the Botanical garden above it, which includes the Santa Clara winery: one of the best wineries in Prague that offers its visitors the chance to taste local wines.

We think this walk can create a wonderful afternoon that will bring many memories to kids and their parents alike. The whole walk should not take more than an hour, depending on your pace. If you don't feel like walking back the entire route, you can take the bus from the ZOO to the Holesovicke nadrazi subway stop and follow from there to the centre. St Matthew's Fair opened on 2 March and ends on 21 April. Enjoy!

Show the Stromovka walk on a larger map.

Source.


Shopping in Prague: Koh-i-noor pencils

If you are following this blog, you know that we have already written about the Kooh-i-Noor mechanical pencils here, so you can read all about the history of this famous Czech brand and the awesome wonder of the mechanical pencils in that post. Unfortunately, the Botas 66 concept store closed down about a month ago (we think the high rent must have played a role in that) so we have lost our most favorite place to get these awesome mechanical pencils and one of the best places, in our opinion, to do some great shopping in Prague.


What to do in Prague: Prague views

One of the things that make Prague so great in our opinion are the hills that surround the centre. Prague is often compared to Vienna in terms of atmosphere but we think the hills give Prague a clear edge over Vienna (of course). You can simply walk up, get away from the crowds in the centre and enjoy some lovely vistas. In this post, we bring you a few tips for great views of Prague. If you connect them, they will create a really nice walk around the entire centre, allowing you to see the central parts of Prague from all possible angles.


Czech Oscar Winners

With this year's Oscar ceremony behind us, the time is ripe to do two things: first, to congratulate the winners (we loved Argo, and we thoroughly enjoyed Ms Lawrence's Mr Waltz's performances in Silver Linings Playbook and Django Unchained (we have not seen Lincoln and Les Miserables), and, second, to recollect the Czech and Czechoslovak movies who that won the Best Foreign Language Film category in the past. The Czech cinematography has a very long tradition, booming especially in the 1960s with the filmmakers of the "New Wave" (when the Poles want to say that something is confusing, they say "it's like a Czech movie"). All in all, despite the Iron Curtain and all, three Czech(oslovak) movies managed to win the Oscar Best Foreign Language Film award. All these films can be bought on DVDs here in Prague, with English subtitles.


Things to do in Prague... During a Snow Storm

Ahh, we love snow storms. There are so many things to do in Prague that locals truly enjoy. You can, for instance, shovel your way out of your family house to get the newspaper, or spend good fifteen, twenty minutes rescuing your car from under four inches of snow, just to do the very same thing two hours later... Anyway, if you're a traveler visiting Prague, you don't have to do any of these things, lucky you! If you find yourself in the middle of a snow storm in Prague, we have a few tips that can make your stay truly enjoyable... (unless you want to shovel our way from our house!)


Prague shopping: vinyl records

This is yet another episode of our never-ending series of tips for Prague shopping. Did you know that the Czech Republic is a global superpower when it comes to turntables and records? If you visited several summer houses or old apartments in the Czech Republic, you would undoubtedly see many variations of a single theme: the reliable Tesla turntable. Sold in many Western European countries under various brands (including such hi-fi names such as NAD), the original design has survived to this day and, slightly improved, is still sold under the Austrian Pro-Ject brand whose products have won many accolades throughout the worlds (just search Pro-Ject reviews on the What Hi-Fi site, you'll know what I'm talking about).

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Where to buy vinyl records in Prague?

We understand that a turntable is not the most convenient of souvenirs to buy, but a vinyl record or two? Why not? It's definitely a gift that will keep on giving through many repeated listens. The quality of the records is decent, and the prices are very reasonable (unlike in, let's say, Berlin). So where do we go hunting for a vinyl record or two?

Music Antiquariat

This small shop in the shadows of the Tyn church focuses mainly on 70s rock, 80s pop, CDs and posters. Don't go searching for rarities here, but it's fun browsing the shelves, and we often walk home with a guilty pleasure or two.

Happy Feet

This very little shop in the Lucerna palace next to the Wenceslas Square is out favorite. Owned by a girl vinyl enthusiast, the shop offers a smaller, but high-quality collection of music, with a separate section for soul, funk and jazz. In addition to records, the shop sells Czech fashion accessories and refurbished old Czech Prim wristwatches (Czechoslovakia was only the 7th country in the world to master the manufacture of the automatic watch). Highly recommended!

Phono.cz

This shop near the National Theatre offers a great collection of records throughout all genres. In addition to records, the shop sells (and services) old Czech and foreign turntables and other rare hi-fi equipment. The shop is often busy with DJs searching for new records, and it's clear this is a shop for vinyl nerds.

What to buy?

A Czech turntable, of course! OK, we do understand that a turntable may be a bit of a hassle to transport back home, so we suggest that you buy an old Czech vinyl record instead. But how do you know what is good? Here are some tips:

If you like rock and new wave, we'd recommend, among others, Straka v hrsti by Prazsky vyber (if you can find a pressing - it's a legendary album, banned by the Communist government for years), anything by Vladimir Misik & Etc., Flamengo, Olympic, or Blue Effect.

Or perhaps a Czech chanson? Then go for Hana Hegerova, Marie Rottrova, Eva Olmerova, or, picking among newer ones, Richard Muller (ok, he's Slovak, but it still counts).

Looking for jazz? Choose anything by Emil Viklicky, Jan Hammer, Jan Spaleny & ASPM, Collegium Musicum, or Miroslav Vitous.

And if you're into old, Communist, mindless pop, definitely try Michal David, Kroky Frantiska Janecka, Kamelie, or Dalibor Janda. But you've been warned.

Karel Gott and Helena Vondrackova form a separate category. Great singers, great performances, loved by the nation, but carrying a heavy burden of collaborating with the previous government.

Finally, try to find an album by Michal Tucny. There's nothing like the sound of Czech country & western (really).

Music Antiquariat

Týnská ulička 8, Prague 1

Mon-Sat 10.30-19

Happy Feet

Vodickova 36, Prague 1

Mon-Thu 12-19, Fri 12-18

Phono.cz

Opatovická 156/24, Prague 1

Tue-Fri 13-19 


Prague Shopping: For Paper Lovers

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We love paper. We love paper so much we are sometimes sad that most of our communication is done electronically these days. However, this small obstacle does not prevent us from researching and visiting paper and stationery shops whenever we travel and from browsing their shelves in search of paper and envelopes of various shapes and colors and of stationery ornamented with great typography. If you are like us, this post is for you. While there are several producers and shops that might be of interest to you and us, today we are going to write about Papelote. Started by three young designers, the shop has been around for a few years only but already managed to become the 2011 Shop of the Year according to the Czech Design Awards (the fact that it was designed by the famous A1 Architects studio might have helped). Although the shop is not really big, you can easily spend hours looking at, and feeling, diaries of various shapes, envelopes of all the colors of the rainbow, clever paper packages, and designer postcards; all made from environmentally friendly materials.

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In addition to original paper and stationery, Papelote produces and sells really smart iPad and iPhone covers made of felt (we have one, and several of our guests have asked about it). They also have a small collection of books from Czech publisher Baobab and books featuring different illustrators and printmakers.

In addition to this shop, they also operate Pape.lab, a workshop studio thatoffers its services to basically anyone who is interested in paper, design and originality.

Want a souvenir from Prague? You don't have to hull around a big crystal vase! A nice diary or a simple postcard fits anywhere, and will bring back many memories. We know this works for us, and we think it could work for you, too! Btw if you visit the shop, you'll probably find one of the founders behind the counter.

papelote obchod a dílnaVojtěšská 9, Praha 1, 110 00Mon - Fri 11am – 7pmSat noon–6pm tel.: +420 774 719 113 info@papelote.cz


Shopping in Prague: Communist era Czech vintage treasures

Today, we have a tip for lovers of all things vintage. When we travel we always search for unique local things to bring home. Although we can spend hours antique hunting when we travel, back home we used to prefer young designers. But that’s changing. For a long time the design quality of Communist-era Czechoslovak design objects was ignored by almost everyone. These pieces were basically seen as nothing to write home about. However, the popular haunts for vintage object lovers like NoveretroNanovoMoare/Retroobjects and Tuzeks - all started out of a love for vintage things - have slowly made pointed our attention to design gems that are also becoming very popular on the world market.