Carmen’s Journal
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Photography Becomes a Love
PHOTOGRAPHY BECOMES A LOVE In the last few years, I have I become way more interested in photography. Up until then, I had always been a pretty hopeless photographer, but on one particular trip to Europe in 2015, I fell in love with capturing the beauty I saw around...
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My Family Ties
I was born in Brisbane, Australia and I came from a highly-creative family who all love homes, gardens and property. Whilst my mother sewed, cooked and decorated, my father resorted vintage motorcycles and cars. This was as much a part of our daily life as their work...
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My Interior Design Journey
Carmen Darwin...My Interior Design Background While designing gardens it wasn’t long before long I was helping my clients with their interior design and renovation planning. You see, they would hand me their house plans so that I could design the garden. I would pour...
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Why I love Women
Ever got really excited about meeting new people? I certainly do, so been loving creating some fantastic new networks around the globe in 2017 and I must say I love it so very much. In February I launched my Her Design Story series where I started interviewing women...
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My Grandmother & Her Creative Soul
To my 93 year old grandmother Thank you for teaching me how to spend my life creating. I am forever indebted to your influence. 93 years of stories. It's an extensive time to accumulate things and gather memories that have enormous meaning to them. My grandmother,...
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My Life Philosophy
I believe that we are all put on this earth to do what makes us truly happy and to find what we have within ourselves that can create better lives for others. When we focus on what we do best and that special gift that we can offer, then the world is our oyster. The...
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I Decided to Forgive Myself
Happy 2017 to You I can look back at 2016 and am so thankful for the joy and growth it brought me. As you know I made a dream of mine come true and I took women to Italy for the first time. I had journaled about this for years and made an intention to really push the...
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My Byron Bay Art Retreat
Byron Bay Art Retreat A while back I had the greatest weekend at the beautiful Villa Rustica in the Byron Bay Hinterland. I had the please of staying here after stumbling across their art workshop and accommodation on offer. I saw the images and the workshop on offer...
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I Fell in Love in Melbourne
ROYAL ARCADE IN THE MELBOURNE CBD I had decided that it was time for a trip to Melbourne. I know that one day in the not so immediate future I would like to take a design tour there and so was on the hunt for design and architecture and places that I know women would...
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Styling for A Special Event
On the weekend I had the honour and privilege of styling an event for a friend’s birthday party. She had travelled with me to Italy on my Design and Lifestyle Tour in May and Italy had rubbed off her magic on her, so much so that she and her husband decided to have a...
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What am I About
“When we work together as a team we can and do make things happen.” For most of my life, I have been learning, practising and working towards my goal of being able to help people to improve their homes and their lifestyle. I guess I just didn’t know it. I was never...
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My Design School is Sprouting
Well as you know a while back (actually years ago) I started up my design school to teach women about how to design and style for their own homes, but to be honest, it's been extraordinarily tough getting it off the ground. I never thought that creating online courses...
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Seeking a Travel Fuelled Life
After my first milestone of setting up my design school, I then started to go deep within, as I suppose many women do when they get to my age, and I started thinking about all of the things I love about life and how to combine them to create a business and a life that...
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Paris and the 10 Things I Love About It
Earlier this year I set out on my own personal design and freedom tour and kicked it off with a trip to Paris. Oh, the sites and sounds just sucked me in and spat me out. I had my iPhone ready to capture everything of beauty and delight that I could see. So here I...
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What’s the Real Story
What is it with our homes? What makes us love them so much and spend our time and hard earned money improving them. Lately I have pondered this question so many times, because basically when I talk to my clients or most people I know for that matter, they want to make...
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How to Silence Your Inner Critic
As I grow older I seem to have become ever-more critical of myself, especially frustrated when I am behind on completing certain projects or goals that I set for my personal and business life. I am trying to grow wiser, but sometimes I guess the inability...
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Living With The Squeeze
SMALL HOME LIVING IN AMSTERDAM When space gets tight in our homes, we can become extraordinarily creative when it comes to our living spaces. Amsterdam showed me how it can be done with flair and style. Living in spaces with less square meters than some of our...
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