If I were to tie 500 deflated balloons around a bright pink painted wooden stool, you just know it would look unbelievably lame.

At Unica Home, however, Natalie Kruch’s Balloona Stool Confetti is sheer brilliance — “making the ordinary both intriguing and beautiful.”

I first read about Natalie Kruch and her colourful creation last year sometime, just a little snippet in Canadian Interiors.

She was just about to graduate from the University of Alberta’s Departments of Art and Design, and the stool (which started out life as an occasional table) had been picked up by Umbra when it was exhibited at Toronto’s Interior Design Show! Now, that’s an appropriately uplifting story for such a funky-cheerful piece of furniture, isn’t it?

Tree stumps have long been a staple of casual — even impromptu — outdoor furniture.

Now they’re moving indoors.

It’s another aspect of the continuing strong trend for elements of nature in interior design and home decor.

In fact, tree stumps seem to be turning up everywhere, whether in their natural form or in a more polished version, even as a hand-crafted representation — and put to use as occasional tables and stools and pedestals and bases for glass-topped table… the possibilities are literally unlimited.

On the up-market end, Hudson Furniture shows a line of tree stumps ranging from a gorgeous natural teak stump to an intriguing collection of petrified wood stumps with colourful striations created by the passage of time.

Or mxyplyzyk offers hand-carved stumps from the trunks of discarded Chinese fir trees, each one a unique piece of functional art in its own right.

And DFC goes a different route, with a tree-stump-inspired ceramic version, hand-glazed in bold modern lime-green or sculptural white.

Having lost a huge old maple tree in the past year, I’m looking at these stump stools and tables with a special interest.

Instead of trying to compost that giant tree stump, perhaps I should be thinking in terms of a new coffee table — natural spalled maple with a lovely smooth hand-rubbed finish?

[H/T to Moco Loco and Kingdom of Style]

I just keep finding myself drawn back to Essey of Denmark’s Illusion side table. The surreal design brings a vision of a decor that blends the minimalism aesthetic with a whimsical touch of Disney-esque fantasy.

Think, The Sorcerer’s Apprentice or Fantasia or that classic Cinderella, flights of visual fancy where the most ordinary objects take on a life of their own…

A single sheet of acrylic (clear or solid white) is crafted into a 18 x 12-inch side table that seems almost magical — the design gives the impression of a table cloth on a round table, but there is no table beneath those graceful folds — an illusion, in fact.

Each of these fascinating handmade tables is unique, just as no tablecloth will drape in exactly the same way every time you put it on a table.

Enchanted by eggs? There’s something so satisfying about that solid form, it’s no wonder the egg is showing up everywhere in home decor and accessories.

Clockwise from left:

• Egg-shaped ceramic Nyokki Grass Pets are handmade in Japan. Filled with growing medium and rye grass seeds, they’ll grow a lovely head of green hair in less than two weeks. They come in various animal characters, from this pretty yellow kitty-cat or the classic yellow chick, to a pink pig or bright blue bear, and more.
• Faberge, of course, practically invented the egg as a decorative objet. This hand-painted porcelain Coronet Flower Limoges Egg opens up to reveal a 24k gold-plated flower basket as a surprise gift hidden inside.
• Edesse Design’s fried egg table puts any room sunny-side-up with its whimsical top in painted MDF, perched on slim chrome legs.
• Squirrel-proof birdhouses are hard to find, but the glossy ceramic Egg Bird House is said to be just that. Handmade exclusively by J Schatz in New York, the earthenware-and-aluminum eggs are durable enough to hang outside year-round, beautiful enough — in 8 shiny colours — to make an unusual decoration in a modern room.
• Tiny pinprick holes in the handcrafted ceramic Star Egg Nightlight let out just enough light to scatter a starry-night illusion on a bedroom ceiling. Lovely! The base is brushed stainless steel, and it comes with a clear electrical cord so as not to detract from the elegant simplicity of the egg form.