Stylish home: MyDrap and Strecks clever solutions for storage, entertaining

By April MacIntyre May 28, 2011, 20:41 GMT

The rolls of colorful cotton placemats and napkins are presented in an easy to store perforated roll - 12 soft, supple cotton squares and rectangles that you can tear off as needed.

Getting the house together for the warmer months and organizing with style just got so much easier with two amazing small businesses.

MyDrap and Strecks have created smart solutions for photo and important paper storage, and entertaining anywhere with style in a snap.

MyDrap napkins and placemats come in rolls you can tear apart like a paper towel, but are elegant and useful.

The rolls of colorful cotton placemats and napkins are presented in an easy to store perforated roll - 12 soft, supple cotton squares and rectangles that you can tear off as needed.

The placemats and napkins (four sizes, over 20 colors) are biodegradable, compostable and recyclable, they can even be washed and used over and over.

The company began in 1925, as textile workers, Antonio and Maria Guasch, founded Hostel Drap, an industrial textile company in Barcelona, Spain.

The family created Rolldrap, cotton cloths on a roll for the hospitality market. The unique idea of disposable textiles created MYdrap for the home and consumer market in 2005.

MYdrap is designed to be mixed and matched to your liking. "Living eco-friendly does not mean you have to stay within the neutral tones. With MYdrap's array of colors and patterns you can be your own tabletop designer," said President of MYdrap USA, Debra MacKinnon.

@MYdrapUSA .
http://www.buymydrap.com/

For me, finding ways to display pictures and put up invitations, notes and keepsakes in my office was troublesome, and messy.

American business Strecks has made this so much fun with so many design options, you can deck out the whole house in colorful and classic Strecks boards that organize schedules, calendars, invites, notes, reminders, photos and even children's artwork so your refrigerator has a break.

Strecks create unique and customizable expression boards that adjust to hold displays of any size. The designer fabric and ribbons hold the largest calendar or the smallest note firmly with clever criss cross ribbons, and make it easy to see the week’s schedule at a glance.

Designed by a San Francisco Bay Area mother, Jodie Strecker, Strecks Collage Boards feature 50 designer fabrics and choices between two ribbon colors to create a custom board that coordinates perfectly with your existing decor.

There is even an option to supply your own fabric for a one-of-a-kind look.

Sliding ribbons are used to frame photos or artwork. There are no tacks, magnets or push pins. Display boards can be changed by simply taking it down and sliding the ribbons around to any configuration

Jodie Strecker tells Monsters and Critics that her time is limited, with three children to look after, and all the play dates, parties and art piles up. "I thought about ideas for a new business, I came back time and again to my mother's talent as a seamstress and designer. Perhaps because I relied on her to take care of all my creative and sewing needs, I never learned how to sew myself. Yet, here I was, looking at my life, and all the stuff that was cluttering my world-and what I kept envisioning was a creative, attractive way to organize and display my children's precious photos and artwork. And, alas, it involved sewing."

The idea for her company Strecks was planted in a time of grief. Jodie's mother was diagnosed with Parkinson's disease when she was just 43. Sixteen years later, she was gone.

"The loss of my mother just a few years ago rocked my world and it shook me out of my complacency: I realized that I could bring both a part of my mother and myself back to life by giving birth to a new venture," says Jodie.

Strecks Collage Boards are interior decorator friendly and attractive ways to showcase childrens' works of art, photos, notes and important pieces of paper.

Another wonderful bit of information, Strecks contributes a percentage of sales to the Michael J. Fox Foundation, which is doing such great work in the search for Parkinson's causes and cures.

"Through Strecks, I celebrate my mother rather than dwell on her absence-because she is absolutely present in my life, my heart and my work. Her photos keep watch over me from the expression board above my sewing machine, and her guidance is with me always. I hear her gentle encouragement and “power speeches” in every board I sew: she reminds me that I can make anything happen, if I just believe," says Jodie.

 www.Strecks.com

April MacIntyre is Monsters and Critics' smallscreen and people/celebrity editor who loves to visit and celebrate small American and Canadian companies when she can. You can contact her on Twitter