My Creative Space: 24 Hour Party People

Oh my, it's been a very BIG 24 hours here! Yesterday morning, a most wonderful present arrived from the wonderful Mitsy of Art Mind. I was undoing the layers of divine packaging with exclamations of delight and disbelief at how incredibly generous she is. Suddenly, I remembered that I should be taking photos of these goodies before I devoured all the chocolate etc ;) Mitsy had a giveaway (inspired by Lisa from The Red Thread) where she decided to send a thank you gift to the 3 people who commented most on her blog... and I was lucky enough to be one of them. I certainly wasn't expecting so many goodies - isn't she just so lovely?

Look at these divine ceramic pieces with Mitsy's trademark Matryoshka dolls - all with a gorgeous crackle glaze on them. Another flower piece she has put in one of her handmade boxes - did you catch her tutorial on how to make these? Have a peek here.

There were many yummy chocolates... sadly all gone now!

Totally amazing craft supplies, including some crochet cotton... *in love*... felt that Mitsy had dyed herself and some handmade felted coasters with instructions about how to do it myself... *bliss*

And two surprise packages for my girls who got to open them yesterday afternoon and they just love them, Mitsy - thank you so much! Thank you so much for everything Mitsy - I am just blown away by how very lovely you are :)

But wait! There's more... I was just about to blog about this gorgeous girl when another amazing thing happened... My friend from Chicago was suddenly at my doorstep! Surprise! Oh my, it's been 24 hours of partying around here people! Sarah has left now but it's been a big day and a big night, meticulously planned by Sarah and my hubby to my total ignorance, but oh we've had some fun! To say I'm a tad delicate this morning would be an understatement! ;)

So, my creative space? Well, that happened before yesterday obviously! I made my embroidered doily into a brooch.

Find more creative spaces (hopefully smaller ones!) at Kirsty's at Kootoyoo.

More Thread Text

Casual Poet Culture

...a design studio in Singapore who also have a little cafe where they decided to embroider the menus...

Candace Hicks

...hand embroidered canvas books as a record of co-incidence...

Iviva Olenick

...Brooklyn textile designer and visual artist who runs 30 miles a week...

Katie Cupcake

...Etsian with an idea so fabulous she's closed till 2010 so she can actually complete all the orders she has...

Ginger Anyhow

...multi-uber-artist of many mediums who decided to embroider 20 random love messages...

It's funny how sometimes when you're not even looking for more wonderment, it finds you anyway :)

via Crust Station

Inspiration: Frances Trombly

The work of Frances Trombly is so exciting and inspirational. I love it when people apply any medium in an unexpected way but I must confess I am in love when that medium is crochet and embroidery. I do love her crochet confetti and household items like the power cord and the hose... but just look at that hand stitched receipt..! I still can't quite believe the meticulous detail. You can feast your eyes on more of her work at her website here. I found her via here.

Inspiration: Monokraft

I'm loving the pure lines of some furniture at the moment. Above is the work of a Japanese firm called Monokraft. Find their website here. I found them via here.

My Creative Space - Channeling Ado Annie

Do you remember TV's Saturday Matinee? Week after week of fabulous movie matinees from the 1960s... Jerry Lewis, Doris Day, Rosalind Russell, Leslie Caron, Audrey Hepburn... all those musicals! Did you love them? Do you still remember the words to some of the songs? Well, I've found myself humming the Ado Annie song from Oklahoma lately... you know the one... "I'm just a girl who can't say no, I'm in a terrible fix. I always say Come on let's go, just when I ought to say nix..." If you aren't familiar with this gem and want to have a listen, visit here.

So, yeah... I think I'm channeling Ado Annie ;) I received a lovely email inviting me to participate in an artist's exchange and I knew I had a million things to do... I knew there were so many people waiting for me to do things I'd promised them ages ago... but I just couldn't say no! The guilt did wear heavily on me though, so I set myself a challenge. It was already evening and I told myself I had to finish it that night and that I could only use bits and pieces already hanging around in my work room. So, I found a print I'd made off the stencil for my banksia leaves screenprint, a bird I'd started for my yellow collage and discarded when I realised there wasn't enough room for the tail, a block printed letter C that I'd stitched around one day months ago, some felt bits hanging around and some iron-on transfer bits of lace from a project I'd been working on a couple of years ago. Et voila!

It's the pictorial equivalent of a bubble and squeak soup but I hope Cecilia likes it! (I know, her work is so amazingly gorgeous, it's a wonder I had the guts to participate at all!!) Anyway, bravery was mustered and it is currently winging its way over to Sweden. I'm still one person short to invite into the exchange so if you'd like to participate, email me. It is good fun - particularly if you can bubble and squeak it ;)

See more creative spaces or join in yourself over at Kootoyoo. Big thanks to Kirsty for hosting, as always :)

New in the shop

Two new red shoppers for the shop. I thought it'd be good to have a couple without the long stripy straps over the hessian. These are just as strong as they are lined with some very durable cotton drill from Ikea... (isn't it just the most fabulous fabric? Love Ikea fabric.) So, that's it for now with the bags. I'm not making anymore this year and not sure if I'll do more next year or not. Visit the shop if you'd like to see them in more detail :)

Inspiration: Andrea Myers

I am incredibly excited by this discovery. It's something I've had buzzing on the periphery of my brain for a while now and then I found the amazing work of Andrea Myers and it felt like all the lights came on! ;) These arts pieces are constructed from layers and layers of cloth and paper, and explore the space between the two-dimensional and three-dimensional. I love how the pieces have such a sumptuous wild form, and yet there is that delicate fine art appeal to them as well in the strips of cloth that could almost be brush strokes. Myers says in her artist's statement "I identify myself as a painter who constructs painterly sculptures and installations." So inspiring! For more information and images, visit her website here. I found this work via the ever-fabulous Please Sir here.

Red Shopper

Thank you so much for all your amazing comments about the shopper bags. The two from my creative space are already spoken for (they've been on my to-do list for so long!). So, I've taken on board your comments and have come up with some ideas for ones I might put in the shop. I don't have many of my banksia screenprints left so I decided to follow the atomic theme of the other screenprinting and sew on a 1960s image. Also, I've added a handy dandy pocket. I have absolutely no idea what to charge for them either... I was thinking about $25. Seems a bit much for a shopping bag, but it's actually cost me more than that in materials etc. That's the problem with hand-made, isn't it? It's why I'd rather give things away. What do you think?

My Creative Space - Shopper bags

I'm playing along with Kirsty's My Creative Space meme this week. Join in or have a peek at other creative spaces over at Kootoyoo.

This week's preoccupation was making shopper bags. I had some hessian which I screenprinted with two layers of design. I wanted to add something more but the wide weave of the hessian made this difficult so I added some of my banksia screenprints from months and months ago. It was good to finally use them. I've made up two bags so far, experimenting with the handle design... still not sure which one looks best. Any preferences? Have a happy creative space day!

Inspiration: Sara Ferrari

I guess it's not something I'd actually wear myself, but I really love the idea of this fabulous bracelet by the Italian designer, Sara Ferrari. Each layer combines to represent your age, in a roman numeral kind of way... hence the name, XCIX_Y Bracelet. The bracelet can be layered to show any age up to 99 years. The wooden pieces are made of walnut and show the decades, while the translucent plexiglas fill in the years in between. I love that her inspiration comes from trees (tree-love again!) and the way the age of a tree can be calculated by the layers of rings in its trunk. It's that idea of layering and being able to alter the positioning or parts that I find so inspirational. Also, while it's not something I'd actually wear, I could really see this as a piece of art on my wall... something that can be changed or added to as you clock up the years :) For additional pictures and info, or to purchase one, visit Ferrari's website.

Inspiration: Stig Lindberg

This is a very self-indulgent post, I'm afraid. I realise the whole world probably already knows of the amazing Stig Lindberg and I'm not even going to attempt to precis a career that spanned so many functional art forms. This is simply a visual feast because it is so very inspiring. There is an official site for Stig Lindberg (in English) here and about a google of other hits should you wish to explore further ;)

The lovely people who signed up for my PiF (Pay it Forward) will be pleased to hear that I'm finally on to this item in my list of things to do.... and hopefully they'll be glad to hear that the wonderful Stig is featuring highly in my inspiration for this :)

My Creative Space - Doily stitching

I'm playing along with Kirsty's Creative Space meme this week. You can see some more spaces or join in yourself over at Kootoyoo.

A lovely little parcel arrived from Korea at the beginning of the week... a fabulous doily stamp from the Etsy Store, Lemontree 77. So, I was playing around stamping this and stamping that... and then, I started stamping fabric to see how it would imprint on that. It was rather yummy, but realising the ink pad ink would not stay there, I decided to embroider over the pattern. There are lots of mistakes where the ink was blurred and I had no idea what I was doing, but I think overall it's turned out okay. Of course, being one of those folk who don't know when to stop and leave well alone, I then proceeded to fill in some of the spaces with metallic thread. Sensing the imminent threat of total overkill, though, I stopped so it was just a little distraction on the whole effect. I soaked the fabric in wool wash to ease out the ink and (hopefully) not drain the colour from the thread... and this is the result. Happy Creative Space day everyone!

Inspiration: Lisa Hochstein

If there are three things I absolutely adore, it's fabric, paper and fine stitchery... so, no surprises that the exquisite collage work of Lisa Hochstein has me utterly enthralled. Gathering her pieces from the throw-away world around us, Hochstein's keen eye composes her collages in such a way that there is no dominate force. Each of the mediums she employs works with the other to form pieces where a soft balance or co-existence melds seamlessly within the whole. A fine art painter over her twenty year career, Hochstein began incorporating textiles into her assemblage work about nine years ago. I must confess, it is her stitchery that really makes me swoon... and I'm rather impatient to go and play with the ideas that this inspiring artist has engendered :) You can find more of Lisa Hochstein's work on her website. I found her via the fabulously informative Textile Blog.

Shoulds and coulds...

I should be doing a million jobs and fulfilling a million promises... but instead I made this today :) I think I had a belated Spring moment! It was another geometric shape I was playing with and suddenly I found myself cutting out little flowers in very un-me colours and sewing them onto my geometrics. I must say I'm actually liking it. Stay tuned for more frippery... ;)