Saturday, October 31, 2009

Friday's Projects





After being gifted great stash of large vintage buttons I wanted to make some chokers using nothing but buttons. I made these two necklaces last night. I had to redo them a few times. Once when I was snipping the Beadalon as I was finishing I actually cut the main thread and had to start all over again.

The idea I had in mind turned out to be not mechanically possible but the results were pleasing anyway. I wanted the small buttons to be on the outside but it turned out that there was no way that the necklace would lay right. The necklace would actually turn itself over while you would wear it. (I did a small test drive for a few minutes in front of the mirror.) It didn't take long to find out that it wasn't going to work.  So they turned out to be necklaces that  perhaps have even more personality on the back side than the front. I don't see a problem with that. It's a pleasing design that the wearer will enjoy seeing  hanging even when not in use.
I  finished the ends with some tiny round stone beads that I purchased from  Crystal Penrod of Alaska Bead & Gem 

I 'd like to put them in Chartreuse's shop in downtown  Fairbanks. They feature recycled, upcycled fashions in their fun, quirky boutique that is a fresh addition to the city.

Thursday's Projects




I tried my hand at a tool apron pattern.  The instructions for the ties however, were off.  A 34 inch tie just won't do. I made adjustments and improvised after I had cut the pieces.
The fabric was a desert scene against a Bali sarong fabric and the blue one was inside out Hawaiian tapa fabric contrasting with the right side.

Friday, October 30, 2009

My Office Surroundings

My new rug really ties the room together.

I am indeed lucky these days to have a lots of different spaces to do different aspects of my creating. Kind of like having three different studios.

My first studio is my office space in the upstairs that looks out onto some snowy spruce trees today and fresh tire tracks on the newly fallen snow. This is the room where my Mac resides along with a printer and scanner and office supplies. I am scanner crazy and would feel awfully bereft without one.
Here I have various collections of dolls, antique wooden pieces, Hmong fabric swatches, vintage books along with cool trinkets I've collected over the years.

I have a table for assembling , gluing or packaging in the middle and it's a real challenge to not let it turn into just a catch-all for my messes. 






Next Series of ACEO's






We're getting ready for our trip south to Arizona for the winter and most of my winter shows are behind me now. I'm taking time to play in the studio as my inventory in the bead department is adequate for now. I'll be starting up again with production when we get down to my Bisbee studio.

I'm not sure if some of these  ACEO's are complete but I'm building them up in layers and assessing them to see if they have a finished feeling to me. 

I have been holding on to a wonderful old Japanese knitting machine book for perhaps the early 80's that show sample swatches of finished patterns. They're bold and bright and made for a good background. It's fun grabbing snippets of random text from old books and out of context they become more enigmatic paired with the images.

Some of the images magically pair themselves up on my table like the giraffe and hip socket much to my own delight.  The 1912 book of cattle diseases becomes an inspiration.

This is my second series of ACEO's fresh off the press this week.

Fun with Vintage Ephemera






I'm starting fresh with a new blog since my old one is sadly neglected  and I've been doing some new things. Since my retirement and moving to Arizona half the year I have been collecting vintage books and ephemera ostensibly to sell on Etsy. Now it seems that I'm inspired to keep this stash for myself mostly and make my own artist trading cards (ATC's) or ACEO's Art Cards, Editions & Originals.

The art cards are required to be 2.5 inches by 3.5 inches and can be in any medium as long as they lay fairly flat and not so embellished that they are too thick to fit in a collector's album. 
They are fairly addicting to create I'm finding and I've done my first two batches in the last few weeks.

My main craft however is lampwork bead making which I have been doing for over ten years now. You can find my beads for sale on Etsy and can see an extensive gallery of my finished and mostly sold work in my online gallery on my website.

I also have been posting on my fan page on Facebook. If you care to become a fan you can get more day to day small updates regarding my business.

Here is my first batch ever of ACEO's that were made with vintage cabinet photos collected in antique shops on my last trip to Maine. I use vellum, mica and text from vintage books. a few of the images I got from a site online that  provides free vintage images for your crafting.