its been a while ... almost a month. things are pretty busy around these parts ... there's been snow, falling leaves and much a do about markets, new contracts and new stores (more stores, more markets). all good. oh, and another market this weekend ...

Saturday 22nd November - Chiswick NCT Christmas Fair

10.30am - 4pm

St. Michael and All Angels Church, Bath Road, London W4 1TT

sketching bunnies

Perhaps I was inspired by Delphine Doreau at Non dairy Diary who's been drawing hens ... perhaps it was the kozyndan prints we have on our wall (this one and this one) ... perhaps it was that I had an idea to embroider some bunnies onto a quilt I'm working on ... anyway I now have a collection of bunny sketches, that don't really work, scale wise, on my quilt ... but I'm sure I can find a use for them somewhere. hmmm?

wellington wall

This pic was taken a wee while ago, in Wellington. I think its quite beautiful. I love the way a pattern can be unconsciously created.

First the bricklayer placed each brick systematically in its position, then the painter sealed the bricks with some white paint. But it seems that things did not stop there, more layers were attached and the wall performed its intended task of protecting its inhabitants from the elements.

Then the demolition team and perhaps the weather (it is Wellington after all), pulled away at the extra layers ... revealing a beautiful texture.

why i knit

I could let the picture do the talking. But I won't as I'm too thrilled at the wearer's appreciation of the scarf I knit her.

Nell is 5 years old ... just off to School. A few weeks before her 5th birthday Aunty Sarah looked through her yarn stash and collected up the most colourful yarns and made a simple scarf. After a couple of weeks the scarf was long enough to cast off. It had to be long enough to be 'grown up' and short enough not to drag in the mud.

A few days later Nell received the parcel in New Zealand.

Much to my delight Nell absolutely loved the scarf ...
"its 10 metres long Aunty Sarah!" she exclaimed over the phone
"10 metres long Nell ... are you sure?" her ever sensible Aunty replied
"oh silly me, perhaps I'll have to count again"
Her mum reported that a metre for Nell is one of her feet ... she had placed the scarf down on the ground and walked next to it to measure it. How cute.

So now Nell wears the scarf TO and FROM school ... not at school as she thinks it may get lost and she wouldn't like that. And each time Aunty Sarah calls she tells me that she's wearing the scarf. Brilliant.

How cute are these illustrations. They're from a children's book, 'Iggy Peck, Architect' (ISBN 13: 978-0-8109-1106-2) and the illustrations are by David Roberts.

I want to make clothes like the ones in his illustrations ... with all their stripes and patterns and colours.
I quite like this cushion also ... hmmm?

c'est beau

Isn't he beautiful. This little fulla was found while on a walk up to Lac de L'orceyrette. At the top of the lac there is a type of grass/marshlands where I took the following photo ... the colours were beautiful ... had to make a colour palette from it.
After spending the majority of our time in the Alps we visited a friend near Lyon. He lives in a beautiful rural area near his very hospitiable family. We were spoilt with their good food and company.

I was taken by this little road which resembled something of a patchwork quilt. Perhaps I'll design one inspired by the patterns on this road!

a weekend in the french alps

I've been away ... and it was lovely. Adam and I went to the French Alps for a friend's wedding. We went to Serre Chevalier and stayed in my favourite town there, Monetier.

happy shopping

Its sale time. Check out my shop for lots of savings.

onion teatowel sketch

The beautiful text sitting amongst the onions is by my friend Rachel Smith. Its part I of a two part poem ... stand by for the next installment. I hope to print this one on Thursday at the studio ... it needs a bit of cleaning up tomorrow but I pretty happy with it overall. The roots look a bit mushy and the text is a little hard to read in places ... oh and I need to put a capital T on the first word ... but these things aside ... its working for me. You'll need to click on the image to really see it.

tomato red

My first tomato! This big fulla has been hanging out on my tomato plant for AGES ... the weather hasn't really been warm enough to redden him up ... till now ... the last couple of weeks have had a couple of deliciously warm days ... and voila ... Mr Tom was able to show his true colours! He was absolutely delicious on a piece of Vogel's Soy and Linseed, with butter, salt, pepper and basil ... mmmmmmmm.

As I was going to St Ives ...

Went to Cornwall for the weekend. Tidy little villages meet wild and rugged landscapes. Inspiring.

Inspired by these coastal rocks ... the colours and the textures.

oh onion you are so beautiful

I'm embarking on a wee project with a friend ... which involves me exploring vegetables ... starting with the onion.
I love the way nature seems to explode as you look closer. An onion, a crispy brown skin encasing a whiteish greenish smelly cooking ingredient that makes you cry ... simple.
But start looking and its actually a pinky rust coloured casing with lines expanding through the middle and contracting at the ends. Peel this layer away and the most beautiful greens are revealed fading into white.

Then look at the peel ... and its actually

a fairy's wing?

There are so many nuances to the different layers ... some have an almost synthetic electronic quality with tiny surfaces reflecting light in different directions. While other layers are really matt and paper like.

And now for the nudie shot ... quite explicit really.

Italian surfaces

catch up

I've been ignoring my blog ... apart from the odd ssd product update ... there's been no photos of things that inspire me ... I guess I've been busy ... I guess its been summer(ish) ... I guess its time to start posting again. So lets take ourselves back two and a half months to our trip to Puglia, in Southern Italy. Ahhhh ... just thinking about it warms me up and relaxes me. The city rising from the sea above is Polignano a Mare.


These buildings are part of Sassi di Matera, an ancient town which began as a prehistoric cave settlement. Most of these buildings are actually the built entrances to caves.


The people in Puglia were incredibly friendly and generous. Especially in the towns were tourists weren't common. We were given fruit for free, people refused our tips, and generally people were very patient with our dreadful Italian.

in store now!

After much organising ... I'm online with my products ... yeeehaa! If you click on 'my work' you'll be taken through to my website where you will be able to see what I've been up to these past few months.

revealed

zukzuk asked to see the whole print (a showed a wee smidgen in June 13th's post). 'We three trees' ... a christmas design, not sure what I'm going to do with it for the next 6 months! Being summertime it felt like Christmas was approaching (I grew up in the southern hemisphere!).

more crafting

check this out ... how to make your own ceramic transfers ...

paper

Thursday Printday was a bit of an adventure for me this week ... as I tried out paper screen printing for the first time. I've had a few people asking me for paper printed artwork so I thought I'd leap in and give it a go.

Its a suprisingly different process to fabric screen printing. The main differences being that the screen is suspended above the paper, the screen mesh is much smaller and the screen is filled with ink (flooded) before you actually print. So it was a little awkward at first for a textile printer ... but it didn't take long to get the hang of once I'd go my head around it.

You're only getting a sneaky snippet of a look at the design ... just a morsel ... someday soon I'll show you the whole thing.

camera love

So here are my first product shots. I am exceedingly proud of my efforts ... mostly because taking these required a lot of effort. I think I could probably do better, but its a good start me thinks.



It seems that the love I have for my Canon 350D camera has been a very superficial one. Yesterday we did a little bonding with the help of the manual and this guys tutorial/rant/waffle about taking product shots.



Please note ... I found it necessary to copy this tutorial/rant/waffle into Word and delete all the many unnecessary paragraphs of information. Leaving me with the following necessary and very useful points for taking product photos:

Use a small aperture (which on my camera means big numbers (f stops))

Use reflected sunlight preferably on an overcast day

Small apertures require long shutter speeds, so use the timer on you camera and mount you camera in a steady place (I don't have a tripod).

Use the long exposure noise reduction function (My 350D has this function)

Use the white balance correction function (Yes, ol' 350D has this one too)



So I went out into the garden and set up the most hilarious studio with 4 pieces of mount card. Took a whole lot of pictures ... played around in photoshop ... and voila ... I have a set of clear pretty images. But they could be clearer I think ... perhaps I need 'proper lights'?

It took the majority of the day to produce these, but I am delighted with my new found knowledge ... and even more infatuated with my lovely Canon.

show's over

I had great fun at the trade show earlier this week. I thought I would hate having to sell my work ... turns out you couldn't shut me up! It was great meeting the many many interesting people that came through. Will let you know who'll be stocking my wares in about a months time.


Being Thursday Printday yesterday ... I went to the ELP studios to get my print fix. I set up a few screens for a printing session early next week. Stand by for printed teatowels.