New work

handmade felt bead bracelet

I started working on a few new ideas recently (in my new studio!). Above is one of the bracelets I have made for an order that I delivered 2 weeks ago to the new Oriel Mostyn Craft Shop. They reopened the new gallery, cafe and craft shop and it has been a huge success with the most beautiful space imaginable (frankly I would like to live there). All of us locals have missed the thought provoking, world class exhibitions and are thrilled to have it back with us. The craft shop have subsequently sold all of my bracelets so I have been madly making a pile of more felt beads, that are more the size of gobstoppers but whos quibbling amongst friends?! The are also selling some felt necklaces, felt corsages and some of the cards that I produced from the beachy pictures in an earlier post.

beaded necklace

This was a necklace that I have been playing around with for a friend. It is covered in gorgeous beads and joined at the back with pearls that have been linked with sterling silver coils. This is like a sweet shop of yumminess to hang round your neck and goes with any outfit. Pleased to say my friend loved it and hasnt taken it off since she recieved it.

the window with my bunting and pictures

Luna Flower is another one of my stockists and she has the most gorgeous flower shop that you want to just mooch around and spend time in. She is such a clever florist and has a brilliant eye for unusual flowers in the most fantastic colours. She has displayed some of my bunting and the original artwork that I have developed my cards from. She also sells numerous other bits and pieces that I’ve made, teacosies, tea towels, mugs, brooches to name but a few.

a close up off one of my corsages

Gorgeous colours and the effects of the silks, ribbons and wools in these always amaze me, they are just like a real flower with all the veins running through them and the colours are just divine.

printed aluminium brooches

printed aluminium earrings

Above are for of the aluminium broches that |I have printed with lace…the contrast with the metal and delicate pattern always intriuges me. I went back to Sarah Anderson for another lesson in how to solder so I can make the sterling silver posts to hld these brooches together. Needless to say I still have massive problems with trying to master the art of this and I end up getting very frustrated with myself and my inability to grasp what should be such a straightforward technique! I did manage to make enough to make these four brooches and to also try out these earrings which I am so thrilled with the way they have worked out it was worth the frustration. If anyone knows of anyone who might be interested in making me some sterling silver posts then I am willing to talk turkey!

A piece of land art sculpture I made 'is it a giraffe?'

I made this piece of land art on a visit to Newborough Beach on Angelsey  one weekend when the weatherr was amazing and the drift wood around the beach is always in good nick and plentiful. Can you see thgiraffe?

New bracelets I am playing round with at the moment

I have raided my box of goodies and being a magpie I have threaded all sorts of deliciousness onto cord of differing thickness and added pearls and moonstone to headpins that dangle off at intervals. I am really in love with these at the moment and am finding that the way I have got a slip knot working to keep them on and so different wrist sizes can wear them is working brilliantly. Production here I come.

different view of bracelets

So this is what I have been doing recently and on the whole there are some rather interesting avenues that I am going down. I just need to concentrate on a few at a time now! Not an easy featt for someone with a butterfly brain…

Commission

I had a comission recently from Karen at www.allabouttheboys.co.uk for a picture of the sea. The only specification was that it needed to be very beachy and had to have a mad seagull in it. This is quite a broad request but I set about drawing up some compoisitions and then deciding which I liked the most. I settled on a deckchair with a huge stripy umberella above it. I wanted Karen to think of relaxing by the sea, hearing the waves lapping on the shore whilst she lounged in the deckchair, giving her a break from her incredibly hectic life that she leads running a very successful childrens clothing company.

I drew the umberella, flag, bucket & spade with pencil and then oil pastel. I cut these images out and then placed them on a fabric background and then sewed them in place. I then set about making the deckchair out of fabric…..this was one of those things that I ended up wishing that I had chosen a different image to tackle! I must have cut out 20 different deckchairs and non where right. I eventually settled on one but this went horribly wrong. Nothing I did made the picture any better in fact it got to the stage where I decided that I was better off unpicking the whole thing and starting from scratch which is what I did and I think the finished article works well and the mad seagull is as daft as I was hopng he was going to be.

sunny day by the seaside

Karen I hope it makes you smile and I hope it gives you some peace in those totally mad moments?! Thanks for giving me the opportunity.

New Studio

Recently I managed to persuade my long suffering hubby that I really needed a studio space in the house and the end of our ridiculously long lounge would be the ideal place for it! It is only ever used to pop the Christmas tree once a year and the rest of the time it is filled with boxes of my clobber and random pieces of furniture that have yet to find a home.

The view of the jungle outside my studio window

As anyone who works from home will understand, the hostile take over of the kitchen with work, can lead to, shall we say…’heated’ discussions with family members. Everytime a meal needs to be prepared and if we really must, eaten, the worktops, table and probably hob will have to be cleared of the days collection of boxes of fabric, baskets of work being finished off, jars and bottles of beads & buttons, a sewing machine and all the other detrius of what goes into making a tea towel, picture or  even a piece of jewellry.  Then it will have to all be bought out again to be spread out once the meal has been cleared away so work can be carried on  with. This can lead to even the most placid of people feeling ratty, snappy and rather like a shreiking banshee.

So it was, that very early on a Friday morning I found myself letting in a very nice man who had come along to fling up a wall! I was racing out to a silversmithing course and came back home that evening to the most amazing sight of 1 room having turned into 2!

The brick wall in MY STUDIO!

I was unable to do anything about it on either the Saturday or the Sunday (much to my chargrin) so I awaited the Monday morning where I got up, painted the room and the new wall and then started heaving the furniture in and getting all my things collected from around the house and putting them in their new homes. I was amazed at how clear the rest of the house became and how each room suddenly looked all neat and tidy. I honestly hadn’t realised that I had taken over in quite the capacity that I had. Oops!

Organisation = shock!

Being able to put things away was such an amazing feeling and then being able to go to something I needed without searching the entire house trying to remember where I had tidied it away to last time I used it was so fabulous. It has also become an amazing time saver!

fabric and wool store

When everything is shoved away in boxes and bags it is hard to rememeber what you have in stock and I had found whilst unpacking that I have doubled up on somethings & totally run out of others.

A table of my very own!

It is so heavenly to be able to walk into this room and just get on with my work without having to worry about the mess, whether stuff is going in the food or more importantly that the food isnt going on my work so I have to start it all again. Even the animals seem to know that this is a space where they cant run amok and ‘touch wood’ so far the kids have done nothing but poke their heads in…this in itself can be rather a calming thing! The other half has laughed as he can stand in the middle of the room and almost (thats quite an important almost) touch either wall. He is ridiculously tall and frankly there is only me in there so does it matter? Mighty things start from tiny seeds!

Tea Cosies, Tea Towels, cakestand and a cameo from one of my mugs!

These are some of the new things that I have been making this week for an order. I am really pleased with the outcome, what do you think?

appliqued tea towels

These appliqued tea towels are really pretty and wash really well even though they are almost too pretty to use! The fabrics are some really pretty patchwork ones, some vintage ones from my Godmother and others that have been given to me over the years or that I have found. The trimmings are sometthing else I think and I love the way they just finish the tea towel off and take it from something quite ordinary into something really interesting with loads of diffferent textures going on.

tea cosie, tea towel and cake stand

The idea for the cake stand came from one Id seen in a shop made with teacups. I had these beautiful plates from my Grandmother and they had been knocking about in a cupboard for years never being used so by doing this I can now use it for cakes…if I ever make any again..i keep trying to avoid it as I then have to eat them all! Or like in this picture for ‘lifestyle’ shots for my stuff. I pinched some of the kids easter eggs to put something on it for these shots. I also thought it would be a great thing to use for displaying my things at craft fairs and if I make some more for display in some of the shops that stock some of the smaller things that I make.

one of the teacosies, cakestand and one of my mugs

This is one of the new teacosies I have made with appliques images on the front of either a cup and saucer or a cup cake. On the back of all of them I| applique the word panad which is Welsh means cuppa. The also have a mini cupcake sewn on that I top off with a pink ‘cherry’ bead.

back of the tea cosie

pin striped tea cosie

The pinstriped tea cosie makes me chuckle as its normally a fabric found on business men but instead its on a girly appliqued tea cosy!

panad side of the tea cosie

think this one is my favorite

panad side

Wool tops

Just put an order in with www.fibrecrafts.co.uk so many amazing textures and amazing colours – yum yum

I ordered some of these wensleydale fibres

Some of these beautiful silks

and some of these delicious merino wool tops

I am looking forward to them arriving and then I can get making some of the  corsages for my order and some of these bracelets and necklaces

felt bracelets

this is the sort of corsage I need to make for the order too

Gwynedd and Clwyd Association of Craftworkers

craft guild

I had good news on Monday night that I had been accepted to join the craft guild here in North Wales. I had been told I wasn’t suitable as I make too many different things! Thankfully, the lovely and talented silversmith Sarah Anderson, who runs the amazing course I went on the other week, (where I made the printed aluminium pieces), fought my corner and made them see that everything I make is textile based (apart from my paintings). She was saying that it is important to have young blood (!) following in their footsteps & to bring new ideas to the table.

So here I am thinking this all sounds very grown up and rather WI to say the least! I am not the best sort of person with clubs and rules…golf clubs make me come out in hives with all the rules of which door can be used if your a woman and what trousers you can wear?!  But it will be nice to have a group of hopefully seasoned crafters to turn to for advice and it will hopefully be a chance to showcase my work with people who are producing things of a more proffessional standard than I have been finding at some local craft fairs.

New Images for Summer Cards

I have had an order for some cards from a local gallery that is reopening in May so I have been trying to make some summery beach images. I think they have worked. They have been made with a fabric background and then I draw some of the detail images and sew them onto the fabric. This is the first picture that I have done like this for a while and the beach hut image proved more than a little frustrating to get right, I wanted it to feel beachy but not too real as it would then jar with the rest of the image that it sits in.

Beach hut, Rowing Boat and Surf Board

The thing that really bought the picture together was making the rowing boat out of fabric as it was’nt working at all by being drawn and by making it green it gave a really good contrast to everything else that was going on around it. The crazy seagull makes me chuckle everytime I see it and it filled the gap above the hut in the sky as it was seeming really empty up to this point. I love that he is swooping into land with his sticky legs coming out at jaunty angles.

The next image was the sandcastle image.

Sandcastle, Crab, Bucket and Spade

This is one that stared off all wrong and then it just clicked into place. I am hoping that it has captured the beach days of childhood with the little windmill blowing in the wind. The bucket is really eye catching in the red and you can imagine that after it has been used for making the sandcastles  it will be filled with pebbles, shells, seawater and the odd little crab that has been pulled out of its rock pool home.

Then came the ice cream….

99 anyone?

The Mr Whippy 99 is synonomous with trips to the beach and the white froth melting all over your hand and down your arm before you have had a chance to eat it. Saving the flake til last, this is more like a cold blob of shaving foam with sugar added but it seems to be the one item after a bucket and spade that is always readily available on British seasides regardless of the weather! This really didnt need anything else in the picture as it has it all in the swirly topped cone.

The last image is one that is perhaps still being worked on. I like it but I have been told that the deckchair is looking more like an armchair…what can I say if I’ve got to sit on a draughty beach pretending it boiling hot I might aswell do it in comfort!

Deckchair, nosy seagull & windmills

I am not sure whether this picture needs a flask of tea by the leg?! The windmills where added as they are fast becoming part of the view from the beach out to sea of most British coastal towns, well certainly that is true where I live. They are monumental and never seem to be actually on harnessing the wind when there is actually a breeze blowing! But sculpturally they are like The War of the Worlds and you can just imagine one day them uprooting and striding onto the land.

In my picture, thankfully, I think they are far less sinister and they have more of the interesting about them rather than spooky.  The seaull is pottering over to see if there are any chips or any food going spare, I think he may be a little disappointed at this chair. The boat is just bobbing along soaking up the rays.

So I think these will work alongside my other images that form the other cards – the fishing boat & the light house. I am hoping that they will also translate into a new batch of mugs! Keeping my fingers crossed on that one.

Galleries and shops now stocking Louli

I went this morning to a shop on Anglesey that is stocking some of my doorstops. www.janetbellgallery.com. Owned and run by Janet Bell the artist. Her paintings are so beautiful and colourful, lots of boats bobbing about on the sea, deckchairs & of course Pen Mon Lighthouse amongst others. She stocks allsorts of fabulous artists work from all around the coastal areas of the UK and she is putting some of my bits in too..I feel honoured!

I also have some pieces in The Royal Cambrain Acadamy, www.rcaconwy.org which is based in the beautiful walled town of Conwy. Doorstops, teacosies, teatowels, some of my jewellry pieces, cards, they have quite a broad range in there and all seem to be selling very well, which is more than pleasing.

The other place locally that I am selling my things is in Luna Flower,  www.luna-flower.com Andrea the owner does the most beautiful arrangments that are a riot of colour and she uses such amazing and interesting flowers, I could, if they weren’t flowers, eat them!! She is the only person I put people who are looking for arrangements in touch with, she just gets it, quite a talent. So, she is also very kindly selling some of my things and I must say they all fit in really well with all the colours she has going on with the flowers and her walls are painted in the most stunning yellow – a spring day, everyday. She again seems to be selling all my things very well. In fact I am about to take some new pieces over to her in the next few days, just in time for the Easter holiday makers.

If you don’t visit the area of North Wales or live here, you can find some work that I have been lucky enough to add to www.swankymaison.com and www.wowthankyou.co.uk. Both sites are stocking totally different ranges of my work. I have also started uploading some of my work that I already have in stock & that isnt a commission, onto www.folksy.com I feel that the last few weeks have been rather busy to say the least but so productive in such a positive way. I just hope I get some orders now! I am looking at another site to put some more jewellrey based products onto so once I have sent in the pics and had them okayed I will let you all know.

Heres to 2010, I told myself it was going to be positive and I was going to push forward with my things and so far I seem to be almost meeting the goals that I have set myself. Now I need to keep the momentum going.

1st painting

This is the first picture that I have repainted from the 3 that I have to do. I am so pleased with how its worked out. Its a brilliant sized canvas (6ft x 6ft) for me to paint as I can get some really big movements going with the paint, the weather was also on my side in that it was stunning & was able to drag it outside and paint it in the sunshine..heaven for the soul.

untiltled '10

Detail - slash and wire binding

detail

re doing paintings

pictures taking over my hall

I have had these 3 paintings hanging round the hall propped up all over the place since early December. I am going to repaint them to hang in the offices at View Creative. They are work I did 12 odd years ago and I have never been that pleased with them so have been itching to get my hands back on them, so when they moved, I pinched them back to rework. The day has come today to make a start….

no2 pic in my hall

Two are 6x6ft and one is 5x5ft. I am wanting to slash them and then stitch them back together with wire, think the sewing I have been doing recently has been feeding my ideas! The walks on the beach and seeing the sky and horizon meet have also been ticking over in the old noggin.

one of the images that have triggered ideas in my head

So after layering paper to give texture and depth I can get on with throwing the paint around. So I am off to the kitchen to plaster the walls and floor in bin bags and move the table and chairs out so I can get started….

the last and smallest of the 3

I know we shouldnt change our work but keep it to learn from but these look at me and make me feel flat and guilty everytime I see them. So goodbye rubbish and hopefully, hello fab new work!