Keeping The Wolf From The Door

I went for a trawl around the charity shops today in search of interesting fabric and desperate for a book ( having read all but two Moomin books …the last two being saved for an emotional emergency as they are hot chocolate for my soul!) I found these beautiful old books with weird and obscure titles. Too expensive for my pocket money but aren’t the covers gorgeous? I love the faded colours on “Dick’s Dog” and the sailing boat… no sign of a dog though.

I came home with Inspector Morse ( not literally unfortunately!) and a handful of buttons and belt buckles which was all they’d let me take from a button tin I was hoping to buy and rummage through. I love old button boxes- they always smell funny and generally have one or two treasures hidden at the bottom.

I’m still making my little note books, the picture above is the latest, using a design I’ve showed you before, but this time printed on cotton and embroidered. At the moment I’m all over the place and not at all focused so I think I need to stick to one idea at a time , maybe books on Mondays, New Leaf Tuesdays etc.

I just got a couple of e-mails , one from Leanne Hodgson, mentioning a new blog for the “Venitia Red ” label .”Venitia Red” is a really interesting idea; a fashion label supporting new graduates and run as a community project. The other was a newsletter from Selvedge magazine which included a big advert for Helen Stevenson’s “Designers Marketplace”. The next event is in Newcastle on March 28th and should be well worth a visit.

Reading: Inspector Morse Omnibus by Colin Dexter

Listening to: Last Night a DJ Saved My Life

Hand In Day

  
Here are a random selection of images to celebrate handing in Final Major Project yesterday. One is a strange family photograph featuring me, my mum and my brother with our Daddy as cameraman! The other two are part of a second year furnishings project that was based on the Wienner Werkstatte. Not my strongest project but I do quite like the final painted out design which survived a major coffee spill disaster and was actually improved by it! The sketch book page shows samples of heat transfer print on cotton velvet, a technique I’ve enjoyed exploring in further projects.This project was entered for the Bradford Textile Society Prize, which was won that year by Leanne Hodgson from my yeargroup.
Well, I can’t believe four years of study is over ( apart from the degree shows ), it feels very empty here in the kitchen without the piles of fabric and paper and thread and beads and general junk. Typically the heat wave is over now that I have time to enjoy it and the garden has gone crazy,time to get out there and knock it into shape…