Thank you to everyone who stopped by my table yesterday during the Sandusky Art Walk! This was the debut event for my plarn items and I really enjoyed witnessing peoples reactions to them once they learned that they were made from plastic grocery bags. Now I can’t wait to see what I’ll be able to come up with before I return to Sandusky for the next art walk on September 1st! See you there!
Today was the second day of the Lakewood Street Sale, and although it was a bit of a wash with all the rain, I was able to try out a new card display that I recently made.
I found two of these wooden wine boxes on the side of the road one trash night years ago while I was still in school and thought they were pretty cool. They’re still one of my favorite trash hunting finds.
It didn’t take much to turn it into a display. I just stapled some gross grain ribbon to the insides to keep the lid at about 90 degrees and then added a couple of more strips of ribbon to clip more cards to. Here the cards are displayed with little gift boxes made from 100% recycled materials, mostly junk mail.
Tomorrow is the MayDay craft bazaar at Bella Dubby and I’m busy putting the finishing touches on all of my products. As usual, I had some last minute ideas, such as typing my website on the backs of my new, hand-embroidered note cards (above and below).
And here’s a little sneak peek of some other new items since the Spring Showers Show; bookmarks (above) and small flower pins (below).
I finally ran out of the cute stationary paper that I used to make my last set of DIY business cards, so I thought I’d get high tech and use the computer to draft my next batch. However, as it turns out, my printer isn’t working! Luckily I was able to bang out some new ones using my good old trusty typewriter and nice, thick drawing paper.
Believe it or not, all my products and display items for tomorrow’s show will fit in my newly refinished suitcase, shown above. Handy, since I’ll need to walk home after the event.
I hope to see you tomorrow at MayDay!
Filed under Events
I love old suitcases. They may be antiquated luggage, but they have so many other things going for them. I’m not the only one that feels this way. People like old stuff, they like objects that tell a story and have a history. But the connotations of travel bring another level of excitement to these already awesome objects. When you think of travel, you think; adventure, exotic sights, and the unknown.
I think that’s what drew me to start my collection of old suitcases in high school. At the time, my best friends were traveling throughout Europe and it made me start to day dream of what it would be like to go to a place so different from the small town where I grew up (which I eventually did, but that’s another story).
Most of my collection came from my Grandma White. You might call her a hoarder. Well, she has a lot of stuff, but she’ll also give you any of it if you ask, so maybe that’s not really hording.
She gave me this suitcase probably 10 or 12 years ago, and it’s in pretty much the same condition now as it was then.
I’ve always really liked it. I could tell that it was a diamond in the rough. It has good bones.
Recently I was scavenging in the attic looking for something when I came across my suitcase collection and decided that I was finally going to tap into its potential.
But how?
Though a little rough around the edges (literally), I didn’t want to really change the outside; it was the inside that was making this beautiful and interesting piece unusable. I didn’t want to use it for storage or anything else in the condition that it was in. The fabric was musty, ripped, heavily stained, and pulling away from the exterior (exposing old, sharp, hand-forged nails. Ouch!).
It had to go.
With the lining removed, the case already looked a lot better. I even liked that the lid was lined with an old newspaper. Unfortunately, I didn’t see a date anywhere on it.
It was at this point that I decided that this case could make a nice display/carrying case for my artwork when I go to shows. Since I would be using the case in the open position at shows, it was important that the inside be lined and clean-looking, despite the shabbiness of the exterior.
I had the perfect fabric for this project. A gold, velvety material that I inherited during college, and I had just enough! The fabric and the case combined remind me of my old cornet case.
To line the suitcase I first cut out three pieces of book-binding board, to fit into the bottom of the case. This was a little tricky, but I eventually got the pieces to fit into the case nice and snugly.
Next, I covered the boards with the fabric. I used an iron-on adhesive to adhere it to the boards.
The covered boards fit very tightly in the base of the suitcase, so I didn’t bother gluing them down. I want them to be easily removed in the future if needed.
For the lid of the suitcase, I cut down a piece of thickest piece of cork board I could find and covered it with the same fabric. Then I tacked it to the lid using small nails, both original and new. The cork board is a way to easily attach products to the lid for display at craft fairs.
To keep the lid at a 90 degree angle, I attached some grossgrain ribbon in a contrasting chocolate brown.
I get a really deep satisfaction of a well executed DIY project, which I consider this to be. I got something that I needed (a display), used materials that I already had and treasured but wasn’t really using (the suitcase and fabric), and kept the integrity of the original piece while adding a bit of my own story to it.
Do you have a DIY project that you are especially proud of? I’d love to hear about it! Tell us about it in the comments below, or better yet, post a picture of it on zween’s facebook page.
Today I thought I would share a hair clip display that I came up with shortly before the Spring Showers Show last Saturday.
This was a fun and simple project that didn’t cost very much money but added height, color, fun and interest to my table.
Since my hair clips are crochet flowers, I thought it would make sense to display them as flowers; that is, in a vase. For this project I knew that I wanted a vase that had a small opening.
Unfortunately, I hadn’t come up with this idea before my last trip to the thrift store, since cheap vases are usually abundant there. Instead I went to a local craft store where I found the vase for $2 as well as the other materials needed for the display: two different gauges of flexible green wire and that dense green foam used in flower arrangements. All of the items were found in the fake flower department of the store for less than $5.
To make the curly cues I wrapped the wire around different sized knitting needles. The wire is folded into a small loop at the end so as to prevent the clips from slipping off. The clips are easily removed for purchase by just opening the clip.
Do you have a fun and interesting product display that you’d like to share? Tell us about it in the comments, or post a picture on zween’s facebook page.
Today I am sharing some fabric collages that I’ve been working on lately in hopes to get some responses from my readers. So if anyone is out there, please have a look and respond with your thoughts with a comment.
The following tells a meandering tale of how it is that I came to make fabric collages, so please bare with me.
It all started when I was accepted to participate in another indie craft fair organized by the Cleveland Craft Coalition. Though the show is called Spring Showers and has a loose shower theme (think baby and bridal), they also excepted me as an “other” vendor, meaning that although I didn’t fit into those categories they’d let me participate anyway.
I haven’t really found my niche yet, so I’ve been trying to play around with a lot of different materials and mediums, mostly trying to incorporate materials that I already have on hand while trying to come up with a somewhat cohesive collection of products.
Thinking spring, I started crocheting a bunch of brightly colored flowers then added fun buttons and made them into hair clips.
While thinking about how I could display them at a craft fair I came across a small stash of old, wooden picture frames. I grabbed one of the frames, attached some strips of bedsheet fabric and vola! A hair clip display!
I propped the display frame against the window on my work table so that I could look at it and decide what to do next. The hair clips were fun to make, but at the last CCC craft bazaar a few other vendors where also selling hair clips (all of which were super cute!). Though mine aren’t like the ones being sold at Bella Dubby last month, I thought it was probably best to focus my attention on making something other than hair accessories. So, it was back to the drawing board…
Looking at the flower hair clip display gave me an idea though. I really liked the way they looked with the frame and started to ponder how I could make some visual art incorporating the crochet flowers.
Of course this lead me to pull out all my fabric…
Playing around with materials, I came up with the following four pieces. All of the following four pieces are intended to be put in frames, though only some of them are photographed that way. Also, keep in mind that I intend that the frames be painted white (something that I need to do on Tuesday when it will be a bit warmer I hope). The first two pieces are 8″ x 10″ and the other three are 11″ x 14″. These aren’t the best photos, but they give you an idea of what I’m talking about…
To create these fabric collages I was stitching the layers together both by hand and with my sewing machine. In some parts I was also using some really old (and extremely wrinkled) stitch witchery to adhere some of the layers together, mostly to help with the sewing.
Soon I ran out of the little stitch witchery that I had so I went to Pat Catans to see if I could buy some more. What I found was something that was similar in concept, but this stuff came on a role and had a piece of paper on one side that you peel off so as to adhere one fabric to the other. It was a lot more controlled and precise than what I had been using, but on the packaging (which I had failed to read throughly before buying) said not to use if sewing was needed. Hmmm…
Since I was half way through a design I was working on already, I decided to give it a try. Here’s the result:
Above; moose antlers, 11″ x 14″
Interesting, but not exactly what I had in mind.
The new fabric adhesive product gave me an idea for making smaller projects though. Up until this point I was limited to how much detail I could get with the fabric pieces. Make them too small and the pieces would lose their definition if they frayed at all. This fabric adhesive, however, made my cutting precise and kept the cut fabric looking sharp. That made me think that it would lend itself to more of a graphic look. My original idea was to use mat board in conjunction with painting stretchers. I have several reclaimed modular stretcher segments but the lengths are pretty long. I wanted to work with a smaller, more intimate scale, at least for now. I’m much happier with the way these last two came out yesterday. They are both roughly 5″ x 7″ and mounted on some scrap double thick mat board and remind me of post cards (hmm…this sounds like another idea…). I like the way that the base fabric wraps around the board, giving a nice, finished look. I can attach a small piece of hardware to the back for easy hanging; making a frame unnecessary (ironic, since the frames are what lead me to make hangable art in the first place).
Please leave me a comment and tell me what you think about this direction that I’m headed. That’s one thing I miss the most about being in art school, the constant access to peers and professors ready and willing to give their opinions about your work.
Filed under Critique
Crochet is my superpower. Recycling is my passion. Virginia, my daughter, is my muse.
