Making More: Woollen Bouquet Brooches

Here are the samples pieces I made for the Making more taster day. A simple low tech brooch, that could be made at home on the kitchen table, or the galley table in our case! The idea is that you can make these works without a fancy studio and with minimum equipment. It's a good project for using up scraps of wool you might have kept from making other things.

And here are some of the brooches I have collected from the 30's/40's...which helped me research how they might have been constructed.

Making More: The workshops

Some selected images from the last few workshops onboard LV21. The group has been working on both the felt brooches and the leather flower & button brooches. They have been a great group of people to work with and it has been really enjoyable to see thier skills developing as the workshops progress.

DUPLICATE: International Exhibition of Earrings

I am showing some earrings in "Duplicate". An exhibition starting on Friday 4th April at Galerie Noel Guyomarc'h.

"Invited by Nicolas Estrada, Barcelona jewelry designer and author, writing the preface of his book New Earrings, published by Thames & Hudson in 2013, Noel Guyomarc'h offers a selection of earrings end of this publication loops. Nearly 200 jewelry will be exposed."

"Unique jewel which requires physical intervention or piercing the lobe, the earring remains the most popular accessory. This is Mongolia, there are more than 7000 years, archaeologists during excavations found early examples. Over the following centuries, this gem will take different meanings and functions. Talisman symbol of wealth and prosperity, now banned for religious or political reasons, it will take many forms. Poissardes of the candelabra, through the use of pearls and precious stones, the designs vary and influence. In recent decades, many unusual materials make their appearance. This exhibition looks at the current production in contemporary art."

"Brightness, color, humor, asymmetry, the list would be long to describe selected for this event proposals. Made of traditional materials, plastic, silicone, porcelain or other earrings presented compete in originality, ingenuity and surprising aesthetic research. Bold, delicate, refined and sublime, they will not leave anyone indifferent."

I am showing my Cloudberry Earrings and Juniper Earrings, which featured in Nicolas Estrada's book.

The artists taking part are:

Anne Bader (Allemagne) Catalina Brenes (Italie) Pilar Cotter (Espagne) Mirla Fernandes (Brésil) Joanne Haywood (Grande-Bretagne) Daphne Krinos (Grande-Bretagne) Katja Prins (Pays-Bas) Jan Smith (Canada) Felieke van der Leest (Norvège) Rike Bartels (Allemagne) Petra Class (Etats-Unis) Lluis Duran (Etats-Unis) Hella Ganor (Israël) Peter Hoogeboom (Pays-Bas) Judy McCaig (Espagne) Iris Saar Issacs (Australie) Antje Stolz (Allemagne) Babette von Dohnanyi (Allemagne) Ela Bauer (Pays-Bas) Andy Cooperman (Etats-Unis) Nicolas Estrada (Espagne) Liis Hashimoto (États-Unis) Beate Klockmann (France) Martin Papcùn (Allemagne) Karin Seufert (Allemagne) Rudy Tancharoen (Thaïlande) Emily Watson (États-Unis)

Making More: Felt Research

As part of my research on felt brooches, I have been working from some old patterns from a Dryad handbook. It was interesting to see the instructions from many decades ago, with hand drawn patterns. Some of the descriptions are not very politically correct for nowadays. The language used and the changes in society was as interesting as the patterns themselves.

It was great to see the booklet as a whole and how they had used repeated techniques in variations for the different brooches/corsages. Also the choice of flowers I found very interesting and what would have been popular at the time for people to wear and buy/grow.

Making More: Onboard LV21

Here are some of the images taken by Gary Weston, at the Taster day on the 15th March. I think the photos capture what a great day it was.

And here is an image of us looking at the first samples created for the project. I was so impressed how everyone picked up all the techniques quite quickly. Pretty good for everyones first go!

Making More:Taster Day

After four months of researching, designing and making....it was time for the "Making More" taster day.

The workshop took place on the 15th March, onboard the ship LV21. For the Taster day I chose to deliver a workshop which would cover some of the basic techniques we will be using and it's also one of the most accessible for finding up cycled materials. Sourcing off cuts/remnants of wool is something most of us can find, beg or borrow!

Above are some examples of the Woollen Bouquet brooches I have made for the project. I took these in as samples so the cohort could see what they would be making that day.

These are some of the results for the first workshop. 21 people took part and everyone managed to pick up all the techniques, which was pretty impressive for the first session. I loved seeing them all together at the end and how different they all looked!

It's great to be doing a project in the County where I live...and to meet such an interesting group of people. Can't wait for the next workshop...

The images of the workshop day were taken by LV21 Skipper, Gary Weston www.spaghettiweston.com

Making More: Test pieces

Here are a series of test pieces I produced early on in the project, just focusing on the curtain ring construction and testing different materials to cover them with. I wanted to be able to use as much upcycling as possible, yet still try and capture the feeling of the old 1940's pieces...I tried coloured plastic carrier bags, cotton fabrics, fishing latex elastic, leather cord, balloon latex, nylon monofilament, felt sheet and wollen yarns. The modern day equivalent to the plastic used is Scoubidou strings which a lot of us will remember from school and they have become popular again recently...however the modern Scoubidou strings have a cheaper quality about them and the pigments just don't look quite right, they look too squeeky (if that makes sense).

One find I am quite pleased with is a stock of 1940's brass coated safety pins, enough probably for the whole project. They are standard safety pins but the mouldings are a little more unusual than we have today. Each "bunch" of pins is a variety of sizes and comes with a little tag from the production company. You can see an example in the images below