“What I’m really interested in is the future and what it looks like” and “in inventing a future through history and material culture and art.” – J. Morgan Puett, designer and artist. Puett elaborates further on this philosophy: “It’s not about nostalgia or re-enacting,” she said. “I believe that all of these time periods and histories are pressing in on us at once.” These quotes are from a NY Times article, In Her Own World by Alastair Gordon. Be sure to view the related NY Times slideshow.

I just finished re-decorating my bedroom with mustard-colored and ivy-covered painted walls, faded floral curtains and a blue floral strip quilt. The room reminds me of the comforts of my grandmother’s house in Wichita, when I was growing up – but it is not a direct quote of her 1920s/30s prairie heritage. The room instead reflects a collective memory of comfort and coziness, while still being part of the 21st century.

Then this morning, I read the NY Times article and realized that what Puett was creating is what we should all be doing, making a place that is an “ongoing experiment in art, design and aestheticized living”…The house is filled with Ms. Puett’s and Mr. Dion’s eclectic collections of art, antiques, hundreds of books, stuffed birds, skulls, outsider art and ephemera. It’s at once a private, family space and a public, multipurpose environment, as Ms. Puett describes it. “This is not my dream house,” she said. “This was designed as a central community kitchen and reference library.”"

The web site for Puett’s space, called Mildred’s Lane, defines the project as: “Mildred’s Lane is an artist-driven project for the rethinking of the contemporary art complex, which is tucked away in the woods of Pennsylvania, on the upper Delaware River. It is a large-scale collaboration between the artists J. Morgan Puett and Mark Dion who have lived and worked on this rustic 96-acre site since 1998. From the beginning there has been a desire to critically re-imagine the space between environmental practice, artistic domesticating, and socially engaged research. By hosting and supporting international cultural producers, organizing informal residencies, developing site sensitive projects, seminars, dinners, research think tanks and more — they have made Mildred’s Lane a significant but invisible center for new forms of cultural practice.”

Puett’s web site offers glimpses of many more of her installations, including grafters bee shack with embroidered veil and miscellaneous bee-related textiles; the nurse’s uniform, which covers the uniform’s history and future (intergalactic nurse); and a collection of wonderful shots of her (former) NY store, when it was in Soho.

Meggiecat is back! This was one of my favorite blogs for years – then she vanished. I guess that we all need a breather. But Meggiecat is back with wonderful articles, tips and all kinds of visual treasures. Do yourself a favor and drop by – but do plan to stay and browse through her archive of links that extends back until 2004.
Spoonflower On-demand fabric printing is one of Meggiecat’s recent finds. This is the brainchild of a fellow Chapel Hill-ian (whom I have yet to meet!), formerly of Lulu on-demand book printing. When Spoonflower is up and running, we can all have our own fabric made to order:

“Meggiecat wrote the other day to ask the most obvious question about printing fabric on Spoonflower, which is “what do we need to do to prepare designs?”

Image Size:
You can take an image of any size (240 dpi or greater) and repeat it to create a pattern. Alternately, you could create the pattern repeat on your own computer and then upload a large file equal in size to the amount of fabric you wish to order. For example, the fabric we will be using is 44″ wide (112 cm), so if you wanted to order a yard you could create an image that is 44″ x 36″ (or close to that). We have not yet determined if we will need to impose a size limit for files.

Fabric Size:
Once Spoonflower goes live you will be able to order a swatch (8″x8″), a fat quarter (18″x22″) or any multiple of a linear yard. During portions of the beta period we may limit these options temporarily. We will always recommend that you order a swatch of your design before ordering a larger quantity. That will give you a chance to examine the colors firsthand to make sure they printed as intended.”

Creating an engaging composition provides the basic framework of any visual work. Melanie Bilenker creates jewelry, each piece a moment frozen in time, caught at odd angles, reminiscent of ukiyo-e prints. The odd thing is that these miniature ‘paintings’ are made of gold, sterling silver, ebony, resin, pigment and hair.

“The Victorians kept lockets of hair and miniature portraits painted with ground hair and pigment to secure the memory of a lost love. In much the same way, I secure my memories through photographic images rendered in lines of my own hair, the physical remnants. I do not reproduce events, but quiet minutes, the mundane, the domestic, the ordinary moments.” artist’s statement

“By setting individual strands into epoxy resin, she creates life-like vignettes of routine moments, like hands cutting an apple or a woman drawing a bath. Despite their small scale, each maintains the depth and scope of a full-size painting, which is why she makes only about a dozen each year and they cost a pretty penny.”
Daily Candy

How to tell a good friend? One who is kind enough to make a body-double dress form for you (or your daughter). Last week, Nancy came over and made one for my daughter, the fahionista.

In the past year, Nancy has made several for her daughter, experimenting with different materials and techniques. Nancy’s first form was made from all duct tape. That sank into a gooey mess as soon as it was removed from the live model. Her second form used the paper tape technique, but wasn’t the tape wasn’t wrapped tight enough (that attempt was done in the South in July). The third form used paper tape and turned out just right. This is what she repeated for us.

The directions for the just-right drees form are online at Sew News in an article, Sewing Stunt Double by Connie Amaden-Crawford. Materials are pretty straight forward and very well illustrated. Be sure to follow the author’s recommendation on the type of tape!

Materials

• Lawn-and-garden trash bag to fit over the body (not tight or too loose, and long enough to reach 3″ above the knees)
• Duct tape (about 3 yards)
• 3 to 5 rolls of 2″x 60 yard self-adhesive paper packing tape––not the shiny type (See Sources at the end of this article.)
• Permanent marker
• Heavy cardboard scraps
• Basic sheath-dress pattern with shoulder princess seam
• 5 to 6 pounds of polyester fiberfill
• Stand (See Dress-Form Stand.)

For the stand, we used a stripped down pole lamp and a curved wooden hanger. The remaining steps are to cover the form with some soft muslin, stuff it and use it!

A quick word of caution, the article states that the entire procedure takes an hour. Even with one person tearing strips of tape and the second applying it, the entire procedure took well over 4 hours!

Anyone for a stitched 5 foot drumstick? Watch a short video as UK artist, Maddi Nicholson visits the oldest working steam powered textile mill in the world. and then designs and constructs a whimsical textile sculpture. Much of Nicholson’s work features cartoon-like characters, interpreted as fabric sculptures.

At the same Artisancam site, you can see a gallery of Nicholson’s work and take an afternoon trip to a sleazy British seaside town.. The perfect solution to the workday doldrums. I’ve got my smile back!

So Simple; so brilliant: A dotted scarf with mother-of-pearl buttons – and little tails of thread leading the eye here and there!

I first came across greenolive’s work on flickr. Greenolive’ secret identity is as Martine Booth, an Australian designer – both graphic and textiles. She makes many things and tells a small tale about each object. The story behind today’s scarf:

“You like hearing the stories behind the scarves, so here’s another one. A tale of a classic black-and-white spotted scarf which is on its way to my Mum.

1. Start with a silk remnant from Clegs. Yes, this was bought on the same day, the infamous Clegs Boxing Day Remnant Sale.
2. Sew it up, and then decide it looks a bit plain and needs something. Buy said somethings while out shopping with Aunty Shabby.
3. Sew somethings onto random spots on the scarf
4. Voila! A finished scarf complete with a certain je ne sais quoi!”

I am sending this blog entry to the daughter who is taking a fashion design class at Syracuse University. Do you think she’ll get the hint?!

The expansive nature of landscape and the constricted environment of embroidery create an automatic tension. UK textile artist, Carol Naylor explores this relationship in machine stitched wall hangings and smaller framed pieces.

Naylor says about her work:

I stitch directly onto painters canvas using the sewing machine as my paintbrush and the threads as my palette. The weight and intensity of the threads cause distortions to the base fabric, which are deliberately enhanced in order to create more tension, adding a unique sculptural quality. I use this technique to explore and enhance form. Undulations and movement are created that would be impossible to replicate in either formal painting or other textile techniques. Some pieces include finely stitched details to provide contrasts. Traditionally, paint is worked onto the surface of the canvas. A weaver creates a completely new cloth. By covering the canvas totally with stitches that penetrate the material, I transform a flat piece of canvas into a new fabric with three-dimensional potential.

I find that this approach to embroidered textiles provides me with a more painterly approach to textile art. My work is very tactile, and I prefer to leave larger pieces unframed so that the public can interact with it more directly.

Inspiration has always come from two sources. Personal experiences and observations provide the source materials, whilst the works of specific artists have informed my use of colour and line. Dufys placement of dark lines over blocks of gold and blue to describe form, and Klees immaculate use of colour and light within his paintings, are just two of the artists I have referred to when resolving ideas.”

Furoshiki is a Japanese art of using fabric squares to wrap packages. It is both utilitarian and beautiful. I first discovered this craft when browsing Maureen Shaughnessy’s blog. This approach to wrapping is regaining popularity in Japan as a way to reduce the waste produced by paper and plastic shopping bags.

Furoshiki are a type of traditional Japanese wrapping cloth that were frequently used to transport clothes, gifts, or other goods. Although possibly dating back as far as the Nara period, the name, meaning “bath spread”, derives from the Edo period practice of using them to bundle clothes while at the sento- (public baths). Before becoming associated with public baths, furoshiki was known as hiradzutsumi, or flat folded bundle. Eventually, the furoshiki’s usage extended to serve as a means for merchants to transport their wares or to protect and decorate a gift.

Modern furoshiki can be made of a variety of cloths, including silk, cotton, rayon, and nylon. Furoshiki are often decorated with traditional designs or by shibori, chirimen. There is no one set size for furoshiki, they can range from hand sized to larger than bed-sheets. The most common sizes are 45cm and 68-72cm. wikipedia

“For centuries, the furoshiki was truly an indispensable part of daily Japanese life. In Edo times, people would lay their futon on top of the furoshiki before going to sleep. fires were extremely common back then, so when people had to get away in a hurry during the night, they only had to throw their belongings on top of the futon, wrap and tie the furoshiki, and leave through the nearest exit. Merchants usually carried their wares inside the furoshiki to transport just about anything you could imagine. When the furoshiki was not in use, people would fold it up like a handkerchief and put it away.” Tomen Journal

What else can you do with furoshiki? 9brand has created sleek wrap cases for laptop/notebook computers:

“At 9brand, we say “Learning from living things”, and this “living things” does not only mean animals. The plants sometimes become our motif, and so do human’s forms and movements. Especially, 9brand focuses on the human’s hands and tools, and these relationships.
‘Furoshiki’ made of urethane is a protection for a lap top computer, evolved from Japanese traditional tool, furoshiki. Traditional furoshiki is a big sheet of cloth which wraps various things of different sizes. Our ‘Furoshiki’ keeps the flexible character, so the size is adjustable. We searched the hands’ movements of wrapping and its possibility.”

Another contemporary interpretation of the Furoshiki is the Furoshiki-Bag, which combines tying techniques with contemporary handles for easy carrying.

There are lots of sets of directions on the web for creating your own furoshiki. The simplest is a sheet of visual diagrams, (created by the Japanese Governments’ Ministry of the Environment and downloadable as a pdf file) illustrating a variety of packaging methods. The most beautiful illustrations come from a site entitled Life in Kyoto. Scroll about halfway down the page and click on the links to see an individual page for each wrapping technique. Waku has a page of simple diagrams, with explanations below in Japanese.