Button collection

Here's another watercolour for my new "Collections" zine. Some of these buttons and the old button packaging are from my nana's sewing box, but I took a few liberties with the colours. Next up is a shell collection...some of the shells are proving a bit of a challenge to draw!

My creative space: figs!

When I go out running I sometimes can't resist coming home with a few figs from the fig tree on one of my routes. They're such a great colour and shape. I've been playing around with designing some more fabric this week so I thought I'd have a go at making fig fabric.

I drew some of my figs:

Then I played around with them in photoshop and made this fabric design:

The background colour is meant to be like the bit around the seeds when they're ripe. I'm going to try a green version too, kind of fig skin green. I'm getting excited about ordering some swatches from Spoonflower! Now to clean up all the fruit, leaves and seedpods that are all over my drawing table!

How about you, what are you working on?

To see more creative spaces head on over to the "our creative spaces" blog.

Happy Thursday!

Found fonts

I've been collecting some fonts with my camera lately; the more paint peeling off the signs the better!

My creative space: dots and sticks

I was reading one of Lotta Jansdotter's books the other day and in it she talks about how one of her friends had mentioned that a lot of her pictures were like dots on sticks. I found this plant on my way home from work that looked like it was made of dots on sticks too and it has been no end of inspiration to me this week.
First I displayed it:

Bottles courtesy of a great Dunedin op shop

Then I painted it:

Then I drew it:Then I turned it into a fabric design:
I'm hoping to get some fabric printed by Spoonflower soon so I've been playing around with some possible designs. I'm thinking something with seedpods, something green...

How about you, what's inspiring you at the moment?

To see lots of other creative spaces pop on over to the "our creative spaces" blog.

Happy Thursday!

In quiet moments

One of the things I like about doing the door for bands, or having slow patches when I'm doing my market stall, is drawing in my sketchbook. On Saturday as I was running out the door to do a market I grabbed a couple of shells off the top of the cupboard, thinking that if I had a quiet moment I could practise drawing them. So here they are; I had a bit of a play with them in photoshop afterwards. Mr. Millicent Crow bought me a small sketchbook for Xmas and I must remember to keep it in my bag so that I can steal little moments of time for drawing.

Seedpods

Finished another page for my new zine the other night...seedpods are one of my favourite things to draw and paint at the moment. This one's done in watercolours, on watercolour paper. I've got another waterlily seedpod that I bought at the op shop (seems like a strange thing to buy for some reason) but unfortunately it was too giant to fit in this collection. I must put my Dunedin photos onto the 'puter...we had a great time roaming around that lovely city last week!

Silo Park Markets

I'm going to be stallholdin' at the new Silo Park Markets today from 12-6. I'm a big fan of the new silo park at the Wynyard Quarter, it's a good mix of beautiful and industrial; I'm excited to be doing a market there. These photos are some that I took at the opening of the park back in the middle of winter, so hopefully the sky won't be so foreboding today...fingers crossed!

Out of season Xmas decorations and leaving town

I happened to be in town bright and early this morning, so I had a bit of a wander with my camera. I'm not much of one for Xmas decorations (although my bedroom is currently festooned with Millicent Crow flags, a bit of a failed experiment) but I did admire these giant chains draped across High Street:
And these doves flying down Durham Lane:
towards one of my favourite buildings in Auckland:
But see that gloomy weather in the background? I'm going to try to escape it, and I'm heading down to Dunedin tomorrow morning. I'm hoping for a nice cup of Modaks coffee, a wee bit of op shopping and perhaps some albatrosses. Oh and this show! Got any Dunedin recommendations for me?

Works in progress

Here's what I'm working on this rainy afternoon...
This dress:
with this homemade bias binding. I'm hoping to get it finished in time to wear it out tonight...story of my life!

And this watercolour painting:
It's for the new zine I'm working on, along with this painting I did the other day. Speaking of zines, I got Stolen Sharpie Revolution out of the library yesterday...there are lots of good zine-making tips in there.

How about you, what are you up to on this rainy afternoon?

Collections

This is an illustration from the new zine I'm working on...it's going to be about people and the things they collect. This little collection of weeds is done in pencil and watercolour - I'm hoping to turn it into a gocco print too...

Biased

I used this slightly scary-looking implement today:
...and made myself some homemade bias tape:

Homemade bias binding has always been a bit mysterious to me, but it was fast and easy to make. I was a bit confused about how to join the pieces of bias tape but Martha Stewart helped me out. Now I'll just have to test it out on the new dress I'm making!

New Year's dresses old and new

I was looking at some old photos the other day and found this one of me in my new year's dress in 1999, in all my dreadlocked glory. I remember sewing until 6am for a few nights making that corset thing! I'm drawing a tattoo on my arm with a marker pen, a tattoo that looks like a practice for the one I have now, for better or worse.

And it seems that I'm still making new year's dresses...I finished this one on new year's eve. Here it is in action:

Or more extreme action:

It's my old faithful pattern, Vogue 1923 from the '90s and, luckily, it withstood a bracing new year's day sea swim.

Happy new year to you!