Major dissaster in the kitchen but the feltwork must go on..

I was just attempting to clear the drains in my house and unluckily the rod got stuck! So i was really scared.. What to do? Dig out the pipe which runs across the kitchen extension.. But i took the risk and decided to dig out to see whether it is possible to reach the stuck rod somehow..
Well, it seems that underneath my perfectly misshapen tiled floor in the kitchen here it was a concreted over drain sewage collection box.. No wonder that the tiles got mishapen.
So now my feltmaking friends are suggesting i should make use of this drainage outlet and connect my feltmaking table to it...
Still thinking about it, luckily there is no smell as the pipes were well washed!!

Now onto the feltmaking work
Used prefelt as a backing for the silk, first dye the piece then cut the shapes and then sand onto organza silk dyed black!

Dagmar Binder Workshop in Dublin, organised by Irish Feltmakers Association

This was the second workshop in feltmaking I attended ever in my life! But Dagmar was the very first artist that I got absolutely fascinated by and as you can see my style got very influenced by Dagmar.

Photographs from the process: here

Here are some photographs of the pieces I was making at the workshop.
The scarves are available now in my etsy shop.

Finally, back from Horst workshop in FiberFusing and a fantastic opportunity to participate in Amsterdam Fashion Week!

Running a fashion show is not an easy task, but helping to run a fashion show Alongside Thomas Horst and Dorie van Dijk and her Family was a hugely beneficial experience!
Suffice to say for more info please look up Dories FiberFusing Blog!

I prepared 3 pieces, one of them was a copy of a dress I submitted to a RDS National Craft Competition 2012! You can see it a couple of posts earlier, both the proces as well as the finall dress!

It proved to be v beautiful but extremely difficult to put on, despite having a zip on the side!. So i had a quite a racing challenge to put it on Louca Ruhe, the model that bravely decided to wear it!! It looked amazing but i was told that the panels should have been made in contrasting magenta! Fair enough I think soo too but at least I had a contrasting scarf!

The funniest bit was the fact that i learnt from Dorie abd horst that i gotta have 5 pieces! There we are! Its Monday afternoon, 1 day before the show and off I go to the warehouse to felt the two remaining pieces! The Jacket uses the design ideas from Dagmar Binder, Charity van Meer and Horst template!! I was finally able to make Horst style jacket precisely the size I required!!
I was working my way up to 1.45 pm including the dyeing bit!!!
For the srcond vest with red strands hangong out I used Horsts own vest and dyed the strands separateky in Red! After finishing the piece it was overdyed!!

A separate thanks to Chris van dercapellen for the interesting pattern i used in my jacket!!
I love late challenges so I think i work best under pressure!!!

Snippet from Amsterdam Fashion Week

Just a quick update!
I got homeand now dealing with all my pending orders!


Below: Model Louca Ruhe is presenting my dress at REFASHIONED part of Amsterdam FAshion Week!! A collection was presented amongst fantastic designers! Thomas Horst, Dorie van Dijk and Tatiana Sherveda!

I made felt totally by hand - and found it very easy.

As many of you know, I use sander to attache the wool initially. However, this week for the   first time in my life I felted a scarf totally by hand at Dagmar Binder workshop in Dublin!

Thanks to her unique technique of rolling and the scarf was pre-felted in 10 minutes!!!

I was amazed at how quickly it could be achieved!
It all depends on the technique of rolling. see the video!

The scarf was folded in bubble wrap on plastic plumber pole (the squiggy one). And tied. That's it!!
Amazing!!
If I can recommend Dagmar's workshop to everybody I am doing so now!!! Valuable experience!!

Invitation to a Workshop In Dublin and my intern has a go on a carder

Here first some new designs that I was experimenting with!

I will be attending a workshop by an amazing feltmaking artist,  Dagmar Binder, organised by FEltmakers Ireland Association in Dublin
 

3 D Floral belts or collars

Advanced Two Day Workshop

With

Dagmar Binder

 Dagmar makes amazing stuff not only 3d collars which we are gonna be making, - such as here

She also makes amazing hats - there is to be a workshop on these on the 22nd of September in Italy organised by Ruth Baumer, I am feeling so sorry I cant attend! 

I was also invited to a special workshop organised by Craft Council of Ireland, in Dublin on Thursday! Its about colour trends for knitwear in 2013!! Very exciting!

Knitwear Trends Forecast Workshop for Autumn/Winter 2013. 

 The presentation will be made by Beryl Gibson, UK based Textile and Yarn consultant with many years experience of the industry in Ireland, UK, Europe, Far East, South Africa and South America.

Looking forward to this- as it might give me loads of ideas re my future collections!  

I Also got an intern who is learning the basics of feltmaking! 
Yesterday she was playing with coloured wool 

 

An Update: Irene Van Den Wolf - amazing felt artist!!

In previous post I mentioned one of the most fantastic and inspirational feltmakers; Her name is Irene van Den Wolf and she is based in the Netherlands. I had an opportunity to see her last book, Image in Sight,
  To get any images I had to photograph the image of the image on my laptop using my iphone, cause screenshot doesnt work! I think her technique is amazing, she is very inspirational as an artist! and Buy the book cause you would never have guessed how this is made!!!

She uses a special technique based on a special perforated foam called UPWOLFInG,that creates fantastic effects : see here


 http://www.kunstwolf.nl/nl/beeld-in-zicht-ii/upwolfing#!prettyPhoto[670]/47/
Her website can be visited at www.kunstwolf.nl, very inspiring!

I loved her treatment of - well yes, ladies knickers!!

Fantastic sense of humor! 

RDS National Craft Competition Submission - Grey Felted Dress

In next couple of days I will be making a submission for a final judging of the RDS National Craft Competition 2012 in Dublin. 

The dress that I designed is based on this necklace that I made a while ago.

I used the same shape by just replicating it along the whole length of the dress. 

Here are some details from the dress:

Some photos from the making:

 and the dress itself

sorry about the quality it was just a prototype