Thursday, June 7, 2012

Sawtooth Faculty Exhibit

I was thrilled and honored to be invited to teach at the Sawtooth School for Visual Art this summer, I'll be teaching a felting class making a fun little Strappy Shoulder Bag in July. The gallery is also having an exhibit of the teachers' work, and we were asked to bring in up to 3 pieces representing what we'll be teaching. So of course I had to do a couple of new felted items; I knew the attendees would enjoy the Flower Fairy Bed & Quilt, especially the kids. I also nuno-felted a new silk and wool scarf, it came out looking like the solar system...should've named this one "Transit of Venus"! Doesn't it look like it's flying through the universe? And then I felted a flower, should've named that one "Wicked" lol! I do love the colors though, always enjoy happy, bright cheerful colors and of course I love the greens!

New Designs

I've been having a blast felting and designing some new patterns for spring! My Woolfelt source, National Nonwovens, came out with some gorgeous new colors in Woolfelt with a wonderful heathery look, and I couldn't resist creating some fun new hat styles to show them off. First I updated the classic pillbox hat with some contemporary fabrics and embellishments, I love this style and there are so many things you can do with it! I only did 3 in Woolfelt, cotton and batiks, but you could use lots of different fabrics and arrive at so many different looks: dupioni silk, velveteen, linen, almost anything with a little body will work. What gives mine the great shape is a new interfacing I used called "Soft and Stable". It's almost like a thin bonded foam, easy to sew, presses great, and really holds the hat shape beautifully. My sewing time was made even more fun when I ran across the interviews on tape with Jackie Kennedy - you know, she practically invented the pillbox hat! - and I listened to those vintage chats from 50 years ago, taped just after JFK was killed, it was quite enlightening to hear Jackie's take on those years. And then I just had to do one of those little fascinator hat patterns, they are so adorable and look great on everyone! My awesome daughter Maxi was sweet enough to model for me and she was just perfect! We had a ball shooting photos at different scenes, even got a couple of good shots of her and her dog Beta (who just happened to match lol!) Maxi looked so pretty and really showed off the hats nicely, love the look she brought to the picture.