P/hop and a knitted reindeer pattern

P/hop is a fund-raising initiative supporting Médecins Sans Frontierès. Designers create knitting patterns which anyone can download. If you download a pattern you're asked to donate based on how many hours of pleasure you'll get from knitting the pattern – pennies per hour of pleasure! There is no set donation amount, it's entirely up to you.

Their most recent pattern was designed by my mum! Rudolf, That Reindeer! is a pattern for a cute, little reindeer. Look at how adorable they are!

Download the pattern, donate some money, make some reindeer to give as Christmas gifts and help MSF provide medical aid where it's needed the most.

Mad as a March Hare

I've been waiting to write this post since September!

I've just got back from a costume party based on Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. I went as the March Hare, my favourite character from the Alice books. (The phrase “mad as a March Hare” apparently refers to their strange behaviour in the spring, when hares appear to box with each other. This isn't males competing over territory or mating rights as you might expect, but female hares rebuffing the advances of males.) I decided to put together an outfit loosely-based on the version of the character from the 1951 Disney animation. I didn't want to end up buying clothes that I'd only wear once so I tried to only spend money on things that I thought I'd use after the party.

Pattern Magic, part 2

So here's my attempt at the takenoko (bamboo shoot) bodice from Pattern Magic.

I love this design. I want to get some more of this fabric and make a proper top using this pattern.

(Not pictured, the pieces of calico that could be used to make the hideously ugly crater bodice, if I could get them to line up correctly, and the many, many, many bits of paper used to work out the patterns for both.)

This was an interesting – and occasionally frustrating – course. I've only ever used shop-bought dress patterns before so this was my first experience drafting and manipulating my own patterns. It's possible that I could have done with an interim stage as Tomoko Nakimichi's approach to pattern design is very technical! However, it was really useful to see how the shape of a pattern can be changed by adding or deducting space. I really hope I can apply some of this knowledge when using shop-bought patterns in future, altering them to create a better fit. (Although that kind of alteration is definitely made easier with access to a tailor's dummy.)

Pattern Magic, part 1

I'm doing a two-day course at Morley College taught by Manisola Omotoso called Pattern Magic. It's based around the book of the same name, which is full of amazing ideas for creating sculptural effects on sewn garments, but doesn't exactly hold your hand and guide you through them. The idea behind the course is to offer more detailed instructions for carrying out the techniques in the book.

I thought I'd have more to say this evening, but today was taken up with drafting a block for a bodice and then using that to create a pattern for one of the designs in the book. I have a lovely collection of bits of paper with sums and shapes drawn all over them, (this book is math-tastic), but no textiles to show off yet and no idea if I'll have any time to work on this before next weekend.

Frustratingly, there's lots of stuff I'd like to blog about right now, but it's all either unfinished or intended as a surprise for people who I think read this blog! Maybe in December I'll finally be able to post some pictures.

Bow-tie

I needed an orange bow-tie for a costume party I'm attending in December. Obviously there are many serviceable and affordable versions available to buy, but while I was looking for wool for another project I uncovered a large piece of orange fabric left over from my course. It was supposed to have been yellow, but I'd dyed it for too long and then set it to one side thinking it would come in useful for something else. Here was that opportunity! I would make my own bow-tie and save myself £4.

Graffiti

Two pieces seen while walking along Caledonian Road. It looks like the top one was done to promote the Cally Festival.

Eat Your Heart Out 2012 at St Bartholomew's Hospital Pathology Museum

A friend and I went to Eat Your Heart Out this weekend. This pop-up cake shop took place in possibly the only grotesque museum in London that I haven't been too - St Bartholomew's Hospital Pathology Museum. It seems that this museum isn't open to the public, though you can arrange a private viewing and it does host events, usually lectures and seminars.
   

New blog feature

I've added a new section to the blog. On the right-hand side there's now a section labelled "Patterns" where patterns and instructions that appeared in blog posts are collected. At present it's got the phone case knitting pattern mentioned in the previous post, the lambda knitting chart from this post and the paper watch template and instructions from this post.

Swedish Snowflake Phone Case - Free Pattern

So, I recently designed myself a knitted phone case. As a friend of mine was also in need of a phone case I tweaked the design and made my own fair-isle chart to use with it. The result is Lucy's Swedish Snowflake Phone Case. The pattern can be downloaded by clicking on this link or if you're on Ravelry you can search for "Swedish Snowflake Phone Case" in the pattern database.

Advertising

Walking past Selfridge's on Thursday I discovered that Yayoi Kusama is collaborating with Louis Vuitton on a clothing/accessories collection. Polka dots feature heavily, (unsurprisingly), and the Selfridge's window display is enjoyably bizarre and slightly creepy. It includes an army of tiny Kusamas and two photo-realistic mannequins.

Graffiti

Some shots from Leake Street.

I'm not sure if it's clear what's going on in these next pictures. There are headless plastic bodies with lightbulbs inside hanging from the roof of the railway arch. Obviously.

Snoooooood!

The last of the August knitting projects - a snood in a very fancy silk/mohair yarn with tiny gold beads. The yarn is Artyarns Beaded Rhapsody. It's a lovely yarn, really soft and lustrous, but it is prone to splitting at the slightest provocation. The pattern is a modified version of Persnickety Knitter's Zigzag Lace Scarf. Instead of knitting two sections and grafting them together to make a scarf, I knitted one long piece and grafted the ends together to make a snood. (There wasn't enough yarn for a satisfyingly long scarf.)

Viking hat and beard

This is the second of the three knitting projects I've been working on this month: a Viking helmet* and beard for a friend.

The hat is a heavily modified version of this pattern by Becky Veverka, but with the horns designed by sar. The beard was made using Melissa Campbell's crochet beard pattern. (Unfortunately, I think you can only get that pattern via Ravelry - apologies non-Ravelry users!)

* Except it's generally agreed that Vikings didn't actually wear horned helmets. Oh well.

Fashion & Textile Children's Trust

I spent some time this week at PURE London volunteering for the Fashion and Textile Children's Trust. This lovely little charity provides financial support for children whose parents or carers work in the UK fashion and textiles industries.

What am I doing with my life? Also, some knitting.

After a month of trying to decide what to do with my life, I think it might be time to start blogging again.

I've been knitting three different things over the last month; here's the first one:

Street art

It's time for the annual Whitecross Street party! My two favourite pieces of this year are posted below; I wanted to take more photographs, but it started raining straight after this.

Photographs of some of the previous year's artworks can be seen here.

Exhibition

I originally intended to take some photographs of the installation and the opening night of the show, but sadly that didn't happen. Here are some rather badly-lit shots of my work in situ:

Black knight

He's about 5 foot 2 inches tall.

End of year exhibition

My course finishes in two weeks' time, which I have mixed feelings about. On the one hand, I have to make some decisions, (which I've been putting off), about what to do next, but on the other, I think I'm ready for a change. To conclude the course students' work, (including mine!), will be on show at Morley Gallery from the 5th to the 12th July.

Gold: Power and Allure at Goldsmiths' Hall

Entry: Free

While I was experimenting with gold leaf last week my tutor suggested I visit the current exhibition at Goldsmiths' Hall, Gold: Power and Allure. It's free, which was enough of a reason for me to go. Goldsmiths' Hall belongs to the Worshipful Company of Goldsmiths, one of the many livery companies of the City of London. The Goldsmiths' Company was founded to regulate the craft of goldsmithing and has been responsible for testing the quality of gold and silver since 1300. More recently, platinum and palladium have also been added to their remit. They run the Goldsmiths' Company Assay Office, responsible for applying hallmarks to goods, (hallmarks = marks made in the Goldsmith's Hall), and perform the Trial of the Pyx, the annual examination of coins from the Royal Mint.

Knitting needle case

Several months ago I was given a lot of knitting needles. Unfortunately, they've languished on a windowsill in my living room since then, waiting for me to find somewhere more sensible to keep them. This week I finally tired of knocking them on the floor whenever I opened the blinds and made a case for them. The instructions came from Stitch 'n Bitch, (which has a few sewing patterns alongside the knitting patterns, all for knitting accessories).

Armour part 4

The felt armour now covers the mannequin's torso. I never reattached the arm/shoulder piece that came off some time in March, instead I've been using it to test ways to apply gold leaf to felt, (answer - felt is not a smooth enough surface for gold leaf). The gold decoration in the pictures below is gold leaf, but it was applied to fusible interlining, cut to shape and then glued to the felt. (I can't afford the genuine gold leaf made from real gold so I bought some very reasonably priced fake gold leaf from Atlantis Arts.)

New year's knitting resolution

My new year's resolution to finish some knitting projects continues with a third pair of socks. Happy birthday, James! They are only 10 days late!

The pattern is a heavily-modified version of Knitty's bmp. (People on Ravelry are welcome to look at my Ravelry profile for the technical details.) Neither of the next two projects are socks, which is a relief; I think I might be done with socks for a really long time.

Graffiti

Here's the second new graffiti post. There's been good stuff on Scrutton Street, Curtain Road and Christina Street before - examples here and here - but this is the first time I've seen someone use that stretch of wall for one continuous scene. I've tried to capture the full effect by stitching my photographs together, (I'm currently using GIMP for tasks like this); the images below are larger than I'd normally upload so click on them to get a better look at the details:

I feel I may be missing a lot of references in all of this. I recognise tributes to Moebius and Adam Yauch in the Curtain Road section (middle image) and the Scrutton Street section (top image) looks like it might be a John Carter of Mars scene. But what about the pointy eared woman riding the horned cat or the big game hunter and the monster he's shot? Are these references to things I'm unfamiliar with or are they the inventions of the artist?

Graffiti

Apparently it's been nine months since my last graffiti post! Here's the first of two new ones - the recently repainted Queen of Hoxton on Curtain Road:

You can still see some of the old design - flowers and vines - one the metal shutter in the central picture, which seems strange. Was the bar open while it was being repainted or did the painters just get bored and skip the shutter?

What to do?

So, my sister sent me an amazing birthday present, two different versions of an Alexander Henry fabric called "Osteology":

They're so great! But what should I do with them? I need amazing projects for this amazing fabric!

Things to do in London in May

Three free things to do in London this month...

Saturdays and Sundays in May, beginning 5th May: Magnificent SevenDeadly Sins, a public art exhibition in the mausoleum at Nunhead Cemetery. Elisabeta Chojak-Mysko, Desiree Ickerodt, Jolanta Jagriello, Debora Mo, Ara Moradian, Jill Rock and Sara Scott each examine one of the seven deadly sins.

12th - 13th May and 19th - 20th May: Dulwich Festival Artists' Open House. Lots of artists and craftspeople in Dulwich will be opening their studios and houses to the public over these two weekends, but I want to give a special mention to Lucy Duke, who will be exhibiting on the first weekend.

14th - 19th May: East London Textile Arts will be exhibiting patchwork and embroidery at St Martin-In-The-Fields, Trafalgar Square.

More weird armour...

Over the weekend I designed a backplate to go with these breastplates and I spent today fitting together the vilene pieces. In order to make this I started off with small paper templates, (which I figured out through trial and error), I then enlarged these using a grid. I printed the enlarged templates onto the vilene using heat transfer paper, cut out the vilene, folded it into shape and sewed/pinned the pieces together. Not at all laborious and long-winded!

Batik

Two batik pieces made on Tuesday.

The spiralling vegetation is loosely based on the design on the helmet below. The helmet is part of the collection at the Royal Armouries in Leeds, which I completely recommend visiting. Entry is free!

This piece, (which came out looking like a pair of aliens in the process of dematerialising), was done using a stencil based on a sketch I made at the Wallace Collection. The sketch is included below for comparison.

Breastplates

I have been doing and making things lately, but I haven't really felt like writing about any of it. Unlike other bloggers, I make no excuses and offer no apologies!

I'm back at college after the Easter break and making breastplate-like forms from paper, pelmet vilene and heat transfer paper.

Crochet update

At some point in the last week the movements of crochet became unconscious. It turns out that it's a better craft for public transport - easy to pick up and put down without losing your place and unlikely to unravel in your bag.

Armour part 3

I'm still working on the felt armour mentioned in previous posts. It now has a backplate, a paper helmet and some embroidery, but is currently missing its left arm piece, which was broken off somehow. I'm planning on reattaching that and creating a breastplate after the Easter break.

Crochet

I'm currently learning to crochet.


I saw the episode of Horizon about the unconscious mind recently and it was fascinating to watch right before beginning to learn a new skill. I've knitted for long enough that those motions have now become automatic, but crochet feels awkward and unfamiliar – it still requires conscious thought (and will do for a while I suspect). An added difficulty is that I knit English-style, with the the yarn in my right hand, so I feel incredibly clumsy manipulating the yarn with my my left hand.

Found

Fourteen peacock feathers, found on York Road between Leake Street and Waterloo at 7:15pm on Wednesday 14th March.


London is weird.

Skull skirt

I mentioned in an earlier post that I had picked up a pattern for a gathered skirt from Sew Over It. This skirt is now finished.

Yayoi Kusama at Tate Modern and Victoria Miro

Entry: Tate Modern - £11 adults / £9.50 concessions with Gift Aid donation; £10 adults / £8.50 concessions without Gift Aid donation; Victoria Miro – free

I heard Yayoi Kusama's name long before I knew who she was – she's one of the people name-checked in Le Tigre's song “Hot Topic”. Many years later I found an entry about her in an art book and got to go, “oooohh, so that's who she is”. She is, (for anybody who can't be bothered to click the link above), a prolific artist who has been working since the 1950s in a huge variety of mediums. In addition to her paintings, sculptures, installations, and performances, she is a novelist, a fashion designer and a film-maker. And she has also been a resident at the Seiwa Hospital for the Mentally Ill since she voluntarily admitted herself in 1973, (apparently her studio is within walking distance of the hospital).

New year's knitting resolution

My new year's resolution is progressing nicely. The Hedera socks are now finished, though they don't quite match - curse you Zauberball yarn with your colour repeat that doesn't repeat properly and your tendency to split without any provocation. Still, it's a nice pattern and they are very soft.


Next up? Another sock pattern from Knitty - bmp.

Intro to dressmaking at Sew Over It, Clapham

After a couple of less-than-successful attempts at making clothes on my own, it became apparent that it was time to get some guidance. Thanks to a voucher I received for Christmas I could afford to attend the Introduction to Dressmaking class at Sew Over It in Clapham.

It was a great class, very relaxed and with a practical approach to things. And I've finally sewn an item of clothing that I could actually wear, (if it wasn't snowing at the moment).



I picked up a second skirt pattern while I was there - this time for a gathered skirt - so I can practice what I've learnt. I fear that sewing in a zip without Lisa Comfort in the same room to help me may be a bit trying.