Ohako at the ICN gallery

Entry: Free

A new gallery – the ICN Gallery – has just opened on Leonard Street, with a mission to show “new works which use Japanese culture and sensibilities as their base”. I missed its first exhibition, but managed to catch Ohako, its current show, last week.

Apparently, ohako means two things in Japanese: it can refer to a person's best skill or to a box for preserving tea leaves. For this show 30 Japanese artists working in a variety of disciplines were each given a tea box and asked to use it to showcase their best skill – an ohako inside an ohako.

Graffiti

Judge Dredd piece on Great Eastern Street.



I think he wants a hug.

Shop opening announcement

This is my 100th post and I'm pleased to be able to use it to announce the opening of my shop on Folksy. You can find it at: http://www.folksy.com/shops/birdskullbuttons

I'll be adding more stock to it over the coming weeks. Skeleton prints will feature heavily!

Watercolour Wednesday

This week's request was "a mouse riding a dog".

Craftster project: Reconstructed men's shirt

I've been looking around for simpler sewing projects after this disaster and recently found this tutorial on Craftster for turning a men's shirt into a tank top. This turned out to be an excellent beginner project with a straightforward tutorial. My only complaint would be that it isn't quite clear from the tutorial where you should cut to remove the shirt collar.

I picked up this short-sleeved men's shirt from a local charity shop. I chose it because I liked the subtle skull print on it, but with hindsight I should have considered the size and the type of material more carefully. It's 100% cotton, but it's quite stiff and doesn't drape very well. It also turned out to be far too large for me.

If I were doing this again I'd use a medium, or even a small, shirt. This was a large and it's definitely too loose for my taste. It also sits too low and is slightly see-through; I'm wearing a vest underneath it in the picture below.

You can see more from the designer on her blog.

Power of Making at the V & A

Power of Making has been jointly organised by the V&A and the Crafts Council to promote the idea that making things is awesome, an idea that already has my full support leaving me slightly at a loss as to what to say about it. It's not really about making anything in particular, or using a certain material or technique, it's just all about how great it can be to learn a skill and apply it to make interesting things.

King Silver Gorilla by David Mach

Life Drawing at Candid Arts, Islington

Normally I just use charcoal when I go to the Candid Arts life drawing classes, but today I used a mixture of pencil and charcoal. This is why the first image, which was done entirely in pencil, is practically invisible.

E17 Art Trail

Entry: Free

The E17 Art Trail is currently taking place in Walthamstow. This annual festival is organised by local artists and makers to promote their work, which is displayed in local businesses until 11th September. There are 157 venues altogether, though some of them, such as Walthamstow Library, are hosting more than one exhibition.

With so much going on there's definitely something for everyone. However, each venue on the trail is open at different times and on different days, so if there are specific things you want to see you may have to make several trips to catch them all. Even if you don't go for anything in particular, but just take the paper guide and explore, you can expect to spend a lot of time flicking through it trying to work out which exhibitions are open on a particular street. I suspect that it's easier if you download the guide as a phone app, but I lack the technology to confirm this.

There are walking and cycling tours, though they don't cover all of the venues, and there are various workshops, activities and performances taking place in addition to the exhibitions. Honestly, if you live in the area you have no excuse not to stop by and see something. Walthamstow was one of the places in London affected by last month's riots so it's good to see something positive happening there instead.

Kelvedon Hatch Secret Nuclear Bunker

Entry: £7 adults / £5 children (5-16 years) / £16.50 family (2 adults + 2 children)

There's a secret nuclear bunker about a 45 minute drive from my home.