Sigh no more

This post is dedicated to the memory of Carol.

And while you read it and look perhaps you might like to tune into this gorgeous song Sigh No More with the beautiful lyrics by Shakespeare. I can't get it out of my brain at the moment, it appears to me in dreams and in every waking moment ever since I heard it on Joss Whedon's Much Ado About Nothing. 

There is no right or wrong way to grieve, everyone does it in their own fashion. For me, I like to pour it into an artwork. I find the process of making something truly therapeutic, it gives me time to reflect and something to give away at the end. A kind of symbolic letting go.

This is a fabric book I made for Carol's partner to use as he wishes, and in some small way, help him process his grief. It's a bit girly, well, VERY girly. But hey ho, so was Carol, so let's acknowledge that beautiful feminine person with something equally feminine.

Recuerdos - mixed media, vintage fabrics, eco dyed mull, found objects.

The brown fabric is mull, eco dyed with NZ harakeke seed pods. Embellishments are vintage beads, buttons and lace. The pages have been left plain, ready to fill up with memories, photos and stories. Binding is simple long stitch.

Pickled cabbage is alright.....

While boiling up this red cabbage to make dye I can't help singing in my head an old song from the English music hall days about cucumber by Harry Champion. Anyone know it? No, I thought not. A hangover from my early childhood when the family used to gather around the piano at my Grandad's house in Charlton, and have a good sing-song over a few pints of ale. Parties would last all weekend, and us kids would get to sleep in the 'good' lounge chairs or in Nana's bed.

Anyway, getting back to the red cabbage. I had thought it would make a blue colour, but my batch turned out purple as you can see. I used rain water in a stainless pot with a dash of alum crystals for mordant. Although it's not blue, it is a beautiful dye colour.

I tested it out on silk. Funny tho', while the silk holds the colour well, after a couple of days in the jar the liquid colour fades, even in a dark place. And by god it gets really stinky. I'm too scared to take the lid off!

In search of the elusive blue, and for my next trick, I'm going to try dyeing with black beans, which you can still eat after you've used the soak water. My son tells me they make really good brownie....who would have thought?

Eco-print Fabric Journal

Last few months I've been playing around with dyeing fabrics and paper with leaves, India Flint style. The muted salmon pinks and browns along with vintage lace and vintage found objects, old jewellry, form into a book that has an aged and worn look about it (much like myself). Here is the result, an embellished journal made entirely by hand stitching with a long-stitch binding.

What I love most about this book is the combination of recycling objects from nature with objects that are made. Creates a nice symmetry I think.

Front Cover

Back cover

Spine

Opened book

Inside pages

Page print - Eucalyptus leaves

Dyeing to Print III - paper technique

About 2 months ago, I put down a couple of jars of solar dyes. One with flax seeds and one with morning glory. I left them for a month in the weak autumn sun. When I took off the lids, phew, did these babies stink!! Putrid rotten leaves, dumped by the neighbours fenceline, and jars quickly stuffed in the dishwasher. The results were quite subtle, but give a good aged feel to the fabric. And once they are rinsed in rain water and dried, thankfully the smell dissipates.

Here are the results. Morning glory produced a pale pink, salmony colour. The flax, a sort of tea shade, more of an English Breakfast than Lady Grey.

This sample is from a fabric book I have been making with the Eco dyed and Eco printed calico and mull. To make the pages for this book I followed the technique documented by Cassandra Tondro
My dyeing equipment doesn't yet include a very large pan, so to get all my pages in the pot I had to cut them first after spraying with alum spray.

Each page is stuffed with autumn leaves, made into a bundle tied up with string.

This is placed in a pot, on a rack above water, and weighted down with an old iron trivet that weighs a ton. This bundle was steamed for 2 hours, then left to cool.

Once cooled, I couldn't wait to unpack it.

Each page has a unique print of leaf, some darker and more distinct than others. In particular, eucalyptus and loquat work really well.

The pages were laid flat - on the kitchen floor - to dry, while I batted the cat, who loves shredding paper, away from my work.

The next day, when fully dry, I ironed them using a dry iron, and folded them into the book pages ready to bind into the cover. I will blog the finished product next time.........