BirdBrain Designs

small leather zip bags

May 16, 2012 by Birdbrain Leave a Comment

Right now I am riding my bike as much as I can. A week today I leave for Italy–a biking and barging holiday–which will require more distance than I am used to. I have a city bike with baskets on the front and back and I bike everywhere I can in the city–to the market, the grocery store, my exercise class–but no great distance, ever. Belleville, my small town, has a wonderful network of trails along the bay and the river and these are my favourite biking routes. However, I will soon be graduating to an italian beauty and 50 kms a day. I plan to blog from the barge–so will report on my adventure!

In the meantime I have been making small things. And I am learning abut my process as I go. In my head are some new bags for the fall. I’m doing my casual research, asking the people of style in my life the three top things they need in a bag, and eyeing the new leather I bought in Montreal and Toronto. I love making pieces from recycled remnants as you see here, but I also love a brand new large piece of Italian pebbly leather — and I have some great colours. There is no substitute for the substantial weight and durability of this leather–great for big bags made to carry lots. But in the meantime, I am fooling around with little pieces, combining colour and texture. These cases will make their way to the shop soon too.

from studio to shop

May 14, 2012 by Birdbrain Leave a Comment

Happy Monday! We had a lovely day yesterday with lunch at The O’Connor House in Deseronto. What a find this place is–a Victorian tea room with wonderful service, delicious food and attached to an antique/curiosity shop. I highly recommend a visit there if you are in Eastern Ontario. Btw, I took this photo with my new iphone, (that’s my finger smudge in the corner!) a big pot of delicious Earl Grey tea.

On to some news…

I have wanted a shop connected to the blog for some time. As a mother’s day present, Owen revamped the blog and added a shop button. Over the weekend I put some items in there–so if you get a chance, click top left and have a look. If you are interested in anything you see, just hit the contact button and send me an email.

I will be posting more of the small heart pouches and others today. The combining of assosrted coloured remnants is one of the most fun things I do. In the meantime, here area a couple of glimpses of the colourful, ordered chaos of the studio–one of my favourite places.

dyeing and other colourful pursuits

May 13, 2012 by Birdbrain 1 Comment

While waiting for the water in the dye pots to clear today, I had fun combining leather scraps to make some new kodachrome pouches. Here are two I completed. More to come!

and the reverse sides…

Now for the dyeing. The first batch involved dividing a yard of texture into four quarters and dyeing each quarter a different colour. I used Aljo Dyes on this piece, a mid-brown plaid. From the top : 1/8 tsp Military Green, 1/8 tsp Indian Yellow, 1/4 tsp Golden Brown and 1/8 tsp Golden Brown over 1/4 yd. I like the way the colours work together in these pieces.

I then began with two and a half yards of this bright striped wool and divided it into 10 quarter yard pieces. There are two 1/4 yard pieces of each colour. From the left for each quarter yard: 1/8 tsp Aljo Aubergine, 1/8 tsp Pro Chem Chocolate Brown plus 1/8 tsp Chestnut, 1/8 Pro Chem Turquoise, 1/4 tsp Pro Chem Boysenberry and 1/8 Majic Carpet Blue Violet.

pendleton skirts

May 12, 2012 by Birdbrain Leave a Comment

I love vintage 100% woollen Pendleton skirts. I find them in thrift shops and in the big bin at the back of the Dorr Mill store. Here are three particularly nice ones I have on hand, washed and ready to go. I use them for the backs of pillows and chair pads and I also dye them for hooking. I was surprised to find an Etsy site that specializes in these great skirts–right now has 418 of them! Now I must say, I prefer the hunt through the thrift store bins and the thrift store prices too–but there must be far greater interest in these vintage beauties than I know. Are people wearing them again?

new work

May 8, 2012 by Birdbrain 1 Comment

Here are some of the new pieces I have been working on. They are made from remnant pieces of beautiful grainy leather I have collected here and there. I like to make the linings have a story too–the purple started life as a Jaegar skirt–gorgeous cotton; the green and orange is Tanzanian cotton, a gift from the Principal of the school I taught at in Metangwe. The colours are the colours of the Kenyan sky and soil. Both pouches have removable wrist straps and small leather pockets inside. And both are destined for the shop.

Here are some smaller pieces, also made from remnants, (the small photo on the left shows the reverse sides). The red and black is a great pencil case, the fuchsia and lime a coin pouch. All four of these pieces, and I hope some more, will be in the shop by the end of the week. That is definitely on my list! I have also been dyeing for the wedding rug–and will post results soon. In the meantime, I hope you are enjoying these lovely spring days–here in Ontario, the lilacs are just out and the cardinal’s nest outside my kitchen window brings flashes of stunning colour.

my favourite things montréalais

May 6, 2012 by Birdbrain 2 Comments

I spent the morning in the studio and I want to show you what I made. But that will have to wait until tomorrow. A beautiful sunny afternoon and some bike riding intervened, so a couple of pouches are done, yes, minus the riveting which I hope to get to later tonight. But, I wanted to list some of my favourite things in Montreal, just in case you find yourself there, or want to check them out on line.

1. We ate at Crudessence my first night in the city. This is a charming small place on Rachel which serves delicious raw vegan meals as well as take-out and prepared foods. They have a cookbook available, but their website has lots of information, including recipes of their most famous dishes. Have a look! You may become a convert!

2. Myco Anna on St. Laurent is a favourite of mine. I first encountered the design label several years ago at the Salon des Métiers D’Art, Montreal’s huge Decmember craft show. Much of the Myco Anna clothing is made from recycled fabrics. Since then the shop has grown to include other Canadian designers of both clothing and bags. I discovered the amazing work of Annie Thompson–her personal baggage collection is very inspiring for a bag-maker like me–great combinations of colour and fabric. However, I was really taken by the design work of Advika and bought this top made of organic cotton and soy. For me it is the perfect combination of style and comfort–plus it is designed and made in Canada of a renewable and biodegradable fabric. Perfect!

new CB2

May 5, 2012 by Birdbrain Leave a Comment

Getting back into the studio. This version of the CB2 is made from the leather left over when a friend had her new skirt shortened. It is a beautiful buttery cocoa, lined with batik cotton. The CB2 pouch is designed to be carried alone or popped into a bigger bag. Small leather pocket inside and detachable wrist strap. L 6″ x W 9″ x D 3″

More Montreal

May 4, 2012 by Birdbrain Leave a Comment

There has been no sunshine in Montreal all week, but the streets are filled with inspiration. I love the architecture, the colours–the old city very much present. I’m writing from my ipad, getting used to this blogging app again, so things might look a bit differrent. I can’t adjust or crop photos, so the posts are ad hoc. But this is good practice for later in the month when I will be biking in Italy snd taking you along, I hope.

montreal

May 2, 2012 by Birdbrain 2 Comments

I am spending a few days in Montreal. I have many reasons to visit, but one is to roam the fabric district which is a few blocks from my son’s apartment. It is a great neighbourhood where it is easy to lose yourself for a day.

dyeing and glimpse of #3

April 30, 2012 by Birdbrain 3 Comments

One of my favourite methods to dye is Wanda Kerr’s wandering method. Wanda is a master at understanding dyes and making beautiful combinations. The subtle changes of these light wanderings will work well for the small squares I plan to use in the sky on the next rug. I want to make more of these in slightly darker values to give the sky some depth.

Because it is a gift, this is all I can show you of the third chair seat–the troublesome one. We have finally come to a truce–but only because I made several concessions demanded by the piece. As I was thinking about all of this, I rediscovered Mary Ann Wise’s article in Rug Hooking Magazine, Jan/Feb 2010. (What a resource these back issues are!) This article is well worth checking out–there are tips to help you analyze your rug when you know things aren’t right. Tip 1 warns that you have to avoid getting too attached to images “that make the composition trite or sentimental”, or as she says, you must “kill the darlings”. I had wanted to have hearts in the sky and I thought they would work as the circles did in the second piece here. Instead they seemed too cute and very distracting, actually tacky! They are still there now if you squint, but in the same value they don’t irritate. Big lesson learned before the big rug.

We decided on the size of the new rug last night and the border. I now need to confirm the style of the main motif. The third sample veered too close to a real landscape for my liking, so I am hoping to stay more primitive and symbolic–but it’s quite a journey, as you know, with discoveries all along the way. Off now to cut and serge the linen backing–that I know is straightforward!