Suspended

This window display caught my eye as I was cycling today.

So I pulled up for a closer look. It's fun but I realised it struck a chord because it reminded me of the way I suspend metal objects on their side and in a repeat sequence in some of my chandeliers.  It looks so striking on a bigger scale.

I love these chance sightings of odd things that add a bit of poetry to your day.

More Stairwells

 I saw these lovely old stairs in an old building in Kings Cross a few years ago. There was an exhibition there though this has possibly all been developed by now.

There is something so lovely about worn steps.

I found I'd taken almost the same photo of some other steps - these were on the Isle of Wight in the building where friends were getting married (great bloggers Artemis and Nao) There's something about stairwells....cinematic....symbolic....mysterious...

More Tin

I knew I'd find a use for those rusty icing nozzles.

I Love Tin

I love the humble tin, it's such a gorgeous object.

You can buy plastic lids for them - usually made for pet-food tins so mine have a cat impression on them. I have been looking for more but haven't seen them for ages. Look out for them in the pound shops they're so useful.

Look at these beauties, they're more appetising than patisserie. I found these at Kempton Market - my first and only visit, you'd think it's the kind of place I frequent, but no, I often avoid the temptation to acquire more stuff, unless it's for my work of course. I am looking forward to making my first croissant chandelier.

Upcycling Horse

This is possibly a poor excuse for a blog post but life is very stressful at the moment re info on the post before last. Amazingly I have managed to maintain some chandelier making during this period and it's like a tonic to do it. But in the countryside you see these reminders that people have always reused stuff. I'm not bothered by the terminology; upcycling, recycling, reusing etc - though re-purpose always sounds a bit clumsy to me - I'm more bothered by over trendiness and the core of resourcefulness being overlooked by some fancy styling - so here is an under-styled horses water drink thing for you to admire.

Snowdrops

Here in the countryside the snowdrop season is coming to an end. My friend Matt Bishop is a very very serious galanthophile or should I say galanthus expert. Here's a taster. I've had a tour of his own new nursery where he's nurturing varieties that will be for sale from his website when the sales go live in the summer. I always liked snowdrops because they look like baby goats faces with floppy ears. Matt travels to various snowdrop belts and has identified previously unidentified varieties. He named one variety 'Toby' after my late brother (they had worked in horticulture and studied landscape architecture together) so when he's reared these baby plants I'm going to get at least one of those and will have to find a good place for it. So if you're stuck for gift ideas from this summer I reckon a rare snowdrop from Matt would be a fantastically original present.

Countryside

This is the beginning of my second studio I'm setting up here on the edge of Dartmoor. It's not exactly by choice - my mother has had a stroke - what dreadful things they are and so common - so I'm needing to be away from the London studio part time but wanting to work when I'm not at the hospital. I often wonder how other people cope with the mix of professional life and crisis with friends or family health, though it's not a new scenario for me to down tools to be bedside. I suppose we creative self-employed people are lucky to have a more flexible set up than many. Anyway I found this nice old tin and thought I'd keep my new tools in it. I hate cheap crappy far eastern tools - I'd rather pay more and get a decent pair of pliers but they're hard to find so sadly I succumbed to the £1 guys - lets see how long they last! What a cynical activity it is to produce a load of cheap rubbish to make a fast buck.
Countryside tales to come!

Tavistock

The buttons in the previous post were from a stall in the pannier market in Tavistock: a little market town on the edge of Dartmoor. I went to a huge comprehensive school there before I ran off to bigger cities at 16. I struck lucky on this everything £1 table - maybe a January clear out by the dealer - as I also got a cute technicolour jigsaw of Monmartre - wish I was there in the sun...

and two little jugs and some brooches - I already gave 2 brooches away as presents, probably the jugs will go the same way,

There's plenty more to tempt you here like home baking with the name of who baked them and where on the package,

Hand knitted dog and puppy coats - very very adorable no?

There's a great cheese shop called Country Cheeses where you can have a taste before you buy.

Tavistock got in the national news a few years ago because McDonalds (can't believe I'm writing their name in my blog!!) failed there and closed - YES - the local food triumphed, read the story here. And it's not a really posh place like the home counties or Cotswolds or the like.

Then recently I read this Guardian article telling that it's the only place in the UK apart from parts of London where women earn more than men, so it's clearly becoming a very cool place. 

So many places have a growth of independent shops and food ventures and are run by people who have a real passion for what they do so they should outlive what you could see as a trend, remember that when hear of all the closures in the news. One of the other great draws for me to visit Tavistock is the 10 charity shops within spitting distance of each other!



Little potted pale blue/grey iris were £1.50, I bought two. At home in London I rarely ever set off on 'shopping trips' but in Tavistock it's a real pleasure.

Buttons

I bought these pearl buttons in a market recently for £1, I know - bargain! But I've been admiring the choice of thread colour and the arrangement of non matching sets. It seems so lovingly done. I often use buttons in my work and it was my intention to snip these off and use them but I'm wondering if I'll manage to destroy this little work of art.

More Coco Chocolate

I've been busy making another confection of a chandelier for Coco Chocolate recently. This is Sydney bound for a new shop there, their 3rd, so chocolate seems to be booming in that far away land. I've had alot of returning customers recently which is lovely, I have a few who have 4 or 5 of my pieces - that's very gratifying and of course they get loyalty points!
Unfortunately I'm a long way from the Coco chocolate shops - there are 2 in Edinburgh - but they do have an online shop that I've used before.

Food Bank

It's very nice to have lots of thriving independent eateries on my doorstep in Brixton. The market seems to have the right balance but there is a real threat that rents will just soar and that these places could become a victim of their own success. So far the big names have not muscled in. Also this movement 'up' of the area had cleared out some drug dealers - very good news.

However there's an edge to watching this that makes me uncomfortable - the difference between those who can afford to eat out and those who now need to use the Food Bank. I read about my local food bank in the Brixton Bugle - the paper arm of The Brixton Blog and am horrified that we now have hungry neighbours amongst us. Just google to find your local food bank, go on, they tell you what they need. I spent just an extra £5 on my shop before Xmas and dropped in non perishable food.

Why cant benefits be a bit more to meet food costs? - all the money goes back into the economy at local shops, claimants aren't going to put it in an off shore account are they?! no, so it stays in the economy and then everyone's a winner.
Re the last photo - I don't eat meat - it being corpses and therefore unappetising - but I do like big simple words hand painted with shadows.

Stairwells and Wiltons

I realised that I have alot of photos of stairwells. They're often so photogenic and beautiful. These 3 stairwells are at Wiltons Music Hall. You may have seen Wiltons in films and TV as a location.

Visit the Mahogany Bar here; it dates from the 1700's. I went before Xmas, it's gorgeous, with layers of old textures, history and character.  Nice bar staff introduced me to the Moscow Mule! (vodka and ginger beer).

You can admire the patches of original plaster work over a drink and snack.

There are lots of rooms to explore. Here's a mechanical sculpture in an exhibition they had. I love the view from the old interior out through the geraniums in the window box to an east London modern block lit at night.
Wiltons always needs support for restoration. I became a friend a few years ago as it's such a special London gem we don't want to lose. Find it 10 minutes walk south from Aldgate East tube.

The Bright Stuff

I love the reflected light you get from snow. Today was the first time it's been bright since it's snowed and the light has doubled, it must be my favourite kind of light.

I love the quietness of it too......

.....and the perfect souffles....

....and the way it outlines things.

Do you remember when we were desperately collecting water for the garden? - then it rained forever and the storage filled completely and water seemed like something we'd never be short of, well here's a funnel I cut from and empty plastic water bottle to channel rainwater into containers - now all overflowing with snow. You can shovel snow but some poor folk are still flooded with nowhere for water to drain to.

There's not much of a downside to cold weather for Otis because he loves languishing by the fire all day - I put my gloves by the fire to warm up and he looked so sweet when he decided to try one on.

Organisation

This is my mums kitchen drawer. I was looking for tools and found it hard to find anything in this sea of useful looking things. I'm not sure how really useful they are though. Plenty of elastic bands and bits of string and lolly sticks to label plant pots with, paper clips and drawing pins, sachets of powder for vase flowers and old nylon tights which she uses in the garden to tie things like trees to stakes - they never rot - amongst other stuff.
I was going to tidy the drawer so it would be easier to find things - but then I didn't have the heart because it seems like a work of art in itself. Also unfortunately my mum was in hospital over Xmas, (the first time she's shown any real signs of her great age) so I didn't want to feel like I was taking advantage - I would hate it if someone tidied my stuff!!!!

And then I found a repaired elastic band - even though was no shortage of complete ones. Obviously I've inherited some of these tendancies.....

Festive

Have a Great Holiday Season all you peeps in Blogland and a fantastic New Year!

By coincidence I've been making a red and green chandelier this season and it's been brightening up the studio. The red cups were in a surprise parcel from my fellow up/recycler in Seattle Russ Morgan. Thank-you Russ! and more about him in a yet to come post.

Happy Mess

I think tidying up can be overrated. I've occasionally over tidied my studio and then felt it's lost some creativity. I need to see stuff lying around because therein lie the solutions. That's my excuse anyway!

For Sale..

Apparently these are called fascinaters - not to be confused with the head gear! I originally made one for a baby, just to look at, not to handle as they do have some sharpish bits. When I put a photo of some more on the blog they got masses of re-pins on Pinterest. They're too time consuming to make to commission so I don't take orders for these but occasionally I'll make smaller items for fun.
So I finally made a couple available before Christmas. They are £50 each plus postage and packing (around £2 in the UK) If you are interested in them just e-mail me at the e-mail address on my profile page. The 3 tiered piece above is 27cm long x 6cm wide. The larger single cutter below is 10cm wide x 20cm long. Each also have a mini suspension chain. Vintage components are listed below.

Vintage pastry cutter/s

Vintage chandelier glass

Old mustard or salt spoon

Key from a Victorian school, London

Piece of old clay pipe from Thames River, London

Vintage French blue glass buttons from Portobello Road Market.

Various beads and buttons

Old metal bell

Coin (French centimes or Japanese yen)

Found Garage

The cards for my Tokyo exhibition arrived today and I love them. It's next week at Found Garage  in Naka Meguro for any of you lucky people who might be there during this firey coloured season amongst the maples.

Light Brigade

The evolution of light bulbs has been seriously testing my green credentials as incandescent bulbs are phased out. I'm all for saving energy and always have been but the aesthetics of the low energy long life bulb have been a problem for decorative lighting. You cant really stick big chunks of white plastic in antique chandeliers for instance. Lamps with shades are not a problem, it's where you see the bulb that it is. You can still buy clear 100 watt bulbs (pictured above) but they're designated for "rough service" not domestic - interesting - I definitely need one of these in my studio where I really have to see what I'm doing, it is the only one I will use. You can read more on this here and facts here.

Otherwise these halogen bulbs are replacing golf and candle bulbs and are becoming more readily available. You can see the filament bit is different to the classic outlawed style and it is brighter - more concentrated - so it's not comfortable to look directly into. These save about 30% energy.  They may well make a twisted candle one which will replace what I've been using in my Teacup chandeliers.
LED candle bulbs are pricey and not up to scratch yet, I've been watching bulbs for years and waiting for the technology and aesthetics to improve and I'm sure LED's will be better in just a few years.
Incidentally alot of these bulbs are not as green as you think, the carbon footprint of producing them (in the far east) can be high and is anyone really disposing of the CFL's (compact fluorescent lights) properly as they have mercury in them? So there's alot more change needed ahead.

These lovely filament bulbs will not be permitted to be manufactured anymore - though they are long life bulbs - you can still buy existing stock, there's a great selection here from Historic Lighting and it's made in Switzerland. You see these alot in trendy bars, the one on the left is called a squirrel cage filament - terrible name!! - but I love the bulb shape. I wonder if it's going to be possible to one day produce something that looks like this but uses less energy, I hope so.

Paris Flea Market

Les Puces St Ouen, Porte de Clignancourt

You really need time to explore this place, it takes a while to get the hang of it. It's about 10 minutes walk from Porte de Clignancourt metro stop at the north end of Line 4.
I love the mix of the modern graffiti with the old objects.

The market runs along the Periferique so it's interesting city scape where you move away from the old style centre and find yourself under flyovers etc.

It's like a small town in itself. I tend to go on Mondays, maybe the prices are better then because Saturday and Sunday ( these are the 3 days it's open) are very full of tourists. I don't always haggle but it is the norm there - often I'm buying stuff from the really messy rows of boxes of junk and they've never charged much so I would never dream of haggling. It's a real feast for the eyes - you don't have to buy anything it's interesting just looking - though I find I can quite quickly be overwhelmed, there's so much to see.

Just south of the market it was good to see that some things never change!