Edinburgh Yarn Festival and How It Went.

I had such a great time!!!

This was my stand at Edinburgh Yarn Festival on the 14th and 15th March.

I didn't get time to take many photos at the but here are some taken of my neighbouring exhibitors in the Pop Up Market.

All these incredible felt items are handmade by Dalia at Felting Studio. Originally from Vilnius in Lithuania, Dalia and Linas now live and work in Edinburgh and the quality of Dalia's felt making is outstanding.

Their Cat Caves were very popular as were the slippers. 

I particularly liked this shawl and was delighted to see it get snapped up by a happy customer.

To the other side of my stand was Joe's Toes selling brilliant felt slipper kits and haberdashery. The slipper kits come in many different colours and you can needle felt your own design onto them before stitching them up.

I treated myself to some cute little wooden butterfly buttons which I hope to use on some boxes in time for Open Studios.

I also had the pleasure of meeting Clive and Laurence from Thurso who were there with their wonderful hand dyed, hand spun yarns and fibre batts. We had 'met' online and Clive had carded some batts that he just knew I'd love and funnily enough I picked them out straight away! I also got a few hand spuns to use in my felt pictures which I have been enjoying working with this week.

The yarn festival was a big event, taking up the whole of the Corn Exchange with vendors and visitors coming from all over the world especially.

There was such a great atmosphere with everyone in their element surrounded by wonderful products and exciting new materials to take home and try.

Most of the vendors were through in the main exhibition hall and although I was busy on my own stall, I asked a friend along to help me so that I could escape and buy some fibre for myself.

I love this hand dyed roving from Strathearn Fleece and Fibre. So many different colours and it's a lovely texture to work with. 

I also bought these lovely greens and worked them in with scrims and hand spun to make background pieces for landscapes.

You can see the results below.

I purchased some beautiful hand dyed silk embroidery thread which I have used for my flowers here. It has a lovely sheen and subtle variations in colour along the strands which makes it just lovely to work with. I'm wishing I'd stocked up on more while I had the chance! 

'Mary's Cottage'

Sold

Here is some more of my stash below. If you love all the colours in this photo, then imagine a whole exhibition hall filled with stands selling all this and you can understand why everyone was so excited and happy to be there! :)

You can see more photos from the event on the EYF website here 

Our Open Studios North Fife event is only 6 weeks away now. I will be at my usual venue in Ladybank with a whole host of new pictures, Trinket Boxes, Booches and Jewellery pieces to exhibit. I am also planning to have some new printed cushions available. I just need to get the artwork made first! 

You can pick up brochures for the event from me today at Falkland and from Waterstones bookshops in the next couple of weeks. You can also find all the information you need on our website here.

Open Studios - Over For Another Year.

Phew, I can see why busy businesses have 'people' to do their online 'stuff' for them! I have not had a spare minute in the last week to update my blog to tell you all how it went at Open Studios North Fife 2014!

First of all I'd like to say a big thank you to everyone who came along! My venue in Ladybank was packed out the door again this year! I had a few minutes at the start of the day on Saturday to take a few photos and then it was pretty steady with visitors. We counted just over 400 over the 3 days this year!

I really enjoy this event as I have much more space to display my work as well as space to show ongoing projects and some of the materials I use in my work.

I have expanded my range since last year though and still struggled to make shelf room for everything. I resorted to hanging some of my new Heart Pendants on the wall. A handy piece of fishing net came in useful for that!

These new designs were very popular but I made lots so these are now available in my Etsy shop.

My work corner was brightened up by 'Tabitha' my tailors dummy showing how the brooches can be worn to keep cardigans and shrugs closed at the front. She was also a great model for my new larger pendants and I sold all my flower shaped ones.

My little Textile Trinket Boxes stole the show again this year with the big one with the row of harbour cottages selling first thing on Saturday morning. My lovely customer let me keep it for display over the weekend though. This was all that was left by Monday and now there are only four available.

The largest boxes measure 12 x 12 x 7 cm and are £46. This one below measures 10 x 10 x 6 cm at £38.

The next size down are 7 x 7 x 7 cm at £32

And the smallest measure 5 x 5 x 5 cm at £26

These four are all still available here

I had some Bits Bags for sale over the weekend which went down very well. I bagged up all the hand dyed fibre in the colours that I tend not to use and sold it so that I can buy more in the colours that I do use.

I also had some Felt Soap Rock Kits for sale which were popular. The kit comes with a lump of soap, loose merino fibres and full instructions. Basically you wrap the merino fibres around the soap, wet it, rub it and roll it and you end up with it looking like a pebble made of felt. The soap is still inside it and you can use it for washing with the felt layer acting like a scrubby. Great little project for children. 

My larger felt pictures made a great display in the back room of the studio. I sold a few but still have some left.

'Crofter's Cottage'

£245 Framed

£195 Mounted with no frame.

'Fisherman's Bothy'

£245 Framed

£195 Mounted with no frame.

'Low Tide at Willowherb Bay'

£245 Framed

£195 Mounted with no frame.

'At Peace By The Sea II'

£145 Framed

£95 Mounted with no frame.

'Daisy Cottage'

£95 Framed

'Heathery Knowe Cottage'

£95 Framed

'Purple Haze Cottage'

£75 Framed

The larger frames cannot be posted and are only suitable for local collection or delivery which is why I have given the prices for unframed as well. I can post  the pictures anywhere unframed.

The smaller pieces are fine for posting. Full details are in each listing in my Etsy shop.

I now have a pile of commission pieces to work through and orders from gift shops to fulfill so I'm actually still just as busy as I was before Open Studios! It's great to be busy though. 

If you have any questions about anything you have seen here on my blog, please feel free to get in touch with me at aileenclarkecrafts@yahoo.com

Makers Market at The Steeple, Newburgh

I had a lovely day on Saturday at The Makers Market in Newburgh. It was gloriously sunny and warm so I felt really privileged to have a stall outside for a change, especially one as fab as this! 

The stall was hand built by local artist/blacksmith and fellow Open Studios participant, Jim Shears. He plans to make another and they will be available to hire from Twist Fibre Crafts Studio.

It was fabulous to have so much space on the stand and plenty of room behind my shelf unit for packing sold items.

Here is Jim at his portable forge during the market.

My Mum popped along to see me and bought us coffee's and delicious lemon meringue Tiffin from Hatter's and Co's pop up cafe in the courtyard. 

Next to me on the other side were Rustic Simplicity with their gorgeous oak barrel furniture and cupboards.

Below is Newburgh based Jason Shearer playing his Tank Drum or Yantra as he calls it. I loved the sounds this instrument makes and asked Jason about it. Turns out he makes them from old gas bottles! If you fancy one, Jason will make you one for £150.

Contact jason.shearer@rocketmail.com

There was a great atmosphere at the Market with local session musicians playing tunes throughout the afternoon. These guys can be found regularly at The Stag Inn in Falkland every Wednesday evening from 8pm.

Today has been spent tidying up the work space and organising my stock. Lots of new pieces have been listed on Etsy.

Pendants £22

Bothan Ruadh

£35

Candlewick Cottage

£65

Now it's back to the felt making to build up a stock of new Trinket Boxes and start on my pictures for next year's calendar. 

Hope everyone is having a productive month. June can be such a lovely time of year with everything being so lush and a bit warmer at last! Hoping to do plenty of sewing outside soon.

May Makes

I had a lovely time with the ladies of the AWA (American Women's Association of Aberdeen) on Monday. I might be going back later in the year so I'll keep you all informed about that.

My next event is the Makers Market at The Steeple in Newburgh on Saturday June 8th

This week sees me getting all my available work photographed and listed

 in my Etsy Shop as well as working on commission pieces and other bits and pieces.

This Textile Trinket Box with Sea Shells is now available here

£32

I made quite a few little Harris tweed and felt boxes for Open Studios and only have two left!

Thankfully I have plenty of Tweed though so more of these coming soon.

Boxes £30

My Ivy Leaf Brooch Pins are proving to be very popular with all the purple ones sold out already. These gorgeous greens are still available though at £12 each.

More brooch pins. All of these brooches have an extra long brooch pin on them to allow them to be used as shawl pins or to keep draped cardigans closed at the front. They also look lovely on a lapel or hand bag and some of my customers tell me they wear them on their hat!

Harris Tweed and Felt Bird Brooch Pin

£12

All brooches available here

I have a few new Textile Jewellery pieces available as well.

I get asked a lot what these pendant and earring pieces are made from because people sometimes think they are fused glass.

When I used to make a lot of textile art cards and pictures, I loved the effect of the layered shimmery fabrics together and set about finding a way to make them wearable but durable. I came up with this idea to set the fabrics into pendant trays behind either resin or glass.

Pendants £22

These heart shaped earrings feature solid silver handmade ear wires by local jeweller 

Anne Miller.

 Heart Shaped Earrings with Handmade Ear Wires 

£18

Circle and Square Earrings from £15

For Open Studios this year I had a lot of my original felt pictures professionally framed.

This is 'Island Cottage and Boat' in it's beautiful frame from Robertson Fine Art in Glenrothes.

Island Cottage and Boat 

£195

Available here

I'm planning to make more pictures this size over the coming months and to make them available to be shipped worldwide in their lovely frames.

I also have one unframed piece available at the moment.

Harris Beach

£85

More of these coming soon as well.

So although we have had an extended winter and are still waiting for the warmer weather to arrive, I have been finding the temperatures soaring out in my wee shed!

It got up to 24 degrees in here the other day! SUN TRAP! So that's where I have been doing all my needle felting and hand sewing.

My new business cards also arrived last week. These grape hyacinth and primula have the sweetest scent an are so cheerful in my Lochbroom Pottery jug.

I will be continuing to list new items online this week and will hopefully get some more felt pictures finished really soon.

Thank you for taking the time to visit my blog.

Aileen.