Design Inspiration. Planet Stencil Library.

Storming The Bastille

See Paris and Di.  I did both.  Last Sunday morning, I met my long time friends Di and Harvey for coffee at the Places des Vosges.  Di writes the very entertaining and popular blog Designer's Block.  They were shopping for pieces to embellish the Ghost Furniture that she creates from her home in northern England.  I was there to flâner (see next post) and take pictures.  Di and I took many of the same shots so....seeing as she posted first I will say go to Di's blog to see more of the things that I saw.  Isn't this box of small dolls creepy?  Even more so when you crop the box from the shot!  Di has put a photograph of me on her blog and so I will do the same.  Here is Di trying to scale the wall to avoid paying the toilet charge. No seriously, here she is looking for things small enough to fit in her carry on bag.  

Tara at Paris Parfait has posted about the Bastille Antiques Fair too. If you are in Paris before the fair closes on May 18th you can check it out for yourself.  This would have been the perfect entertainment for Rachel, but she had already moved on to Avignon for the week.

Sorry Rachel, but the vendor would not accept card payment for this green handbag and I know you would love it. The sides flip open!  I love seeing multiples of one item in a display and the soda siphons were such a lovely blue.    

Di and I bought small unframed mirrors. She had ovals and I bought a rectangular but convex magnifying mirror.  I will set mine into the garden wall if possible.  I am certain that hers will appear on Ghost Furniture.  On the way home I wandered up the Rue des Barres.  Hard to believe that I was in the middle of a major capital city.  Helen.

Photo credit. Cafe picture (top) from Paris Postcards.

We are away for a week

Rachel and I have gone to Paris.  She is staying two weeks but I will be back next Monday, hopefully with many things to show and tell. In the meantime, I have left you two more posts which I hope you will enjoy.  Have a lovely week. Do please leave us your comments.  If you need anything from The Stencil Library in our absence then Heather and Lesley will look after you.

Oh, and apologies to Teddy Thompson and anyone else watching his concert at The Sage, Gateshead.  Would you believe my attack alarm went off mid song!  Worse than that, I did not know it was me and was fascinated as to how he got the loud, wailing noise from an acoustic guitar.  Even worse still, I did not know how to silence it. Big, big ooops!

I am singing in a fortnight.   So,Teddy, if you are in Newcastle on that night then please set off your alarm whilst I'm singing as it's only fair. Helen.

Nicola Rose - the Raskl

I just wanted to blow a trumpet for Nicola Rose.  Nicola used to be our 'Saturday Girl' at The Stencil Library's shop.  She has assisted me on many decorating jobs through the years.  If scaffolding was involved in a project, our roles were reversed and I was the ground assistant to her.

Nicola trained as a set designer, she is a brilliant painter, model maker and stilt walker.  Yes really, she has performed all over Europe on her stilts!  For the past few years, she teamed up with her brother and some talented friends and formed Raskl .  This coffee table is one of theirs. They work mainly with wood and make the most wonderful, artistic furniture for commercial, industrial and domestic settings.   These were some tablemats and a lazy susan they made for their parents' round table.  The curved edge on the mats is such a good idea.   Nicola was recently featured along with her artist mother on Designers Block blog (Feb 28th).  The blog's author, Di Overton, finds the most sylish, beautiful and often quirky fashion and objet d'art to share with her readers, so Nicola is in very good company.  Helen.

Clyde The Creature

I have never been cute or fluffy.  I was never been one for dolls or soft toys.  So why am I so excited about the arrival of Clyde who is winging his way from America by way of Felicia's Fluffy Flowers ?  Felicia was one of the first people to leave a message on  our blog. I visited hers and got such enjoyment from her sense of humour.  She was weaving stories around the characters that she makes from fabric and sells from her shop on Etsy.com and at craft markets around Macon, Georgia. Clyde appeared on Felicia's blog in late fall. He needed a home, was lonely and more than a little strange looking.  Clyde was made by a process called needle felting. It involves repeated stabbing with extremely sharp needles.  Now craft people may believe this process is benign, but it sounded entirely cruel to me.  I could not believe that one of Felicia's Etsy customers had not rescued him by now. Felicia had written in Clyde's bio that 'His uniqueness makes him a little sad and lonely.  What he really wants is others like him to play with.  So he's decided to set out on a global trek in search of his kind.'   Well, he has found me!  Okay, I am not four inches tall with a fat hairy belly, short legs and a stripey tail, but I feel a connection with him and I could work on my physical appearance.  Felicia tells me that Clyde is itching to get out of his box and into his travelling one to come and live with me.  Hurry home Clyde! Helen

A day out in York

Yaaaay, Chips and I escaped the office recently and took you with us on a dayout.  We travelled by train  from Northumberland

to Yorkshire. 

This is our office viewed from the moving train (as the railway line is nearby).  Our first stop was The National Railway Museum in York. I had heard so much good stuff about it. I like trains and am very fond of railway poster art so it was a good place to start.  The postcards above are from my collection.  To see and buy railway art visit the Museum Prints site.   Just look at the interior of this Silver Streak from the thirties, totally fabulous.   It's a shame I only saw the photo and not the real thing. Notice the stencilling?  There was a fair bit of stencilling featured in many of the trains.  If you like the style and fancy creating a similar look, check out our Art Deco range of stencils.

  Look at the care and attention to the coach lining on the underside of this carriage.

Gold leaf has been used on the lettering and I love the detail of the drop shadow.

Just outside the Railway Museum was the Yorkshire Eye, a giant ferris wheel.  As I scrambled aboard I gleefully said to Chips that I was so glad that my age old fear of heights was now truly behind me.  I rummaged in my bag for the camera to show you all Yorkshire from the air.  Then my whole world went pear shaped as I suffered an unexpected panic attack.  I did not see Yorkshire.  With my eyes tightly closed I was trying to cling onto reason, sanity and upholstery as the glass pod swayed in the wind that howled around it.  I was howling inside it!  Once released from ferris hell, I shook for another couple of hours and kept lapsing into hysterical giggles.  It was now time for more pleasant things....shopping.  York is made up of many narrow streets like this one.  It looks like a Dickensian film set.  The street names are wonderful.  'The Shambles' is one of them and here is another.   Whip ma what???? What is that about?

And..look at the tortured trees!  We took this picture of roof tops from Marks & Spencers menswear dept.  The big cathedral is York Minster, we'll go there in a minute, but first...tea!  York is nearly as famous for Betty's Tea Rooms as it is for it's architectural beauty. Betty's is a Swiss pattisserie/cafe with six branches throughout Yorkshire.   I enjoy their genteel style along with the suberb cakes and fish and Chips. 

Refreshed?  Now we will visit the Minster. I had not been overly bothered about visiting it as we have Durham Cathedral near to us and I had regarded York Minster a poor second.  I was wrong.  They are quite different and equally splendid.

Once inside, one is treated to fabulous carving...

fabulous masonary...

and fabulous stencilling...

Okay, the stencilling is stuck behind the grill on this one.  Good grill though.

Many similar stencils can be found in our Gothic, Medieval and Tudor collection and the little border featured on the clock is in our Indian range.

Do you think this might say 'Have a nice day' in semaphore?

  I hope that you enjoyed visiting York with me. I had fun and I hope we'll have other days out together.

Helen.

More Valentine's Day Stuff

In last year's Valentine's Day issue, Romantic Homes Magazine featured me as a woman 'who inspires' in their annual 'Round Up of the Romantics'.  It was quite an honour. I had always thought myself eccentric rather than romantic, but romantic sounds so much better.  This month the magazine will have featured another ten ladies for their Valentine's issue, but it will be April before I expect to see a copy on this side of the water.  If you are one of the ten please let me know.  We were very lucky with coverage from Romantic Homes last year. Either Rachel or I appeared in each of these three editions.  We were introduced to some other lovely people and their blogs through this magazine.  One of my favourite blog authors featured along with me in the Romantic Round Up and then with Rachel in the March colour issue.  She is Alicia Paulson and writes Posy Gets Cozy.  I love this woman's photography. She writes about food, friends, creativity and life in general but makes it all look so, so scrumptious.

My interview for The Romantics went like this.

"WHAT I LOVE...

* White scented lilies in my home in the winter and plenty of home grown roses in the summer.

* Lots of grapefruit scented candles in the office and fig scented ones for the home.

* The stencilled canvas pavilion in my garden where I can relax with the cats.

* My garden, where I grow vegetables and flowers   

* Having friends over for afternoon tea served on vintage mismatched china.  I offer them a feast of colour and flowers to compensate for my lack of baking skills.

* The countryside where I live and work.

* My husband and partner of twenty five years (now 26) and our enthusiasm and passion for what we do.

* To teach and demonstrate stenciling.  I still get a thrill when I peel away a stencil to reveal the imprint and hear the audience gasp.

* Log fires when the weather is cold and all the windows open when the weather is hot.

*My stencilled home, situated in the middle of fields between two rivers in an area steeped in history.  We rent it from the local Lord who lives in a castle just down the road.  We know we are very fortunate to be living the life that we do."

If you have any romantic or eccentric foibles that could inspire us all then please share... but keep them clean. 

Helen.

Ps.  Maybe I am a tad  romantic, I did make these Valentine's Day Mochas for husband Chips and I.  Stencilled with cocoa powder of course!! H.

Valentine's Day Greetings

Happy Valentines Day!  Recently, I had a day out in the fabulous historic city of York.  I took you with me and as soon as I have the pictures organised, you can see what I saw.  For now, here is the shop window of Wild Hart in York.  I thought it made a nice Valentine image, with love from the UK.

Those Talented Morris Sisters

I think the title was originally said of the Mitford girls but I'll borrow it.  Many of you know that Rachel Morris and I write this blog and that we are cousins both living and working at The Stencil Library. Well today I thought I would show you what our sisters make .

Cinnamon is my half sister and graduated in Vancouver with a diploma in textile arts.  She knows all sorts of wonderful stuff about traditional and contemporary craft, owns a loom and is not afraid to use it.  This Christmas, she sent a care parcel for us all.  It contained felt booties that she had made for Rachel and I, and felt mittens for Chips. I'm ashamed to say I snaffled those for myself too.  I'll loan them to him.  Are they not fab?  The heart is a pocket that one inserts a hand warmer into and they remain snug for seven hours.  I am trying to persuade Cinnamon to sell these online. If she does, I'll let you know.

Rachel's sister, Rebecca is set up for online sales and has a shop called "melysbaby" on etsy.com selling embroidered garments and home accessories.  She sources vintage patterns then embroiders them my hand. The patterns are varied, but all have an old style charm.

These are monogrammed pillowcases in neat little bags that she made as Christmas gifts for Rachel, Chips and I.  We have featured some of her embroidery in a previous post.  I did not inherit the same neatness of stitch, but I think Rachel has because she's been turning out some nifty garments in her dressmaking classes.

Cinnamon and Rebecca have small children and work from home. The eldest of the children, Rebecca's daughter four year-old Stella, is already making her mark in the craft world and has her own spot (called stellababy) in her mum's shop.  We love this design drawn by Stella and embroidered onto a pillow by her mother.  It is a self portrait made for her Auntie Rachel.  I wonder if she can design stencils? H.