Snowman collage card

Snowman collage card by Michela, aged 3

This card was made by my little girl all by herself at a local crafty/arty workshop. The only help she got was with the glue gun. Happy Xmas everybody!

Beautiful and useful

Wooden book handmade in Switzerland, inside pic

Wooden book handmade in Switzerland, closed. It was bought for less than £1 at charity bazaar

William Morris once said: “Have nothing in your house that you do not know to be useful, or believe to be beautiful”. I got to know William Morris better while working for a period home magazine back in the 1990s. Before that epiphany it was just a name in contemporary social and art history, decades after the Impressionists, which were my favourites. Finding out about Morris also coincided with my switch from Impressionism to the Pre-Raphaelite movement. I still love the Pre-Raphaelite artists and really relished the costume drama Desperate Romantics (and various books about them). 

I had the good fortune to live opposite the William Morris Gallery for a few years and was a Friend and regular visitor - until I moved out of London. Aside the beautiful tiles, furniture, books and textiles, there is Pre-Raphaelite artwork in the upstairs gallery.

Slippers made of wool with extractable insole/support. Bought from a shoe shop in Cambridge for £13 (during sales)

But back to the mundane... This is a pair of beautiful and useful slippers, more functional than the wooden book but not less attractive....

Textile art: E17 wallhanging

E17 wall hanging. For more info on Walthamstow Arts Club, visit their blog...

This wall hanging was exhibited at the Walthamstow Arts Club's Show in 2006. I have always been intrigued by textile art and this was my first attempt. Aside local inspiration in the person of Shirley Pountney and the splendid William Morris Gallery, one of my early inspirations came from visiting Tracey Emin's studio in Waterloo before she became famous worldwide. It was at a gathering she had advertised through Time Out, at which I admired her appliqued works: the armchair and the tent.

I was priviledged enough to crawl inside the tent and speak to Tracey one to one. The tent was then sold to a major art collector and eventually destroyed in a warehouse fire. Tracey Emin's early work resonated with me because it's based on crafts like sewing, patchwork and applique. While in America quilting has been all the rage for decades, in the UK textile art seems to have become mainstream only in the past 10 years or so. 

Going back to my modest offering pictured above, Walthamstow themes are embroidered on the letters of the postcode. The background fabric is green because of the Epping Forest, which is one of the features of the borough. The top part of the E has a forest picture. The swimmer refers to a local college pool where I learnt to swim, which was later threatened by closure but was saved because of the coming Olympics (for a borough participating in the Olympics it was really bad PR to close one of the few Olympic-sized pools in the East End). 

The bottom of the E is inspired by William Morris, whose gallery is not far from the college and located in Forest Road. The fabric used is a Sanderson reproduction of a Morris design. The notebooks and pen, plus the number 22 in the number 1 refer to a writers' group in the borough called Forest Writers, which was at number 22 in Orford Road.

The market stall hints at Walthamstow Market, one the longest in Europe. On the number 7 there is a shop front, which represents a restaurant where the arts club used to meet before we moved to larger premises. The last embroidery represents the Olympic circles as Walthamstow is one of the participating boroughs. I’m hoping to do a similar project for my new city, Cambridge, so watch this space! 

Belated congrats to the E17 Arts trail for winning an award!

Oriental insoles and vintage rhyme book

The mystery of the Orient

These pretty oriental insoles were bought from a charity shop in Cambridge. They are wonderful - not exactly my size but the decorative embroidery made me buy them. I paid just over £1 for each sealed pair. Packaging has writing in Chinese only, except for two words, Local Girl (must be the brand) so no clue about them at all.

Vintage rhymes

The rhyme book pictured below was printed in 1976. It originally came with a 7in, 45rpm record. It features 24 rhymes, some are still sung at playgroups, others are more obscure. I just love it! I found this at a Give & Take event in East London. Give & Take events are in the same spirit of Freecycle but you can pick and leave stuff in one place.