vroege vogels - early morning birds

I was happy to meet this photographer Ricardo Poggi - we have done two shoots sofar with the collection  'summer darkness 2013' and the collection 'broken beauty 2014'. Last week he has openend his solo-exhibition with more photo's, not only from my collection. But with this poster I feel very proud. The dress has never been showed on stage and makes a wonderful entree in this way..

the making of....aw13 collection 'Summer Darkness'

My thoughts with this collection were based on my visit to the event Summer Darkness in Utrecht. Watching the people walking around in black cloths, dreadlocks and heavy black make-up and at the other hand the lolita's in soft girly dresses made me wondering why. Both seems to say 'don't touch me!'. The darkness frigthens people while the sweet girls seemed so fragile. Someone told me that this way of dressing will protects the wearers their soft and gentle innersoul....

I started to design 'something' with crosses, because I was inspired by the music and meeting the leadsanger of Cruxshadows. A cross is a sign of protection againts all evil. Along the way of the proces I learned from Carmen Bolanos to work with the indigoblue. Blue was used in the old English wars as a 'make-up' to protect the soldiers during the fights.

Choosing wool and handmade felt as my medium for making the garments I wanted to use the raw wool from the 'Zwart Bless' (Black Bless), given by my friend-farmer Marie-Josee. To test the possibilities with the raw wool in combination with the silks I made several samples for colourcombinations and textures. I have made the felt by myself and used the wool in many different ways.

The natural handdyed and printed silks worked perfectly for the airy lolita dresses, but also as a nunofelt for the tops and jackets. My sister helped me with sewing the fabrics under the felted dresses.

In my opinion the closure of the garments had to be more industrial. I found metalic elements which are normally used for electricity stuff. Together with rubber strips and rings they formed a good closure on the dark clothes.

In a next post I hope to show you more of the finished garments.

Forever green

Never a dull moment, although sometimes it feels time is slipping trough my fingers when I'am doodling around at home or surfing on the internet. That's why I decided to make my time usefull and felt some garments. Big sizes this time, taille 44. The Artwear Shop Jordaan has asked for them. It was if I had to learn again how to make them, because it didn't worked out always the way I wanted to have them. I have used some thicker fabrics for the nunofelting and that made it difficult to get them properly felted. But I love the effects I got with it. It only needs a finishing touch with my french coin, some buttons and a belt.

Ik verveel me nooit, al lijkt het soms wel alsof de tijd door mijn vingers glipt. Dan ben ik in het huis aan het rommelen of mooie plaatjes aan het kijken op het internet. Daarom besloot ik mijn tijd nuttiger te besteden en weer eens wat kleding te vilten. Een grotere maat dit keer, 44, op verzoek van Artwear Jordaan. Was het de kou of wat anders, want het leek alsof ik weer helemaal opnieuw moest leren vilten. Het liep in ieder geval niet soepel, de dikkere stoffen vilten niet lekker mee, maar het uiteindelijke resultaat bevalt me wel. Nu alleen nog mijn herkenningsmuntje, wat knopen of een band aanzetten en dan zijn ze klaar voor een photoshoot!

natural colours make the difference!

Two white dresses, which didn't made it to fashionshow were waiting for a couple of months for some colour. I had made two big dyepots for the classes with Pam, one with onions and the other one with eucalyptus. Both were enriched with an old copperpot and got in this way some extra colouring additives. It is amazing how the dresses come to life and don't you agree that in this case colour makes a big difference? The patterns of the bundling and marks from the leaves has given a gorgeous design on the silk and wool. And I love the button at the front...

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front

Twee witte jurkjes die niet de modeshow haalden lagen de hele zomer al te wachten op kleur. Voor de workshop van Pam had ik twee grote verfbaden gemaakt, een met ui en de ander met eucaplyptus. Om een diepere kleur te bereiken had ik er ook een koperen pot als beits meegetrokken. Na een ruime tijd in de pot te hebben geprutteld, was dit het resultaat. Ik vind het altijd verbazingwekkend hoe het wit tot leven komt door de natuurlijke kleuren en vind je ook niet dat kleur hier het verschil maakt! De afbindstrepen en afdruk van bladeren laten een prachtig patroon achter. En de knoopjes maken het helemaal af! 

                                               

modern felt

Kate Ramsey                                                    

Tatiana Sheverda

The last two weekends I was privileged to host two workshops with Kate Ramsey and Tatiana Sheverda. Both young and working with felt in a professional way. 
Kate has learned us how to make felted garments in a simple, but luxury way. She showed us how to make lines and holes, which created very light and drapey felt. 
Tatiana has launched recently her new fashion-collection Transcendence and teached us already the techniques she has used for this collection. She demonstrated how to create 3D surfaces with different kind of shiboro techniques. Both are willing to come back, Kate around 9 September 2012 for three days and hopefully Tatiana will teach a masterclass again in 2013.

3D surface feltsamples made by Tatiana

De afgelopen 2 weekenden waren helemaal top! Ik heb ik het voorrecht gehad Kate Ramsey and Tatiana Shevera te mogen ontvangen, twee zeer gedreven jonge designers en vilsters. De workshops waren een succes!
Kate leerde hoe je op een doeltreffende manier luxe vilt kunt maken. Ze liet ons zien hoe jezelf haar bestsellers op Etsy kon maken. Met lijnen en gaten in het vilt kan een licht en mooi vallend vilt worden gemaakt.
Tatiana heeft onlangs haar nieuwe kledinglijn Transcendence gelanceerd. In de workshop demonstreerde ze de gebruikte shibori technieken om zo een 3D werk te creeeren, waarna we zelf aan de gang konden gaan. Beiden komen terug, Kate rond het weekend van 9 september voor drie dagen en hopelijk lukt het Tatiana om in 2013 terug te komen.

the colourful results after the 2days masterclass with Kate

Kate Ramsey

Tatiana Sheverda

my feltwork at joetjoep

A little bit of trumpetnoise for myself. I have made a small video of the 2-minutes of my first fashionfame with my NOWA Natural Organic Wearable Art '11 collection from my label Plantdrukkunst ©. This was possible because of the organisation of a fashionshow with and by members of the Dutch Feltassociation.

Twee minuten in de spotlights met mijn eerste collectie NOWA Natural Organic Wearable Art '11 van het label Plantdrukkunst © in de fashionshow Kruithuis, Den Bosch. Mogelijk gemaakt door het committee van het 20-jarig bestaan van de Viltkontaktgroep

ro(c)k & roll in logwoodblue

Currently I'am working at a fashioncollection with eco-dyed and printed nunofelts . These garments will be shown at the fashionshow at March 4th, 2012 organised by the Dutch Feltcontactgroup. This skirt is just a simple wrapskirt, but I like the outcome of the partly overdied nunofelt. I bundled the half of the skirt with some extra leaves in a roll and dyed it in a logwoodbath. Then waited for some days to open it. It was such a surprise to see this outcome, a wonderfull combination of all kind of colours and design. And as a bonus it is wearable at two sides! Unfortunately it has shrunk a bit more so it needed some stretching, but it still fits me. Hope I can survive the coming months without getting to much weight...