Earth 911 - reused planters

Floppy disk planters - Brit + Co

Super-cute colander planter - The Micro Gardner 

Vintage typewriter planter - Besserina 

Dump truck planter - Michael Coghlan 

Sweet shoe planter - Kidchamp

Kitchenware planters - me!

I love quirky planters, especially if the planters aren't typical pots used for plants or gardening purposes.  Recycling website Earth 911 did a fab little round-up today of repurposed planter ideas, including my teapot, kettle and saucepan garden planters!

Earth 911 is a super comprehensive website focusing on recycling, reducing waste and reusing materials - with heaps of info, news, lifestyle ideas and DIY projects.  Check out this video on the website about how plastic bags get recycled - it's quite an eye-opener!

There are some great planter ideas in the round-up and I particularly love the colander and vintage typewriter planters.  Too cute!    

salvaged roadside finds

    Rescued old kitchen cupboard from the side of the road with fabulous lino on the shelves

 The Jolly cat checks out the mysterious piece of furniture

                              

The old kitchen cupboard is now at home in my studio 

A couple of weekends ago I spied a couple of old 1950's / 1960's kitchen cupboards my neighbours had put out on the street as hard rubbish..... they didn't last long on the side of the road before me and Mr B whisked them into our garden for a clean up.

The first one we cleaned up is this very long cupboard with two shelves and three sliding glass doors.  It has the most amazing retro floral lino on the shelves which came up a treat after a good wash (I think the cupboards had sat in the neighbours garden shed for sometime!)  

The Jolly cat was most interested in the new addition and gave everything a good sniff to check it out!

We never had 'hard rubbish' in England.  I can remember a few months after we moved here, we started to notice piles and piles of furniture, random house objects, garden things and general rubbish piling up on the street outside peoples houses. We had no idea what was going on and were very confused!  Now we are very accustomed to hard rubbish - and it has actually become one of my favourite Australian sports ;-)

The rescued cupboard has found its way into my studio and is perfect for storing some of my bits and pieces - thanks neighbours!

Envelope patterns

Illustration by Clemens Habicht

My ever expanding bag of recycled envelopes and papers

Assortment of collected envelopes featuring different patterns

Some of my experimental illustrations below, featuring envelope pattern detail on the

coffee pot and cup & saucer. With these I've scanned in the envelopes and

changed the colour to suit the artwork.

Below are some examples of experimenting with the Gocco printer by printing

directly onto the envelopes.

In the weekend papers a few weeks ago I spotted this collage illustration using the patterns found on the inside of envelopes, created by the very talented Clemens Habicht.  I too am an avid collector of envelopes, so I thought I'd share some of my envelope patterns.

There is surprisingly quite an array of different patterns, textures and colours to be found on the inside of envelopes - and I always love opening an envelope to find a new pattern waiting patiently to be discovered on the inside.  (It actually makes opening bills a bit more interesting).  Mr B know's never to throw away an envelope before I've given it the once over! 

The patterns on the envelopes remind me of Japanese patterns with their miniature scale, perfect repetition and symmetry.   I use the envelopes for collages, printing with lino prints or gocco prints, and for experimental sketches and illustrations - I've included a few examples above.    

So next time you get a boring bill through the post, remember to look inside the envelope to see what patterns you might find.

Home-made, recycled baby bunting

Some of the second-hand children's clothing bought from the Salvo's for the bunting

Pinning the paper triangle template onto the washed fabrics and cutting out the shapes.  A very interested Jolly cat comes to investigate the crafty activity   

All the fabric triangles pinned face-to-face ready for sewing.  Jolly cat 'helps' by pressing the triangle pieces so they are nice and flat!  

After sewing the sides together the fabric triangles are turned inside out - so the front of the fabric is now on the outside   

The fabric triangles are stitched to the tape mixing up the colours and patterns 

And here is the finished bunting suspended from each corner of the ceiling - very cute!  

I've also made a few toys recycled from gloves and socks below (the monkeys rather fabulous jumper is an old pair of my thermal leggins!!)  I used the book Sock and Glove - Creating Charming Soft Friends from Cast-off Socks and Gloves by the very clever Miyako Kanamori.  There is a link here with some images of people who've made much better toys than me!   

Well, things are getting ever closer here in preparation for the baby!  So, I've been busy making a few things for the baby's room.  I recently made some bunting recycled from second-hand children's clothes, some old pyjamas of mine, and some offcuts of fabric.  

It's been fun to make the bunting, and I love the mix of all the different coloured and patterned fabrics!  I've used different fabric on each side of the bunting, and as we don't know what 'flavour' baby we're having I wanted to make something suitable for a boy or girl - and using the children's clothing has been perfect to get some cute patterns and colours for either.

The bunting was really very easy to make, and just requires a sewing machine and some time.  You could use any old or second-hand fabrics for different looks - vintage fabrics and teatowels would be cute, or un-used clothing and bedding for example.

Here's what I did:

1. Firstly I washed all the second-hand clothing (and pressed any particularly wrinkly fabrics so they were nice and flat), and made myself a paper triangle template.  Because I decided to have different fabric on either side, I made sure my triangle was about 1cm larger than I wanted the finished pieces to be, to allow for stitching the pieces together.

2. Then, I pinned my paper triangle template onto the different fabrics and carefully cut out the triangle shapes.  I made sure I had lots of triangular pieces of fabric in different colours and patterns - including some plain colours.

3. When the triangular fabric shapes were cut I pressed them to make sure they were all nice and flat, and then started to pair them up, making sure there were different colours and patterns on each side.

4. I then pinned each pair of fabric triangles face-to-face (i.e. so the front of each piece of fabric faces each other) and using the sewing machine stitched along the two sides of the triangles only - leaving the top unstitched and open.  The stitched pieces are then turned inside out - so the front of the fabric is now on the outside.

5. When all the triangles have been stitched and turned inside out, press them again so they form nice flat and neat little triangles!

6. Organise the tape you want to hang the triangles from, I went for a natural coloured twill tape - but there are lots of different coloured and patterned tapes depending on the theme of your bunting.  I made sure the tape was quite wide (about 2cm) and thick enough to support the weight of all the fabric pieces.  Measure the length you need the tape to be depending on your room size (or wherever it's to be hung) and make sure you include extra to allow the bunting to drape. 

7. Then pin each triangle onto the tape, making sure you get a mix of different colours and patterns dispersed along the tape length.  To do this I placed the top (open) part of the triangle halfway up the width of the tape and then folded the tape over, this way you should have an even amount of tape on either side of the fabric triangle (about 1cm each side) and when pinned the triangle should be firmly attached to the tape.  I also left about 10cm of tape at each end free of triangles to allow for hanging.

8. All you need to do now is to stitch the tape to the triangles using the sewing machine.  Et Voila!  Your own bunting is completed!           

Etsy - Earth Day

I was pretty excited to see my Me Old China repurposed and recycled cut-out 'Dinner' plate and 'Knife & Fork' plate featured on Etsy's April Shopping Guide today! 

The plates were part of the 'earth day' round-up on the shopping guide which was e-mailed out to all subscribers.  Its always a pleasure to see my work featured by other people and I'm very grateful to be included amongst so many other fabulous products.  Thanks Etsy!!

You can see these plates and more of my designs at the Me Old China shop over at Etsy :)

Me Old China at Small Space Jewellery

Last week I dropped some new Me Old China jewellery designs to the lovely Small Space Jewellery in Fitzroy.

Small Space took a selection of Clarice Cliff pieces and Vintage Floral designs, to add to the Willow 'Fancy a Cuppa' collection they already have.

The range above features pendants cut from a Clarice Cliff dinner plate.  I picked up two of these second-hand plates from the local Oxfam shop when I was back in England.  The plate pattern is called 'Tonquin' and was designed by Clarice Cliff in about 1954.  This particular pattern was originally designed for the American market place and was one of her most popular tableware designs, it depicts a traditional English landscape scene and printed in this unusual pinky-red colour. 

The Vintage Floral designs are also taken from a second-hand old English dinner plate.  The sweet floral patterns (taken from the centre of the dinner plate) feature alongside sections taken from the rim of the plate!  You can see the ribbed texture on the bottom of the jewellery pieces, that ran around the very edge of the plate rim.  So as well as adding some textural detail to the pieces, it also helps to reinforce the origins of the jewellery by highlighting their previous use as a domestic dinner plate! 

A big 'Thank You' to Small Space Jewellery for their support with Me Old China! 

Kitchen things

A few months ago we headed along to the closing down sale at the Mornington Antiques Centre.  I was kind of sad the day I discovered it was the day it was closing down - typical!

We picked up this cute little sideboard - I actually think it may have originally been designed or used for a record player and housing records (yep remember those vinyl round things we used to listen to music on!!) because of the tall thin compartments on the right hand side, that don't seem to be suitable for storing anything apart from wine!!

We decided anyway to use it in our kitchen, as its perfect for storing sideplates, teatowels and some of my teapots and kettles - such as this little retro beauty complete with whistling spout!

I also bought this orange patterend enamel dish - which matches the coffee pot I already had.  Perfect!   

And how about this gorgeous metal tin with fabulous illustrations all the way around.  I've no idea of the age or origins of the tin - but I just loved the very cute kitchen themed patterns and colours and for a whole $4 I thought it was a bargain!

If you're interested in all things 'kitchen' you must head over to Liz Jones' (of Betty Jo Designs) new blog You Will Always Find Me......  She has started a blog all about 'kitchen goodness' and like me she has a fondess for all things vintage, retro, colourful and quirky in the kitchen! 

 

It's going to be a fabulous blog and features some images of Liz's own amazing kitchen (see above).  You can submit your own kitchen pics too - which I will be doing very soon!  The blog has gone straight to my bookmarks poolroom (if you know what I mean!)