Trapeze Tree Dress

Always on the look out for another novelty tree print fabric, this beauty called to me across the floor at Chichester's C&H Fabrics shop. It's a lightweight polycotton, not a fabric I'd usually chose as I've an aversion to the poly, however the print is simply stunning and the price was a steal at £4 a metre.

I modified the Esme dress pattern into a trapeze shape and made a simple sleeveless cotton slip petticoat to wear underneath. I decided to give the dress a rising/falling hem so that the petticoat is visible peeking out underneath.

Trial and error with a contrasting patch pocket resulted in my unpicking a bold first attempt before settling on this camouflaged diagonal pocket, matching the trees as closely as I could.

The dress goes perfectly with my new green tree brooch from Etsy's fab You Make Me Design shop, a present to celebrate my 47th birthday!

And then I sewed an Astrid bag

I'm on a roll with Lotta Jansdotter's Everyday Style sewing book and have run up an Astrid cross-body bag to go with the Dot Spot Esme Dress.

Such an easy bag to make, I cut it out yesterday evening, sewed it up in an hour after breakfast and then finished off the hand stitching at this morning's Meet and Make craft get-together.

I used whatever materials came to hand to finish the bag - the lining is left over from my first Esme dress, I used a long zip found in my sewing box and cut it down to size, then sewed a fabric strap so that I wouldn't have to go out and buy leather and rivets as suggested in the sewing instructions.

I made a patch pocket with a Velcro fastening inside to hold my keys. Next time I will try to make one with an internal zip pocket. The finished bag is a perfect shape and size for every day use, in fact I now think all my new homemade dresses should have matching bags...

Decorating the BugCycle Garden with Gudrun Sjödén

Worthing's BugCycle community garden has just become even more colourful thanks to a generous donation from Gudrun Sjödén, Swedish designer of sustainable fashion and champion of environmentally conscious design. Gudrun kindly sent us a bundle of eco-cotton fabrics and home furnishings to use in our burgeoning wildlife garden.

BugCycle was set up by community arts producers Creative Waves in partnership with Worthing Wildlife to regenerate an area in one of the town's central parks. Since February this year, we and a team of volunteers have transformed a disused part of Beach House Park using largely found, recycled and donated materials into a living, educational, sensory garden for all to enjoy.

Gudrun Sjödén sent us a selection of Långrand striped organic cottons in delicious shades of guava/turquoise, lavendula/sky, asparagus/pineapple and peony. I decided to make gardening hats and aprons for our volunteers to wear, as well as some cushions and bright bunting to decorate and furnish the garden. I used these fabulous fabrics together with some Gudrun Sjödén material left over from previous projects.

The aprons are based on Gudrun's perfectly practical Nyttan gardening apron with one large divided wrap around pocket and long fastening ties (I'm wearing a ruby red Nyttan apron in these photos). The hats are made using Etsy shop WorthyGoods super Over The Top sun hat sewing pattern. I sewed simple envelope back cushion covers from the Långrand cotton to complement two of Gudrun's Melissa and Flox print cushions. All left over pieces of fabric were cut into triangles of different sizes and sewn into colourful bunting. Not a scrap of material was wasted!

These photos were taken at a Creative Waves BugCycle Art in the Park workshop, but on another day you could see the Worthing Wildlife Team at work here, one of the town's community groups or up to 120 local school children using the garden as an outdoor learning space.

We'd like to thank Gudrun Sjödén for bringing her Swedish design with a green soul to our own very green and thriving community garden!

Gudrun's eco-cotton fabrics and home furnishings are available from her web shop.

Year of The Goat lavender bags in the Ivy Arch shop

To mark the imminent start of the Year of the Goat I have restocked my Etsy shop with some new Chinese zodiac goat lavender bags. They're made from Mini Moderns Stevie printed cotton which was inspired by an oriental postage stamp collection. Mini Moderns produced this wonderful fabric for Clothkits a few years ago and the fabric is now out of print, making these lavender bags very rare indeed! For the backs I used Carolyn Gavin's poppy design organic cotton.

In the Chinese zodiac the sign of the goat (ram or sheep) is thought to symbolise good things and represents creativity and calm. Wishing you these things and more for a Happy Chinese New Year!

To buy or for more info visit the Ivy Arch shop.

One hundred (and more) ukulele bags

The very last uke bag has left my sewing machine! I have made well over a hundred quilted ukulele gig bags and appliquéd ukulele tote bags since sewing the very first gig bag for my Flea. I've sold them at music festivals, craft fairs and through shops in the UK. Through Etsy I've shipped many out to happy customers all over the world to countries as far flung as USA, Canada, Sweden, Australia, Scotland, Germany, Norway, Czech Republic, Japan, New Zealand and even China.

There are just a few remaining appliqué uke bags left for sale (some in my Etsy shop and a few in shops in the UK) but all the uke gig bags have now gone to new homes. 

I have enjoyed making every single one of them, delighted in carefully packaging them up and sending them out, and loved receiving emails and hearing kind feedback from happy customers. 

 

All good things must come to an end and I'm marking the close of the year by saying farewell to my ukulele bag production line. Here's to new exciting sewing adventures in 2015!  

An Anti-Beige Ottobre Art Teacher Dress

Getting through the colder months with greying hair and sun starved sallow skin – without looking completely washed-out and middle-aged – is a challenge best tackled by wearing more colourful clothes. So having bought some crazy coloured chevron fleece fabric from Brighton's Fabric Land (unsure whether to make cushions or clothes with it), it dawned on me that making a fleece dress in this bright material would solve so many problems.

I've made it into another Art Teacher Dress from Ottobre Design's Autumn/Winter 2014 magazine.

As before, the pockets in this dress design are perfect, and lovely and soft to the touch in fleece. I cut the multicoloured chevrons in different directions, machine finished the hem and sleeves with a fancy topstitch and used bias binding for a neat neckline.

Fleece is so quick and easy to sew – no fraying seams! And did I mention how warm and cosy it is? Fleece fan John Shuttleworth would be thrilled to pieces with such a sensible fabric choice, I'm sure. I still have enough fabric left over to make four cushion covers (for Xmas presents), so will be spreading the fleece love this Christmas. Fleece Navidad indeed.

November ukulele appliqué bags handmade by Ivy Arch

I've been sewing a new batch of appliqué ukulele tote bags. They're all made from a combination of vintage furnishing fabrics with different front/back panels and have a contrasting appliquéd ukulele on the front. 

They're the perfect size for carrying A4 books or magazines and are ideal for transporting your ukulele songbooks. There are five new bags in total, all available to buy now from my Etsy shop. 

Telephones and Clocks: new lavender bags in the Ivy Arch shop!

These printed retro telephone and clock lavender bags are on sale in the Ivy Arch shop! They're made using fabric from Kokka's Ruby Star collection (designed by Melody Miller) featuring telephones in shades of blue, green and pink, and clocks in olive green and rust. Handmade by me, I've backed them with polka dot cotton fabric and stuffed them with highly fragrant dried lavender flowers from Provence.

To buy or for more information visit the Ivy Arch Etsy shop.

With Patience and Love: Yoko Saito Log Cabin Bag

Japanese Quilting Piece by Piece is an enchanting book of quilt artist Yoko Saito's patchwork designs for bags, pouches, cushions and more. It explores traditional patchwork techniques of log cabin, hexagons, baskets and stars and the exquisite projects in this book all look like love-worn heirlooms passed down through generations. There's a wealth of information and techniques to try but the outstanding project for me was the cover design log cabin bag – I had to make one!

Saito's colour palette is muted – Japanese neutrals that draw you in and invite you to examine nuances of colour and texture. She suggests using the wrong side of a piece of material to tone down the strength of colour or pattern. I struggled with this part. I decided to use a selection of offcuts of some Japanese printed cottons. I love the prints and textures of these fabrics and intended to use them on their reverse side but couldn't quite bring myself to embrace taupe, so instead turned them mainly to their right sides, with a few slices of reversed pieces and some tiny squares of jewel-bright 1960s cotton. However, the beauty of this book is that it encourages you to experiment with each project, to improvise and make the bag your own, so artistic licence with the colour palette excused...

This was my first piece of improv quilting and I found making the bag a slow and meditative process. First I cut out 200 rectangles to assemble the patchwork blocks needed, then spent blissful hours sewing the shapes together. The process for making the rest of the bag was familiar as I've made many quilted, padded gig bags before but assembling and constructing my fabric in this way was new to me and something I want to do more of.

My finished bag lacks the precision and refinement of Saito's own, but I absolutely love what I've produced. The bag is small but sturdy, incredibly tactile and seems to have a spirit and character of its own. 

Ivy Arch at Mini Moderns REMIX

I am thrilled to be taking part in Mini Moderns REMIX at East London Design Store as part of the 2013 London Design Festival. The project sees Mini Moderns working with British based designers and artists who have been invited to reinterpret their iconic designs.

As a huge fan of their work I was delighted to be asked to contribute and have produced lavender bags cut from Mini Moderns C-60 and Stevie fabric as well as a limited edition range of coin purses.

 

I travelled to London for the launch last night and was completely bowled over to see my crafts exhibited alongside the stunning work of Benjamin Boyce, Brume, Leonhard Pfeifer, Rimmington Vian, Matt Sewell, Group Design and Urban Upholstery. Zoe Murphy's gorgeous Buddha of Suburbia Drawers are a real showstopper!

Ivy Arch lavender bags and purses at Mini Moderns REMIX 2013

Mini Moderns REMIX at East London Design Store opens on 14^th September and runs until 22^nd September 2013.