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| Linocut print: Penelope Bulldog :) |
So I finally began this Business Start-up Thing. I graduated
from college (hurray!), which was something of a culture shock as I went from
having a basic structure of working to deadlines & specific criteria to...
not really anything. It’s a jump to go from what Edexcel decrees you are going
to do, to what you think the public
may want to buy, in just weeks. I had also decided for some reason that I
couldn’t begin properly until I had a good name. Realising that hard as
choosing a name is, I would never get started if I didn’t just pick the one I
liked the best, The Printed Ghetto was selected. Sometimes I gravitate very
much towards pretty names, but I don’t want to be identified as a purely girly
label, which I thought might happen if I chose ‘Sugar Bird’ or something
similar, so I took one that sounded like it would work in a wider context.
I have been Making Things! Finally getting into it, and here
are my things so far. Later I would like to branch out to more mounted prints
& accessories like belts and scarves, but you do have to start somewhere,
and it was nice to use my skills learned in Textiles and even Fine Art.
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| Vintage Buttons sourced from markets. On hand printed cards. |
Cards of buttons are something that I love to buy, so I was really into the idea of sourcing and selling my own. I have been sourcing and collecting buttons for a couple of years so I already have a good stock, but recently I came across a strange and crazy stall in a market, selling really beautiful buttons that the stall holder assured me came from Spain (made by nuns?). It was fun making the cards, I photocopied pages from Victorian Magazines, and a girls annual from the 30's, and then printed onto them with my Penelope Bulldog Linocut.
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| Pyromaniac Flower Pins. |
These pins were a good way to work in textile elements, & I added embroidery where I could. I like the Pyromaniac name, which comes from the method of production. The flowers are made from satin mix ribbon cut into circles & then melted around the edges. I used vintage buttons to back them before sewing on the pin backs, & to decorate the center of the flowers.
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| Four colours so far, orange, purple, brown and pink :-) |
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| Card #1. I printed my own designs and images for them. |
The cards (like the buttons) are backed with printed card photocopied from Victorian magazines, but rather than Penelope Bulldog they are printed with my Doris the Owl linocut.
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This one to show off the card backing rather than the actual card,
I'm not sure which I am more proud of... |
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Card with a print from my Textiles A Level,
my sister likes this one because the original picture was of her. |
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| My Ghetto Birds |
The owls were probably the most complex to sew out of everything I have completed at this point. I had this sweet pattern which I adapted from burdastyle.com and again I worked in as much embroidery as possible. The owl on the far left, the only one so far which is definitely a girl, has eyes made from lace manufactured for lingerie production... (though never actually used for it). My favourite thing about these are their eyes so I plan to make them bigger and crazier the next time I make them.
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| Just one Ghetto Bird. |
Hopefully my next post will not have such a massive gap in time before it as this one, thank you for reading! Xxx
