Lights!

Within the meandering stretch of Poole Harbour's beautiful shores, lies a little beach called Baiter Park.

Baiter Park, Poole, Dorset

The beach isn't much to look at, but there are some treasures to be found. A long time ago, Poole and Purbeck pottery used to throw out their rejects onto the beach; antique glass bottles and gaudily painted pottery can be discovered in little fragments if you catch the beach at low tide.

I loved the variations in colour of the glass pieces, so I collected some over a couple of beach combing trips.

I then used some galvanized silver wire and assembled the light shade above. The top layer is made of shredded recycled packaging.

My friend's dog Milly once spent a good 15 mins growling at it as she was freaked out by the pendants swaying inexplicably.

What to do with old dining room chairs...?

I had some hand-me-down dining chairs knocking around for a while. Someone back in the day had thought it might be a good idea to varnish them with the kind of wood varnish that looks almost black. They were a bit battered and looking sorry for themselves. Dull, drab, dreary.


My friend's kid came round to do some crafts, and I thought it might be fun to do some chair painting- the kind of thing you're not really allowed to do at home when you're a kid!
Here are the results...

The second chair above started off as an off white colour. On a different day when some friends kids came round to do some screen-printing some dark blue paint was spilled on it. As I was wiping it off with a cloth I thought it actually looked quite good, so we adapted it and gave it a bit of a colour wash! A happy accident.

(After I did this one of my friends commented that my flat was starting to turn into a gypsy caravan.)

finishing things off...

Finishing things off is tricky. The buzz and excitement from the initial idea has worn off and you're now down to the boring, time consuming bit- seeing it through, sticking things on, sewing bits of fabric. It all gets a bit mindless at that point, and unless you've got a whole Saturday free, unfinished projects are likely to wind up gathering dust in the corner of the room, or being hurriedly stashed away and forgotten about.


I thought I'd start this blog to give me an incentive to get things finished! let's see if it works...


projects to finish, in no particular order...

• 3 part painting- singing lady

• bird painting- intended to be a present for my brother and sister-in-law...a few Christmases ago!

• flower painting

• 2 black and white bags- presents for friends

• big silk cushion, orla kiely style

• screen printing- ship picture