The Biscuity Workshop with Nikki McWilliams

You may have seen on my Facebook or Instagram that a couple Saturdays ago I was lucky enough to spend the day with Nikki McWilliams and a lovely group of ladies at Hill Street Design House making Biscuit themed clutch bags.

You might recognise Nikki's name from my Wish List Wednesday post a year ago about her Tunnock's Tea Cake cushion that I fell in love with. Nikki is a Scottish designer, has her own blog and one of the best Instagram accounts you'll find! Her home ware and accessories label launched in 2009 and was inspired by 'a love of British culture, contemporary Pop-Art and her fascination with the ritual of the Tea Break'. You can check out the full range on her website!

The workshop was one of my Birthday presents from Martyn (after a very large hint). We all had to be at Hill Street Design House, on Hill Street, for the class starting at 11am. I wore my Collectif Dolores top, skinny highwaisted jeans, new red pumps and, of course, my custard cream brooch.  

The bright room was laid out beautifully with a big pink covered central table covered in craft supplies and plates piled high with biscuits! Everyone took a seat and Nikki introduced herself and explained the plan for the day. We were all making biscuit-inspired clutch bags with our own designs using simple printing and sewing techniques.

Nikki demonstrated set up our fabric for printing and folding for sewing. she then showed us how to mix the acrylic paint and printing medium then how to print on the fabric using craft foam designs we had to create. We had brown or cream fabric to choose from for chocolate or vanilla biscuits and I chose the cream as I wanted to create a Nice biscuit bag.

We all settled in and started drawing and cutting out our designs, there were some great ideas and we were all chatting and helping each other with ideas, Nikki was floating around the room checking out or designs and offering help where it was needed.

Before we knew it it was time to start printing, Hannah who was sitting by me was doing a custard cream design so we decided to share paint and Nikki helped us mix up the perfect biscuity, creamy yellow.

I think the printing is the most nerve wrecking bit, making sure we didn't print letters the wrong way up, making sure they didn't smudge or even just spill and splatter everywhere! Nikki introduced us to the concept of Wabi-Sabi which roughly translates from Japanese as 'Finding the beauty in Imperfections' which I just love and can totally relate to. Most things that I craft have an imperfection somewhere but I like to call 'Character'. 

I was very happily surprised with how mine turned out, it had just the right amount of 'Character'. We had a break for lunch while the paint dried and when we returned it was time to sew them up and embellish them. The table was covered in wool, ribbons, pompoms, pompom makers, beads, ricrac and all a girl could need to jazz up her biscuit bag. 

We glued craft foam to what would become the inside front and back of our bags and folded them up, sew stitched up the side while it was inside out and them turned them out. We were left with envelope style clutch bags that just need the top flap tidied up with a couple more stitches and we were ready to embellish. 

I love a pompom but I also wanted to keep my bag quite simple so I chose the bright yellow ribbon with mini pompoms all along it, simplicity isn't my strong suit. I stitched the pompoms along the edge of the envelope opening and then made a wee bow that I popped on the back too. Everyone was having a ball making pompoms and tassels it was infectious so I made a tassel for the side of my bag from some thin ribbons in the yellow I'd used for my bow, blue and violet.   

I'm so happy with the final product and was so inspired by all the ladies around me and their creative designs, we had Kit Kats, bourbons, custard creams, jammy dodger and party ring designs too. 

Once we had all finished up, or at least as far as some of the overly adventurous were going to get, we took them all outside so we could take some pictures in the good light and Nikki even took a wee Boomerang video. 

I had an amazing day, it was lovely to meet some lovely new creative ladies as well as Nikki McWillliams herself and check out Hill Street Design House too. I know Nikki is running more of these workshops and Hill Street run events like this all the time making all sorts like jewellery, lingerie and flower crowns as well as hosting private events too. So keep an eye on both of them.

Personalised Scrabble Art tutorial

Check out the adorable Scrabble Art I made for Martyn's sister and her boyfriend for their Christmas. They are moving into their very own house early this year so I made them something for it. These are super easy to make and not to expensive either!

All you need it;
A box frame,
Scrabble tiles 
Backing paper
Craft glue
Double sided sticky tape
Scissors
Bits and bobs

First things first you need to create your design, start with your 'topic' for me it was their New Pad but you could create ones for birthdays, anniversary's or new babies. Once you've decided on that you can add in the extra words or names. I had an easy one just incorporating Natalie and Michael into New Pad. You could use someones name and and put words that describe them through it.

Once your happy with your design move onto the frame. I used the Ikea Ribba frame, it's nice and deep and comes in a couple of colours. Grab your backing paper, it can be wrapping paper, decoupage, fabric or just plain paper. I used some beautiful hand made paper that I bought from Paperchase with a cream back ground and lovely gold pattern on it. Place your backing of choice, pattern down, on your work surface and take out the back section of the frame and pop it on your paper and drawer around it. Cut out your background and use the double sided sticky tape to attach it to the back of the frame, use plenty of it as you'll be sticking the tiles and bits and bobs onto it.

When you have it lined up and stuck to the back of your frame you should lay out you Scrabble tile design, you can pick up the tiles in most good haberdasheries. Begin sticking the tiles down using your craft glue starting at the middle and working your way out, that why the design should stay pretty central. Once they are all stuck down you can play with your bits and bobs, I had picked up a packet of felt keys, locks and blue birds that I arranged around the lettering. 

As you can tell I like things symmetrical.

Give your design a couple hours to dry before lifting it. When you feel the glue has done its job and everything is secure all you do is pop it back into the frame. I had a little trouble with this as I hadn't made the edging of my backing paper very neat but it should be easy. 

Ta dah! Beautiful handmade personalised gift for friends and family. 

Wool and the Gang knitting party

Have you guys heard of Wool and the Gang? I've been following then on Instagram for months now, you should check them out! They are changing the way fashion is created and consumed by sourcing their products with 'consideration so as to reduce impact on our environment'. The wool is natural, renewable and biodegradable and they work with fashion factories to re-purpose their fashion waste into new yarns. They sell their products in 2 ways, you can either buy a kit with wool, needles, a pattern and whatever other bits you need or you can buy the finished product. The Gang are an army of makers, both knitting and crocheting the collections in their homes and not in factories, the majority of whom are based in the UK. Many of their larger pieces are made by their Peruvian Gang. 

Lovely colourful wool

They also host knitting parties across the UK, Europe and the USA. My friend Emily and I went along to one before to knit the 'Snood Operator' woolly snood. Tickets cost £30 each but Emily, who I work with, wangled us a pair for half price! One of the knitting gang who knits at home was hosting the party in Outhouse on Broughton Street Lane so we headed along for 7 on the dot to make sure we got our pick of the wool colours. 

My equipment

We were the second folk there and chatted away to our host for the evening and chose our wool colours, Emily took the grey and I went with, my staple, maroon. We took our seats and a few others arrived, there were 6 of us in totally with a range of skill levels. Wool and the Gang provide everything you need to complete your project including the wool, access to videos about how to cast off, a needle to sew it all up and you get to take away the stunning 15mm rose wood knitting needles. 

Knitting and a pint!

Our host was very patient with us, we had 3 patterns to pick from for our snoods and she demonstrated them for us, I picked moss stitch for mine (which, for knitters, is knit then purl on an odd number to create an amazing texture). We sat in the pub for 2 hours gassing away to the other ladies and catching up on our work gossip and it flew by! At about 9pm we realised that we should be heading home and we were both nearly finished our snoods so we packed all our bits and bobs into the bags and headed down the road. Emily finished hers when she got in but it took me a couple days to get round to it but I love it now and it’s hardly been off since! 

Lovely Emily!

I would definitely recommend looking them up on Instagram and signing up for their newsletter because that’s how you hear about the deals they have and upcoming events. So go on folks check them out and change the face of fashion! 

Wish List Wednesday - Porcelain Oyster Shell Necklace by Little Birdy

So I have decided to start a new feature called Wish List Wednesday, I know it’s not the most inventive name but stick with me. The plan is to share some of the lovely things I have come across in local shops and galleries as well as Instagram and websites like Etsy and Folksy and promoting the work of independent makers and artists.

My first item for the wish list is the beautifully crafted Porcelain Oyster Shell Necklace by Little Birdy, you can find it in her Folksy shop. She has a lot of beautiful products in the shop, prints and illustrations, textiles, hand painted ceramics and hand sculpted porcelain. The Mermaids & Ice Cream jewellery collection launched on Monday, 17^th August, and it’s based around her fascination with ‘life beneath the waves and with natural science’. It’s a stunning range of oyster shell necklaces with pearls and adorable ice cream necklaces and brooches.

I’m totally in love with the Porcelain Oyster Shell Necklace which is two hand sculpted and pained oyster shells that open up to reveal a gold pearl hidden in between them. Painted in gold, blush pink and white it has beautiful polkadot detailing on it. Dreamy!

I have been swooning over the Bristol based artists work on Instagram for a while now, the ceramic narwhals, cats and pushme-pullyous are next on my list and have often been pointed out to my bearded companion with a wink and elbow nudge but to no avail… yet…

You can check out Little Birdy’s stockists in Bristol and London on her website or have a look around the Folksy shop. I hope you fall in love with her lovely wares as much as I have.