Fabric Friday - Heather Bailey

It's Fabric Friday the best day of the week.  Todays featured designer does not shy away from colour and another great example of bold prints. Heather Bailey fabrics evoke thoughts of bright sunny days and vintage tea parties, especially when seen in the back of the classic truck in a picture on her blog!

Heathers life could have taken a very different turn, with plans to be a doctor and even started a PreMed course at the age of 17. Thankfully Heather listened to her heart and started a Bachelors degree in Apparel Design, graduating in 1996. Now she was ready to start her career in fashion by launching Noggin, a childrens hat company. Soon Heather expanded her repotoire and launched Trashy Ties. which have recently been relaunched and are available in Heathers store 

Soon Heather diverted her creative talent to produce her first collection, Freshcut, for Freespirit Fabrics. Her debut collection has since led Heather to design three more collections, Pop Garden, Bijoux and Nicey Jane. These are all fantastic prints that could be used for quilts or dressmaking or any number of projects.  Heather has also designed sewing patterns and a papercraft range which carry strong themes from her textile collections.  All this is acheived whilst being a mother of two children, hats off to Heather Bailey. Another woman follwoing her creative heart and acheiving amazing results, a true inspiration.


Of course I couldn't finish without taking a look at Heather Bailey fabrics being used by other creative people.

A Shade Brighter

Pinnikity

Cathys Totes

My Sweet Chickadee

Paper Pumpkin

Craft Blog UK

Craft Blog UK is the official blogroll for UK Handmade and has links to many craft related blogs. This blog has many tutuorials (blogging tips) to help improve your blog and help you network to gain more followers and hopefully more customers for your craft/design business.  In the last couple of weeks a forum has been added to the blogs bow with it's creator, Haptree, offering to give a blog critique.  This has been very beneficial to as I looked to tidy up my blog and Haptree's constructive criticism and ideas have helped immensly in this task.  I have also used some of the blogging tips and feel I have acheived something in the world of html that I have little experience of.  Whilst my blog looks tidier I still need to try a couple of Haptree's ideas, firstly to have links opening in a new window when I am featuring items from other websites and secondly a 'Cocktail Hour' every couple of weeks...watch this space!

So if you are wondering how to add static pages under your header or want some ideas to tidy up your blog and help promote your business head over to Craft Blog UK and read the blogging tips or visit the forum to get your own personal blog critique.  And I would like to add a huge THANK YOU to Haptree for her fantastic critique of my blog and for creating Craft Blog UK.

Sew Sunny Homestyle and Giveaway Winner

Drum Roll please......the winner is ......Mollimoo. You can find out more about the winner on her blog or visit her Folksy shop for some gorgeous fabric buttons, which were featured in May's isue of Sew Hip magazine.

Another exciting delivery today, my copy of Sew Pretty Homestyle by Tone Finnanger arrived with the mornings post.  So I am now off to dream of living in the house in the pictures making lots of gorgeous things!

Have a great day everyone.

Fabric Friday - Textiles in Jewellery

After a week of looking at sparkly colourful gems and their designers I am in a quandry as to how I can finish with a jewellery inspired Fabric Friday.  Off the top of my head I can't think of a designer who prints pictures of jewels on textiles, but please correct me if there is anybody!  My likely choices for such designs would be hinting towards Michael Miller or Alexander Henry, but I have planned to feature them soon.  So I think the best solution will be to look at textiles in jewellery design.  I have seen some gorgeous fabric covered beads over the past few months and I know bib necklaces have become a possible new item to accessorise your outfit but I am still not convinced about these. Can fabric be used in this design medium effectively?  Let's see.....

Vanda Handmade Jewellery

Spots & Stripes

Love & Sparkles

Pants and Paper

Polka

I stand corrected, you can buy some great textile jewellery.

Have a great weekend!

Adorn London Interview

Whilst most of the UK is gripped with voting and waiting to see who will be our new leader when we wake tomorrow I have been busy interviewing Juliet Hutton-Squire from Adorn London.

 Few of us are lucky enough to have a jewellery stylist to hand or an unlimited budget to buy fashion magazines to stay on top of trends.  Yet as a jewellery designer you need to know which colours are hot, which styles are 'in', never mind which beads or metal is the current trend.  However all of this information is now available at the click of a mouse.  Adorn London is the brain child of Juliet Hutton-Squire and provides you with all the current trends in jewellery.  As editor of Adorn London Juliet researches jewellery trends so that you can spend more time designing and creating.



 Adorn London is a fantastic informative website for the discerning fashionista or somebody who takes an interest in their jewellery as an essential accessory. How do you feel it can help jewellery designers?

- Adorn London has a two fold approach, firstly to inspire the industry providing a summary of trends and style focus for the season. We are already influencing the industry. Someone recently said that she waits for the Adorn weekly newsletter before she sends out information to her own clients! The second is to inspire the consumer. We want to make jewellery accessible to everyone. Jewellery is so diverse and versatile, it can change an outfit and in the current economic climate a costume piece can do just that. On the flip side, investment jewellery has seen an upsurge as people invest in gold and precious metal even though we are in the midst of a recession.


With a background in jewellery design can we expect Adorn London to launch its own range in the future?


Ooh, I would love to bring out a collection twice a year to tie in with the fashion seasons. So yes, that is a dream that I hope to realise one day possibly in collaboration with an established brand as it is a long time since I was on the bench!


What are the key trends for SS10 that are important for jewellery designers?



Stacking – is huge which means for me, wrist wear is key. I think we are more influenced by the catwalk than we may think. We buy clothes that are inspired by the catwalk whether at High Street or designer level. I would like to see jewellery follow the same pattern too. I am excited when I see commercial jewellers collaborate with the catwalk designers – not only does it put jewellery on the map so to speak but as a designer maker it is exciting to think out-of-the box every now and again. I recently interviewed Shaun Leane on Adorn London and we focused on this very point. So I would say don’t take your eyes off the catwalk!


It's imperative to plan ahead as a designer, what can we be expecting to see for AW10?

Jewellery influenced by 18th century Paris . There is an almost decadent, ornate style coming through.



Summer is the season for wedding celebrations, do you consider there to be key trends in wedding jewellery this season?


I think Bridal jewellery follows a similar trend year in and year out as tradition plays an important part in Bridal jewellery. We associate pearls for example with Bridal jewels, I think it is an ongoing challenge for a designer to keep the styles relevant even though the materials might stay constant. Those are the designers I am inspired by.


So if you would like Juliet to be your jewellery trend fairy godmother you can sign up for weekly updates via email from the Adorn London website, one of my favourite features is the Style Stalker.

Ice Cream Sundaes and a Giveaway

As Summer approaches I find I like to play with colour adding accessories to my wardrobe.  After months of choosing warm colours for the colder months I can now look at brightening up a white t-shirt and denim shorts with funky Birkenstocks and jewellery in bold colours.  I have a gorgeous turquoise beaded necklace that I love to wear in the warmer months, even though I was caught out once and had a lovely beaded tan mark! 

Whilst we wait for the weather to get a bit warmer here in the UK and with thoughts of ice cream sundaes and colourful bunting it's time to think of adding some more colour to my necklace stand.

JCU Designs

The Dancing Pearl

The Little Black Cat

Beads & More by Lois

Kianda

Sweet Cherry Pie

***GIVEAWAY***

I will be giving away this gorgeous beaded cocktail ring from my Folksy shop Zoe & Drew

I will randomly select a winner from my blog & Twitter followers on Sunday (9/5).

GOOD LUCK!

Shiny Treasure

Jewellery making and designing have become increasingly popular with the largest numbers of listings on Folksy and Etsy being for the jewellery catergories.  All this week I will be focusing on beautiful handcrafted jewellery and on Thurday I will be posting an exclusive interview with the editor of Adorn London discussing trends in jewellery now and for AW10.

There are some truly beautiful pieces available whether you want a new pair of earrings or a statement necklace, with pieces to suit all budgets.  I adore silver jewellery and have purchased some beautiful pieces from Folksy and Not on the High Street for both myself and as gifts, my husband has even sometimes got the hints when I email him links!  There are some truly creative silversmiths on these websites that I have to share.

Dirty Cherub Jewellery

Zelda Wong Jewellery

JoJo Jewellery

Ali Bali Jewellery

Funkee Jewellery

Scape