Two's Company!

Ello my loves! Things are about to change a little bit around here! I've been dying to write this post for a long time now but things kept getting in the way and slowing down my plans... But anyway, that doesn't really matter now, because things are finally starting to come together!

If you're a follower of my blog, you'll probably know that I've been struggling for a long time to harmonise my work as an artist and as a designer. Sometimes it gets confusing as to whether I'm supposed to be Little Lost Soul or Lucy and it drives me mad... come to think of it, it's probably driven you mad too and made for intensely tedious reading material, so for that I do apologise and in future I will make a conscious effort to keep my split personalities in check!

Because of all this confusion and general silliness, rather than trying to assign myself a job description that encapsulates everything I do - Artist/Designer/Maker/Printer/Marketer/Accountant/Saleswoman/Butcher/Baker... you get the idea - I've decided to just be okay that some days I'm an artist and others I'm a designer. To simplify things not only for my addled brain, but also for my customer base, I've decided to run each business from separate websites.

This leads me to all the mystery and excitement I've been building up to over on Facebook and Twitter, because tomorrow I will be launching a new website! Da daaahhh!!

You will now be able to find my existing website over at www.lucy-pass.com, which is where you'll find all of my art work. My clothing and accessories will now be found on my sparkly new website at www.littlelostsoul.com!

To celebrate, I'll be having a little online launch party, so to speak, with new products and discount vouchers to be used over the weekend! I'll be announcing everything on Facebook and Twitter tomorrow so keep your eyes peeled!

Don't worry, you can still find me and both of my personalities here, on Facebook and on Twitter - It's just the websites that are parting ways!

So that's my news! Hoping to have more exciting developments to tell you about very soon! For now, I'll leave you with the third painting in my Rare Birds series and a video of the process! So fresh, the paint is still wet!

Geometric Dreams!

Got a bit of a photo fest for you today! Not really got too much to say other than, I've gone and done a painting! Two in fact! What's that? Sticking to new year's resolutions? Why yes I am!! I'm working on a new series called Rare Birds and here's the first two for your enjoyment!

Rare Bird I

Detail

Rare Bird II

Detail

I bet you're thinking that geometric jazz would make a splendid print. Crazy! That's just what I was thinking...

I had a total 'eureka' moment when this worked! I may have even done a little dance... but you lot don't need to know that! So far I've used this awesome fabric to make these scarves - I think the gold on grey is my favourite. I'm a sucker for anything shiny.

This week I'll be working on more styles in this fabric so I'll keep you posted! They will all be available to buy from my Etsy shop in a few weeks, but if you want to get in there early, I'll be at the Reetsweet designer maker fair at the Leeds Corn Exchange on the 2nd of February. Read more about the fantastic Reetsweet and their campaign against crap craft here!

Hello 2013!

Happy New Year everyone!

I would have posted sooner but since that there Christmas fair I was telling you all about I've been poorly sick! Boo hoo! I mustered up just enough energy to post Christmas orders and then set about hibernating! Poor old Judd was poorly too, so the whole house was a quarantine zone which really didn't lend itself well to the festive season! New Year's Eve wasn't much better - wrapped up in blankets watching telly with the cold realisation that Jools Holland's Hootenanny really is much more enjoyable when you're trollied! Bleh!

So anyway, all this sitting about sneezing gave me lots of time to think about my plans for 2013 and do a little "year in review" in my head! This time last year, I wrote about what changes I wanted to make, so I've decided to revisit my past blogger self and see how successful (or unsuccessful) I've been!

"1. Try not to eat so much lard! I don't need to take up running or start a ridiculous dance craze, I just need to stop putting junk in my face all the time... just some of the time :)"

Killed this one! Fit into my first pair of size 10 jeans since my teens - Boom! Now I only eat lard for treats! Om nom nom!

"2. Get a sodding hair cut! It's been 2 years, it's got to be done! ...Although I'll probably end up doing it myself again. Does that count?"

Fail. It's now been a whopping 3 years since I had a hair cut, but I have just done a full peroxide job on my head and am on my way to lilac hair so I reckon that'll do for a style change!

"3. Paint more. Over the last year, so much of my time has been taken up with sewing that I've found myself pining for a paint brush in my hand, but unable to find the time for it because I'm busy embroidering a cute little face on to something! Pretty ridiculous for someone who calls herself a painter! Which leads me on to...

4. Sew less. As much as I love stitching, stuffing and embroidering, I never intended it to take over, so it's taking a firm back seat! Also, I'm not so hot on having cramp in my hands on a regular basis! Claw hands are not a good look."

Well, let's see, yes I definitely failed on 3. and 4. - I may have ditched the hand embroidery but sewing is still very much a big part of my life. I must remember that I am not a factory. I am just one tiny person and working round the clock to stock a shop whilst trying to compete with high street prices is both unrealistic and quite frankly knackering. This year I will attempt to find the right balance between being a painter and being a designer. Painting commences on Monday!

"5. Stop working for free. I'm utterly rubbish at putting a value on my work - a condition many artists suffer with, leaving them totally skint and kidding themselves that the exposure is more valuable. It's not. Everybody needs to eat, and eat I will... but not lard, see no 1."

Okay, so I can safely say that I did not do any work for free... although I have undervalued myself on a few projects and failed to stick up for myself when the piss was being taken - I have too many mistakes to kick myself over, so this time next year I hope to have significantly less!

Artists, makers, designers; know your rights, draw up contracts and get what you are owed! And if a client/employer says they are doing you a favour by using your work, just walk away. We don't need favours. We don't need the exposure. We need to have our work taken seriously and have it valued accordingly, then we can pay our bills and put food in our bellies, just like everybody else.

"6. Move house! The Judd and I love our little Georgian flat very much, but the more my work expands, the less space we have to actually live here, so I plan to religiously check Rightmove.com every day until we find something lovely with that coveted second bedroom!"

Well you all know how this one turned out! Even though I miss our little flat very much, I am writing this post from my beautiful studio, which is totally awesome :)

"7. Don't fill the new house with useless crap! ...Who am I kidding?! Ignore that one."

Ummmmm... yeah. Still ignoring that one!

How did I do? Maybe a B+? Definitely could do better! I'll post again soon with my upcoming work plans, but now I guess I should probably add some more to the list! Maybe just one...

8. Be stupid. 2012 was a very work heavy year, both for me and for Judd and I found myself  constantly worrying about the next task on the list to be done and I lost track of how long I'd been working for. Before I knew it, it had been a year since we'd seen some of our most treasured people! That's not okay. I hereby declare 2013 the year of stupid and it shall be abundant with cheap booze, pointless conversations, Myspace photos, bad dancing, ridiculous hair dos, road trips to nowhere and laughing until a bit of wee comes out.

Enjoy it folks!

Christmas Stocking!

I give up! I've completely run out of making time so I've taken to my sofa with a cup of tea to give you a quick update!

Tomorrow is the Festive Market at The Storey in Lancaster and, as is standard for this time of year, preparations have been utter chaos! Sadly, this is the only Christmas fair I'll be selling at this year, thanks to the new house and it's many issues taking up my time! I was intent on making it to this particular fair though as it's always a smashing event, absolutely crammed with amazing things made by local artisans - team that with a stunning venue and it's the perfect way to get all your Christmas shopping done under one roof!

Most inconveniently, my brain seems to find the busiest times to come up with new ideas and over the last couple of weeks my head has been bursting with the damn things, so concentrating on restocking has been nearly impossible! I did manage to find time to work on a couple of new items, though!

These brooches, created using home-made clay, have made me extremely happy! Only very small, but immensely satisfying to make and even better is their extra-terrestrial appearance! Na-nu Na-nu!

I've been wanting to move back to homewares for a while now and my 'Transmission' print turned out to be perfect for soft furnishings! I'll be keeping a couple of these linen cushions for my newly decorated living room!

These new items will be in my Etsy shop asap, but if you live near by and you just can't wait, you know where to find me! :)

Home Remedies!

Around this time last year, while I was gearing up for the Christmas making rush, I quietly decided that it might be time to bid farewell to our lovely little Georgian apartment in the centre of Lancaster - little being the operative word as my work was rapidly outgrowing it's walls and my small nook in the hallway was becoming unworkable. As the months went by, the situation grew ever more desperate as our bedroom developed a sort of factory/skip vibe and I started to scour Rightmove daily (hourly when I was feeling particularly unhinged).

The old place, looking lovely!

The problem work space, looking not so lovely!

We put in many, many, many hours looking for somewhere in the right spot, with the right number of rooms that wasn't going to completely bleed us dry. You wouldn't think renting would be so hard, but Lancaster has proved us entirely wrong! We quickly realised we had been completely spoiled for the last 3 years. We went from home to home (and I use the word 'home' very loosely) feeling increasingly depressed and in some cases disturbingly itchy and quickly reached the conclusion that we were not going to find something that we could just walk in to - we needed to start looking with our D.I.Y. goggles on! We needed somewhere with potential!

One month ago today, Judd and I picked up the keys to our new house. 

Poor unsuspecting fools!

As is to be expected in the grand farce that is my life, we were completely unprepared for what lay ahead and as we delved deep under the nasties left by the last tenants, problems began to reveal themselves one after another. The phrase 'At least we didn't buy it!' has been used a great deal over the last few weeks, upon discovery of such surprises as the leaky cracked toilet with matching basin, 'Weetabix Wall' (the lovingly named patch of damp in the bathroom hiding behind the many layers of  woodchip), the boiler that can't, the shed of unmentionable horrors and the plethora of unidentifiable stains and cigarette burns on every carpet! I could go on, but never mind... at least we didn't buy it!

The pressure was on to get the new place habitable, not only because we had to get out of the old place, but because the plan was to host my famous fancy dress birthday bonanza (yes, that's right) in two weeks time... Bear in mind that my costume is usually a two month labour of love and at this point I had nothing... Stressed is not the word. All I wanted was a massive party with cake and booze and instead I was working twelve hour days, like a D.I.Y. demon! Hmph!

So, we've been knee deep in scuzz and wood dust, high on woodworm killer and stain stopper, spent hours on hold to estate agents and couriers, racked up hundreds of miles in journeys to B&Q and the tip and we have many scars from flat pack furniture battles... and (with the help of Judd's lovely dad and decorating master) here we are, one month on and it's finally feeling more like home - are you ready for some before and after shots?

Huzzah! The blue wood effect cupboards and grim NHS green tiles are no more!!

The pictures need hanging but the fresh coat of white will do just fine for now!

My new studio! I started work in this room so fast I forgot all about the before shot! We replaced the nasty carpet, by the way!

And what of the party, you ask? I wasn't going to allow my fancy dress reputation to be tarnished that easily! The very last box was unpacked the night before and frantic costume making commenced four hours before party 0' clock... The theme? Voodoo!!!

The Judd's doo Voodoo!

And that, my friends, is how we do that!! I have almost recovered from the Voodoo celebrations (even if my memories are still somewhat disjointed) and normal life will resume shortly! I now have the task of preparing for Christmas fairs - details of those will follow shortly - and for those who aren't so local, I'll be stocking up my Etsy shop very soon!

I had best get making!!

Eat Cake & Make!

This weekend saw The Make District's first fabric printing workshop! Charlotte, Jenny and I were so excited for this one as there had been lot's of interest and almost as soon as we announced the date, it was fully booked! This also meant that we were a little bit terrified as there was even more pressure to deliver something fabulous! 

Saturday morning arrived and we made our way to Lancaster Library to set up! We filled our tables with inspirational books, sample printing blocks, exciting fabrics and tools and of course lots of lovely fabric paint to get messy with! My super baker friend, Alice, was first to arrive with not one, but two delicious cakes - the perfect fuel for making - and then it was time to get our teacher heads on! 

Block printing is such a satisfying process and the results never fail to amaze me! Each time you peel away the block a slightly different image is produced! Magic! It was brilliant to see the varied and exciting prints everybody achieved! 

After some practice printing, it was time for some tasty cake and a much deserved cuppa, before moving on to printing the tote bags! Here's just a few of the gorgeous results!

As a final cherry on top, each finished tote bag got a 'Handmade By Me' stamp!

We were so impressed by everyone's work and we're really looking forward to running more workshops in the new year! We can't wait to inspire more of you lovely lot to get your craft on! Sarah, who made two printing blocks on Saturday is now a confessed printing addict (One of us! One of us!) and has since made this awesome print!

To see all of the photos from Saturday, pop over to our facebook page!

What's New?

October already?! I blinked and September vanished! So many things have been happening, but it's all rushed by! Exhibitions, new designs, fairs, workshops and a bit of house hunting chucked in for good measure!

My exhibition, 'Daily Faces', is still up at The Lord Ashton and I've had some really lovely feedback from it. Thanks everyone! There's been some very exciting things going on there over the last month and long may it continue! If you're local or lucky enough to visit sunny Lancaster, do pop in or stop by it's sister pub, The Robert Gillow - there's always something happening from live local bands, open mic nights to poetry readings! Here's some photos of the opening night! You can see more snaps here!

Judd, me and the all important G&T in hand!

 

If you haven't seen them yet, there's some new designs in my Etsy shop! I've been restocking the 'Geometry Of The Heart' vests (your favourite it seems!) like crazy, there's some new gift cards and the newest addition (and my favourite), my 'Transmission' collars! I ruddy well love these and they've got me so excited, I've designed and made some fancy new packaging for them!

More new designs are on their way too - Just in time for Christmas! Some of you might be able to catch me at a craft fair or two! Christmas fairs are my favourite so I'll be sure to let you know which ones to find me at! It would be great to see you there!