Workshop Temptation

I might have mentioned that I’d become interested in a new craft and promised to let you know what has now grabbed my butterfly mind and necessitated the need for yet more shelves to be created and commandeered by me – although, this time a lot of the supplies can be kept in the garage and not the house.  (I have to laugh re-reading that last bit as our garage is already almost full to bursting with ‘stuff’ that definitely doesn’t include the car.)

I do love a workshop but although basic embroidery, wicker work, Dorset buttons, metal stamping and making my own knickers out of a t-shirt were all fun once was enough and, in some cases, more than enough.

I have come to the conclusion that life is definitely too short to make my own apple catchers.

Not my knickers

However, I decided that making mosaics from broken china and found items – or picassiette to give it its formal name – would be something very different for me but, at the same time, right up my street.  At least it will be if my street can now accommodate a face mask, safety glasses, protective gloves, sharp instruments and sticky, claggy substances.  As I said, something very different for me.

So, as is my wont when getting interested in a new craft, I have provided myself with books, tile nippers, adhesive, grout and all the other bits and pieces involved although, sadly, I left my vast collection of vintage china in France where I used to make tiered cake display stands so have had to begin the search all over again.  Charity shops are obviously my first port of call but they have usually disposed of anything cracked or chipped before they get to the shelves and I must admit to feeling bad about cutting up a perfect item.  I have put the word out in the shop where I work a couple of shifts to keep anything broken for me but, so far, not much luck.  Still, the hunt is all part of the fun I suppose.

As a little sewing side story – the instructor at the workshop told us to bring an apron to protect ourselves from adhesive and grout but I didn’t have one.  The shame!  Anyway, Amazon yielded cheap versions, some frilly, some nasty but instead  I found a free pattern on the Tessuti website and rummaged in my stash for surplus fabric somebody had given me for nothing and made one myself in the time it takes to plough through the offerings online – well, not quite, but it’s certainly a quick make if you’re in need and would look great in denim or a canvas blend.

I suppose I’ll have to do some baking or something now.

My workshop instructor, Judith, has adopted the picassiette style and mostly creates mosaics for display indoors but she had made one on a slate tile which I bought from her to serve as inspiration while I get my hand in – plus it’s a hare and I’ve got a thing about hares at the moment.

My plan is to make mosaics for the outdoors, partly because we have quite a lot of lovely slate tiles scattered around the garden I can use for a substrate (see how I’m getting the lingo down already) and partly because there is no room in our house for anything else so I’ve had to start decorating the outside.

At the workshop we could choose two wooden shapes to mosaic and I chose a couple of fish thinking they’d go in my bathroom although they are far from perfect.  So much so that I’m only going to show you one of them.

Room for improvement but it’s quite a forgiving craft and has certainly got me interested enough to carry on.

I now have some sort of compulsion to see every piece of china or glass as a prospective item to take some cutters or a small hammer to which can’t be healthy.  Maybe I could get myself invited to a Greek wedding.

I mentioned a doomed wicker workshop earlier.  I attended one whilst still living in France and didn’t do too well.  I got lost on my way there, arrived an hour late and was so discombobulated that I was in a flap the whole time and made what was supposed to be a hare but could have been anything from a mouse to an elephant.  Unsurprisingly, it didn’t make the move back to England.  Recently I suggested to Mr. Tialys that he take a break from work and enrol himself in a wicker workshop taking place in a nearby town.  He made a heron which, of course, looks as exactly like a heron as can be expected by twisting bits of willow together and now has pride of place by the pond exercising a reign of terror over the fish.

I’ll try to keep you up to date on my progress with mosaics, hopefully there’ll be some worth mentioning.