There are lots of fun pubs and bars in London, UK. However one of my favourites is The Worlds End in Camden. Just south of the Camden Town tube station is where you will find this wonderfully weird pub.
This pub has such a different feel with its interesting shop window walls and fantastic pieces of art. The beer is good and affordable, the food is scrumptious and the people are always friendly. If you enjoy people watching The Worlds End is a fun place to sip on a drink and take in your surroundings.
I get this question more often than you may think. It's become more mainstream just in the past 5 or so years it seems. But the term was coined more than 20 years ago in 1987. The popular show Castle (some of us followed this as Nathan Fillian was our favorite space-cowboy in Firefly) even did a great Steampunk episode.
Starting out mostly as a cult favorite sci-fi book subject and evolving into fashion, design and popular-culture phenomenon. Steampunk combines futurism, time travel, and the Victorian Age. Authors such as K.W. Jeter, Tim Powers, James Blaylock, William Gibson, Bruce Sterling, and Scott Westerfeld all pull their influences from Edwardian authors H.G. Wells and Jules Vernes that have Victorian-era technology and ideals.
These authors have inspired artists, musicians and the like to bring these ideas into their painting, drawing, jewelry, and great music.
Some of you may already know, I have a night job as a bartender at 20 Brix. I get to work with my sister-in-law Cambrey Hastings and Tuesday we worked a great wine tasting.
This time I had the pleasure of meeting Hunter Vogel, the label owner of Treasure Hunter wines at the 20 Brix wine tasting brought in by Purple Feet Distributors. They featured 5 red wines. My favorite right now is the Man O' War Cabernet.
Chef Paul Borraco paired a 5 course meal to pair with each wine. Grahm, Dylan, and Josh assisted Paul in the kitchen to prepare and plate this for 25 people while still taking care of all the normal restaurant business as well. Between each course, Chef likes to come out and talk to our people at the tasting. I think my favorite quote of the night was after one guest told him how great the food was he says, "I enjoy creating mouth adventures."
Hunter Vogel was one of the funnest people to listen to of all the wine tastings I've worked there. After the tasting and bottle signing ("Thanks for letting me put my Pinot in you."-hahaha!!) I was able to get some pictures of him with our General Manager Clay Mitchel, Cynthia, and Chef Paul.
I thought I would show you a bit of a behind the scenes for one of my favorite art forms. Leather embroidery is the art (or craft) of stitching very small beads called seed beads onto leather by hand. Patterns must be figured out, gemstones set, and you must have strong hands! Getting a needle through leather can sometimes be a real pain. I'm nursing a couple of needle pokes now actually. I'm working on a new project called "Sun Spots". Here you can see I'm reusing car leather samples which would have been tossed in the trash had they not been "rescued" by my father. (Three "R"s, right? :D)
I've been working on it for a couple of days now and I'm happy with the results so far. Here is another piece of mine all finished called "Native Earth" shown below.
Most of my embroidery pieces are at theNature Shop in Rowe Woods in Milford, Ohio if you would like to see them in person. I'll also have "Sun Spots" and much more at our show coming up in September, Old West Festival.
Embroidery and most other fiber and needlework arts are believed to originate in the Orient and Middle East. Primitive humankind quickly found that the stitches used to join animal skins together could also be used for embellishment.
In 1964, a Cro-Magnon hunter’s fossilized remains, 30,000B.C., was found at a dig in Sungir near Vladimir, Russia. His fur clothing, boots and hat were heavily decorated with hand stitched horizontal rows of ivory beads - bead embroidery? You bet!
Chinese bead embroidery in Siberia, 5000 and 6000B.C., include elaborately drilled shells stitched with decorative designs onto animal hides. Mosaics of Byzantium, 500A.D., depict embroidery of clothing with silk thread, precious stones and pearls. It is possible the Chinese thread embroidery from 3500B.C. was the origin of thread embroidery as we know it today.
Summer is here! I can't speak for everyone but for me summer is about being barefoot. There is nothing i enjoy more that lazing in the sun, reading a good book with my bare feet in the cool grass. It is because of this that recently I have become a little obsessed with barefoot sandals.
These beautiful items of jewelry are perfect for weddings on the beach to chilling in the garden. These ones specifically are made by 4mydolly. The thing i love about her barefoot sandals is she gives you options, you get to choose the color of the thread and the beads and even offers two bead colors! Although that now leaves me with the predicament of choosing between silver thread with grape colored beads or black thread with gold beads, so many decisions.
The best thing is they look like real jewelry but are stretchy, making them easier and more comfortable to wear. Which comes in handy because you can wear them with your flip flops, pumps or heels for a funky new twist.
There are loads of different patterns, methods and materials that can be used to make barefoot sandals. For all of you talented people who know how to crochet check out this tutorial. I think these Barefoot sandals are just beautiful and really quite simple to make.
Whether you buy a pair of barefoot sandals or make your own I can guarantee these are a hippie must have for the summer.
Earth Gathering has really got my thinking about the different things people can do to help look after our planet. Most people have a trash can or a box specifically for recycling. Recycling is very important, but even better is Reusing! By Reusing an item yourself you save time, energy and fuel, as well as producing less emissions.
As an Artist the idea of upcycling is both fascinating and beautiful to me. I love that you can take something that originally would have been thought of as trash and turn it into something useful and creative. For example my Owl piece was an upcycled plank of barn wood. Even though the wood had dents and paint splatters on it, it didn't matter because it gave it character.
Funnily this piece sold at Earth Gathering.
Here are some more artists i found on Etsy.com that Upcycle -
Upcycled Word is an artist that works in a Library. All of her creations are made from unwanted or unloved books that needed a new home.
I do not know, personally, what attracted these Artists to Upcycling. It could have been the interesting characteristics of the items they use, it could be that they enjoy hunting for those uniquely aged objects that need a new home. What ever their reasons they are all helping the Earth by not contributing more unnecessary waste to landfills across the world.
Artist's Block- Same thing as Writer's Block which we are all familiar with, Artist's Block is something you don't want to run into EVER. But all creative people eventually do. Whether you're painting, drawing, making a pattern or writing a paper for school; all of us need our creative thinking to be in high gear to make something of value.
My living is based on my creativity and I can say it is hard to stay creative and not just fall into a rut of making the same thing over and over. Sometimes I may just make things that aren't quite up to my standards. I know I've experienced this loads of times and had to take apart or just start completely over with a project. (Just ask Rozena, she has seen my "To Be Finished/I Threw This Against the Wall" drawer.) I never let these pieces out until they've been properly yelled at and reworked....
Ahhh...but there's hope. One thing I have found to keep this at a minimum is to be in the Great Outdoors. Just sticking your bare feet on the grass can do wonders. I find that studying the Greatest Artist helps me to stay creative myself. I have pulled out my phone to take a picture of a sunset that had a great color palate that helped me blend my colors better, thrown rocks down a river to take out frustration only to be inspired by the shapes of them and figured out a new way to weave a necklace. Like the one shown here: "Wisdom" Owl Necklace
It's not always oooh aaaaah I was just inspired!! Sometimes it's just about being, just relaxing with the people you care about or on your own. Don't underestimate this time. We live in a culture that doesn't play outside all day until street lights come on (honestly it's just not safe for our children to do this anymore), and most of our shopping is done in a large mall rather than at an outdoor market, and a lot of our human contact is done virtually. So now we must make time to enjoy outside, I'm just sayin'...love that dirt!
In Cincinnati, where I live, it's been raining like crazy! Getting outside is difficult. So this week I enjoyed a trip to Krohn Conservatory where the Brazilian Butterfly Show is currently going on through June. Just fantastic!
So that's what I do to get rid of Artist's Block... the Power of Nature! Hope it helps you if you give it a try. :)
