Tell me a story, Grandad

I love the story of these letters so I thought you might like to hear it too! A customer ordered them as a christening gift for his granddaughter. The maps are of parts of Limerick, Galway and Dublin that show the place where Sarah lives and the exact places where her parents are from (which are also the places where her grandparents live). The cute paper on the 'A's adds a little bit of a baby girly feel and I like to think it represents the countryside in between the cities. If you ever went on long journeys as a child to visit relatives and spent a lot of time looking out the car window at lambs in the fields, birdies in the trees you'll know what I mean! The letters were framed after this photo was taken. I'm sure that Sarah will cherish this gift from her Grandad, that tells her a little bit about her own story, for many years to come.

Little bottles of love

 

A few years ago I met a lovely man and as a Valentine's Day gift I made him a ribbon message in a bottle. After a while he asked me to marry him and I said yes*. I'm pretty sure that it was the message in a bottle that caused him to overlook the fact that he likes tidiness and I have an ability to spontaneously create untidiness at the drop of a hat! Well, at the drop of a hat and some shoes and a handbag and probably some books and bits of ribbon and....

So that was the beginning of the ribbon in a bottle idea. I can't remember why I wasn't satisfied with making a little scroll of paper, but drawing a ribbon out of a bottle to reveal a secret message just seemed right.

After trying to write on ribbon with lots of different types of pen I really wasn't happy - it smudges and runs and generally just looks messy. Eventually I got a notion that typing the message might work so I asked around to see if anyone knew where I might get a typewriter. Somehow I ended up with five of them! I tested them all out and I liked a little vintage Hermes Baby the best  - it also looks cutest and packs neatly away in a matching case.

I've created quite a few customised ribbon messages for people in recent months for birthdays, weddings, christenings and even one for someone joining a silent monastic order! They're somewhere between giving a card and giving a gift, yet a combination of both. I love making them and I hope that I'll have some enquiries for customised messages - I think a marriage proposal in a bottle would just be fantastic!

*Some facts and even whole aeons of time may have been omitted from this part of the story :-)

Let it...

We're having some pretty severe weather here in Dublin at the moment with Arctic snow, thunder, lightening and freeeeezing temperatures as low as minus 10. Not your usual soggy Irish November! Its great weather for staying in, making 3D letters and updating neglected blogs (sorry!).

This week I've been making letters with maps of lovely warm places like India and Australia. I've had a lot of orders from Australia these past few months and apart from finding read-out-loud placenames like Toowoomba, Wallumbilla and Giligulgul, it's nice to be reminded that somewhere else in the world it's springtime.

Here's a moody picture of our street that Gareth took this afternoon as we were walking into town. Snow makes the city feel very quiet and old fashioned (not that our part of it is very newfangled anyway!).

Etsy Ireland Artist Trading Card Swap

Artist Trading Cards (ATCs) are small works of art (64mm x 89mm) that are traded between artists to share and promote their work.

I decided to get involved in the Etsy Ireland ATC swap which is being hosted by Virginie from ViviBijoux.

All the cards will be revealed on September 4th on the Etsy Ireland Blog *excited squeel*. I will be exchanging ATCs with Carrie from Cherry Blossom Tattoo who creates beautiful photography that can be found in her Etsy shop.

At the moment my work is focussed on creating personalised paper sculptures, and I particularly enjoy working with maps.

I love watching people examine my sculptures and find places they’re familiar with.

A little bit of detective work in Carrie’s shop told me that she is from the coastal town of Carrickfergus in Northern Ireland, so my ATC is a teeny tiny paper sailboat made out of two contrasting maps of Northern Ireland.

I added a little pocket on the back so that I could insert the instructions for making the sailboat.

Carrie, if you’re reading this, you might need a magnifying glass and a bucketload of patience but I hope you’ll like your 3D ATC!

The Airfield Baah-zaar

 This morning, after weeks of preparation, littlewhitedog.ie left the virtual world and entered reality for the day at the first ever Airfield Bazaar.

Nervousness and excitement had me wide awake half an hour before the alarm went off, and a peek out the window revealed a soggy, rainy morning.

Paper letters and soggy weather are a great combination.....for papier maché (oh dear!).

When we arrived at Airfield Farm......

and I found my table in the tent I wasn’t so sure about this rainy market business.

But it was when I was halfway through setting out my wares and the table collapsed and all my letters slid onto the ground that Gareth had to grab the back of my jumper to stop me running away! After a stern word (from Gareth), a cup of tea and some carpet tape (from a neighbouring stallholder) we got the table firmly back on its feet and by 11am we were up and running.

From there it was plain sailing! The Bazaar had a great mix of crafts, vintage clothes, retro furniture, books & bric-a-brac and all the stallholders created a friendly, relaxed atmosphere.

I had lots of enquiries about my cards and 3D letters, and lots of lovely customers too! I might even do it again! Click here find out more about Airfield Urban Farm

Art is...

One of my favourite things about selling on Etsy is getting messages from people saying that they love what they see in my shop, and asking whether I can create a special customised item for them.

This is when I begin to get inspired! My 3D letter T made from a Dublin Map was recently featured in Etsy’s blog, The Storque, and my 3D letter S made from a book page made it to the Etsy front page as part of a lovely collection of bookish items.These two happy occurrences have brought some great enquiries such as: “Would it be possible to get a letter made from a London Map?” (Certainly! Would you like a regular street map or a tube map?), “Do you have any maps of Egypt?” (Yes! Would you like ancient Egypt or modern?), “Could you make table numbers for my wedding?” (I could, and I’d love to! Tell me a little bit about you and your fiancé, places you’ve travelled etc and I’ll customise them), “Can you make the letters larger? (Yes, up to about 21.6 cm (8.5 inches) tall).One very exciting commission was from Ali of Three Stories Artspace in Victoria, Australia.

She told me that “Three Stories is a gallery, artist space, cafe and all things creative.” It has an environmentally friendly philosophy so she asked me to make letters from recycled materials such as art books & magazines spelling out the words ‘ART IS A VERB’.

The more I thought about it the more I loved this phrase! Ringing in my head from somewhere back in the mists of my time in primary school were the words “a verb is a ‘doing’ word”, so I set about finding lots of interesting images of different kinds of art, sculpture, painting, photography, installations, land art etc that would show as many different creative processes as possible.

I had an art auction catalogue that had plenty of different styles of painting with some great full page pictures.

A rummage in a pile of magazines in a charity shop yielded a stash of New Yorker magazines with some gorgeous artwork on the covers (my favourite became the letter T in ART).

Before I knew it my Mum was involved, flicking through architecture and design magazines and dropping off little stacks of interesting pages at my desk! When all the letters were finished I brought them out to the park to photograph them.

I thought they’d look interesting hanging from a tree...

and the wind thought they’d look interesting backwards, sideways, tangled up...

so that didn’t really work.

Milo thought it would be interesting to wander off and have a look at those rocks over there, and actually, he was right! The photo below was taken just as the sun was setting in Dublin, which means that it was rising in Healesville, Victoria at the Three Spaces Artspace where you can now enjoy a cup of coffee in the cafe and look at the words “ART IS A VERB” while you decide what you are going to do about art, or what sort of art you are going to do!

Prudence

Milo and I are in this month’s Prudence magazine! Along with five other Irish Etsy businesses, Little White Dog has been included in their ‘Recessionpreneurs’ series of articles about people who have started new enterprises in the midst of the **whisper** recession.

You can have a further peak at the article here on the Etsy Ireland Blog.

You can also have a look at www.prudence.ie but really you should pop out the shop and pick up the magazine.

Its full of prudent fashion, style and glamour, as well as good sound personal finance tips, and at only €2.95 it would be imprudent not to! Thank you to Alex from the Etsy Ireland Team who made it all happen.

Check out her shop Propeller Prints on Etsy for some beautiful original handmade cards & stationery.