I’ll have some Shibori on the street for the 2 weeks of the festival, some Indigo works on canvas as part of the “Small Works Small Spaces” exhibit. My work is entitled “Phases”, and is still a work in progress, I’ve got a bit to finish off before the end of the week.

I’ve been contemplating the notion of shibori street art for a little while now, so being able to take part in this festival is pretty cool. The idea came to me when i was thinking about yarn bombing, and how that has become such an accepted practice in Melbourne, and particularly in Moreland which is where I live.  I love the idea of turning textiles into street art, something that can be either left for all to enjoy or be squirrelled away for use in a project. (Before you think of squirrelling these ones, they’re on heavy painters canvas, so they aren’t going to sew nicely into a quilt for example!)

Now I just have to test pasting this heavy canvas onto a wall! Otherwise I will have to find a different way to install them, and probably a different location on the street too.

Northern Exposure runs for 2 weeks, opening this Friday 12th July 2013 @6pm on High Street in Northcote. You can find more info on the High St Northcote facebook page.

But, I am very sick of looking like an unfashionable hobo, so I need some new stuff. To start off with, I need new tops. If you looked in my drawer right now, you would find about 5 (old) black t shirts and 2 shirts. Plus these, which I made, and are so much more wonderful than everything else I have!!

Modeled by “two” my lovely dress form. The fabric is an Anna Maria Horner voile. The scarf is my “Maria” scarf. It looks fabulous with everything.

This next one you will have seen if you are an instagram follower, It’s indigo dyed silk cotton blend voile. And is actually lined with white silk/cotton voile because it’s a bit too see through on its own. Lovely and soft to wear! I am going to be dyeing some more of this for some solid colour tops and possibly an Itajime one too. This one is shown with “Carmel”.

The pattern is a dress pattern by Pattern Runway, which i just adapted a bit to fit my style. I’ve actually never made the dress from it, just a top!

Soon I plan on tackling a pair of jeans. Which I may overdye…

I had so much fun shooting these scarves, trying to capture their floaty movement, I really love the images that resulted, I think they are little artworks in themselves.

I also managed to get a facebook page up and running yesterday during nap time, where you can see more photos from my scarf shoot yesterday, and keep up to date to any news via facebook. You can find me on facebook at https://www.facebook.com/BindandFold .

It has been a challenge to dive into this without a real knowledge of it, and with no help, but I have been really enjoying working with it, even if a little frustrated at times.

Still I did manage to do some pretty decent stuff, although I think my patience needs a bit of work, I think I began using my vat before it was really “ready” because I am yet to achieve a super deep indigo.  Despite this, I did still get some lovely blues, some pale and summery, some steely blue like the sea on an overcast day, and some in between!

I had less success dyeing protein fibres than cellulose fibres, so I won’t post any pictures of those, but I did make some new couch cushions out of some linen. Ah linen, I love it so. It’s such an interesting and luxurious fabric! It has so much character to it too. I just love it.

I also have some other pieces but I have some sewing to do with them first before I post pictures.

In other news I have started to sort out a little shop! You can see a link to it at the top of the page. It’s currently only get a test item listed, but I hope to have one or two things available in the next few days.