I Heart Wall Art: Make a Noticeboard With Scarves

Now then, if like me, you prefer to make your life difficult via the means of:
a) Trying to not ever buy things new, unless they're full-on proper eco-friendly produced
b) Always wanting very pretentiously to do something a little bit 'different' but not actually having any ideas jump into your head easily
c) getting a bit cross and bothered and wishing you were a really creative 'blank canvas' person who just goes "Ooh, ooh, how about we twist some twigs into a giant pepperpot shape, interthread tin-can shards in it and then invent a whole new peg system made from old cotton reels and make a noticeboard that way!"

Yes, sound like you?  Then what the heck, my love - just steal this idea.  Honestly, do.  It looks awful purrdee and is a proper good scavenging project.  Plus of course, it's got hearts in it, and like it or lump it my good people, hearts are a nice shape, aren't they.

Deely-boppers. Key to our business. Ahem.

Stuff and Things You'll Need

• Scarves from t'charity shop.  Also good - silky tops you've kept to re-use for something.  Best is silky things because they will not be bulky and will insinuate themselves nicely through rings and round nails etc
• Rings - I found a bedillion inch diameter or so metal curtain rings in a charity shop once, and I used those.  Failing that, use whatever rings you can lay your hands on.  Can't find any?  Don't worry - leave 'em out!
• Magnets if your rings are metal - ideally little craft magnets (strong ones), but you could just round up all the magnets yer kids have abandoned
• Paper clips, curtain cafe clips, bulldog clips - anything clippy or hangy or holdy or grabby.  And yes, they are the proper technical terms.
• Hammer and Nails
• Tape measure, Pencil, Rubber

   
Ready?  Hop to it!

We gave our workroom wall a good clean to rid it of dust and, ahem, pencil drawings, and removed bits of blu-tack and sellotape.  A nice clean blank canvas for you to whack your scarf art onto.

Poke through, bring round, poke through again.

1. Tie/sew your scarves and silky bits together, and measure how long it is.  You'll need this figure in your head to give you an idea of how big or small your outline is going to be in the next step
2. Put the curtain rings, if you are using them, at regular intervals.  Simply poke through once, bring round and poke through again, as you can see here, so that the rings are 'caught' on the scarf.
3. Next you need to sketch your heart-shape on the wall (or hey - any shape, it doesn't matter!  Go crazy you creative loons, you) using your pencil.  Start lightly - it took us a while to get the heart shape

   

   The mighty dustpan and brush

   right, let me tell you, and involved lots of standing back and viewing it askance and squinty-eyed before we got it right, which in turn involved a lot of drawing, rubbing out and re-drawing.  
4. When you're happy with the shape, start hammering the nails in to the wall.  Now listen here - you have to angle them slightly, and the angle will differ depending on the shape the scarves will make.  For example, the downward 'dip point' at the top ofthe heart needs a nail which is angled downwards so that the scarves don't just slip off, upwards....think tent pegs and guy ropes and you'll know what I mean!  If in doubt, just hammer them in a little, so that you can manoeuvre them once the scarves are tied on.  You'll soon see what we mean.
5. Next - begin placing your scarves round the nails - if you're on your own, you may need to tie the first bit to a nail, or it'll keep slidin' awff.   Amanda and I were doing this together so one was holding the first bit in place while the other looped and curled the scarves into place.  If you found the whole nail angling thing tricky, you can always 'loop the loop' the scarves round each nail.

   

   Get cafe clips from curtain hardware suppliers

6. Tie the two scarf-length ends together when you've created your shape, or if you prefer, tie them to a nail. Don't worry if you have too much - just let it hang down, or cut it, or wind it round some more.  Don't get hung up with measuring, no, no.
7. Now's where you get busy hanging things off your hearts!  Now, I'll leave this to your imagination - we had all sorts of funny bits and bobs - we've got some things stuck on with two magnets, some things jammed into paperclips just hanging off scarves; we've got cafe clips holding stuff, and of course we used the nails too - see the dustpan and brush there?!  Basically, use whatever you think might work!

A lot more interesting than a boring old noticeboard, eh?  We shove things we love, reminders, our sewing patterns all hole-punched and hanging on a nail, ready to whip down and use when we get orders; we stick receipts on nails, hang works in progress, even coat-hangers sometimes, with other things hanging off them.

Take part in some heart wall art!

What will you do?  Ooh, and what shapes are you thinking of using?  A cat? An owl?  Kisses?  Tell me!

Frame It - Upcycle Your Old Fabrics into Wall Art

One of the things we here at OriginalStitch Towers get to notice in our frequent prowls round charity shops, is the kind of stuff that's always there.....and then we try and think of ways to use it.  From a business point of view that's sensible coz you know for sure if you have a rush of orders, or need to be able to guarantee a certain supply level to retailers, you'll have enough supply to get you by.

And one thing you always see is picture frames.
I'm right no?
Boxes crammed with 'em.  Ok, so sometimes they're really vomit-worthy plastic ones, but most are ok, and they're cheap as chips, if not cheaper, especially if you didn't get the fish or a battered sausage.
Oh, unwise thing to do so close to lunch...can you smell vinegar.....mmmmm......

Um, so, anyhoo....in the spirit of OriginalStitch and our obsession for all things upcyclable, for Amanda Dormouse Moneybag's birthday I went a-rummagin' and dug out some nice old photo frames.  Then I got back to OS Towers and waded through my stash, throwing bits of fabric willy-nilly over my shoulder.  (I do this in an ever so slightly manic way - it's a bit scary, should you wish to know, like a rabbit trying to get under a fence, or a Husband attempting to find a passport 3 minutes before he's due to fly to Las Vegas in 2010, or similar).

I was given, years ago, a great little collection of old postcards, and have been meaning to turn them into wall art ever since, so I dug it out and found 3 sewing related postcards.

All I did here, and I bet you'd be better at it than me, was to cut a piece of fabric marginally larger than the size of the frame, glue the postcard to the fabric right-side, and then insert into the frame as you would a picture.  Even better would have been to glue the fabric to some stiff card, but I didn't have any to hand, so I bodged it a bit, I'm proud to say.

Now, don't stop there, there's a million things you could do to a piece of fabric in a frame.  How about these ideas, off the top of my bonce, and therefore by no means the best....

• Sew buttons in a heart shape, or to look like cogs interlocking.
• Embroider a simple picture over the top - make it unrelated to the fabric for a quirky effect
• Use it as a collage - stitch lavender sprigs, leaves, buttons, ribbons, newspaper or magazine off-cuts onto it
• Make up quick patchwork pieces to frame - just wallop some 3 inch squares together, you'll only need a few, but it will look great
• Use two very contrasting fabrics - cut an easily identifiable shape (a foot? A bird? A sewing machine?) out of the top fabric, and stitch or glue that piece over the other piece. 

These make great presents, and they're fab for using up scrippy scraps of fabric, and random bits and bobs you've got lying around.  I like the idea of doing them in twos, or a triptych of frames, so you can built a theme into your picture. 

To be honest, I was a little peeved Amanda took her pics home.  I dropped a considerable number of hints that they would look nice in our little nook of an office here, but no.  She weren't 'avin' none of it.

Amanda's beautifully wrapped gifts.  Ahem.

Ooh, she's hard that Moneybags.