Hello Rob!

Mum and I travelled to London for the day to finish our Christmas shopping, meet Rob Ryan and collect the prize for winning the Christmas Competition.



Naturally, it was incredible to see behind the scenes and meet an artist whose work I've been admiring for years. Rob Ryan, and all the people in his studio, are as lovely as you would expect them to be for being behind such beautiful work. He showed us around his pad, including his yummy studio and cute bedroom. My camera couldn't capture everything with enough quality, but I can confirm his studio looks like this:

There was an enormous, intricate paper cut work in progress…

As Rob showed us around his (occasional) living space, I got a lovely photo of his finished rest room with their (own made) periodic table tiles, which I read about on his blog post a few months ago…

On the train home, mum and I had so much fun looking through all the glorious prizes I'd been presented with! Here are a few…

Desk Calendar

Cushion Cover

Money Box

Note Book

2013 wall calendar

Limited Edition Laser Cut

Limited Edition Screen Print

Signed Book

Tea Towel

Tea Towel

Tea Towel

Book

Ceramic Tile

Ceramic Tile

Tape

Christmas Tape

And lots more!

Aside from all these beautiful items, by far the best part of winning this prize was meeting Rob and his team, seeing his studios, being invited to do work experience, and getting a massive hug accompanied by a mouthful of fluffy hair. I do hope we meet again.

THE TATTY DEVINE BUNTING WORKSHOP

Saturday 21 July, 2012 

236 Brick Lane, London, E2 7EB

 18:00  The perfect welcome: tea and brownies!

 18:05  We started by choosing colours. This was the most challenging part of the workshop. I had been worrying about this since the day I signed up. I changed my mind every day. As I thought more about it I realised several things came clear for me: 

• It's spring / summer jewellery, so should be made of fresh tones that compliment colours I wear in these seasons.
• I have always liked wearing white and blue.
• I like a little element of something special – mirror or glitter looks great in the sunshine
• I tend to wear more silver jewellery than gold.

There are many colours which I could eliminate straight away, because I'm not so confident in wearing bright colours.

My first plan was white + silver. Then I found out they were not making mirror flags.
After seeing (and falling in love with) the film Moonrise Kingdom the week before the workshop, I instantly wanted more yellow in my life! However, I don't dress bright, I struggle to get it right. I think I'm often too safe. But I'm comfortable that way.

Blue + white + yellow was quite a strong contender. But the day before the workshop I was certain that only white flags would be the best solution for me. Simple and very easy to wear.

On the morning of the event I changed my mind to dark blue + white: this should also be easy for me to wear, still fairly safe, but not as plain as just white. When I got to the workshop I found they didn't have dark blue. To my delight though, they did have glitter pieces! I had to have glitter somewhere!

My final decision was light blue + white + gold glitter. Normally I'd go for silver over gold, but it was a bit too cold together. The addition of the gold glitter pieces gives it a special sparkle, warms it up a bit, and because it's quite a light gold tone it still looks fresh.

 18:15  Lovely Lucy, wearing the white Posie Garland Necklace, demonstrated the right way to hold pliers and the best way to open and close jump rings. It was so much fun fixing the pieces together I got carried away and made the longest single-line bunting necklace the Tatty Workshop Girls had seen. Their design has 12 flags. I wasn't satisfied until I reached 21 flags.

 18:50  After lots of fiddling I finally accepted the main part was complete.

 19:10  Lucy helped me to shorten the chain and re-attach the smallest rings. The chain needed to be very short, since my bunting was so long. It took a few attempts to get right, and Lucy was much quicker at attaching chain that me! 

 19:30  I left Brick Lane with a beautiful self-made piece which I will cherish and enjoy wearing as much as I enjoyed the making. 

I also left with a few other bits, including a few gifts and the first edition of the Rob Ryan newspaper.

The Tatty Devine Studio is full of magnificent things. 

I found Ashleigh on Facebook when we signed up for the event – she was going to the morning session. We messaged each other during the weeks before the workshop. It's a shame we didn't meet, but I'm really pleased to see the colours she chose. Gorgeous dress too. Someone needs to buy her the matching Tatty Devine swallow earrings!

Also in the morning session was Elisabeth: I didn't meet her either, but I found this image of her on Tatty Devine's Twitter and I think this might be my most favourite design I've seen. I really love the little sunshine surprise! I wish I'd thought of that!

MY NEXT MAKE:

Lucy let me take away a bit of chain, a few jump rings, and a few flags. I'm planing to make myself a matching bracelet, as soon as I find some tiny long-nose pliers. 

UPDATE:

I finished the bracelet…

See it here!