The big Brisbane call out

Well, as we've mentioned a few times on this here blog, Ink & Spindle is packing it's wares into suitcases and heading to the Stitches & Craft Show in Brisbane!



We're excited and a little bit nervous - Brisbane is pretty unfamiliar territory (for Bee and myself at least) and we don't really know many people up there.

We also don't know where we can/should stay. The show is at the Convention Centre on South Bank, and we're not exactly rolling in it so we're trying to find somewhere to stay that's cheap but still accessible (we might hire a car). Or if anyone has a spare room for three lovely ladies.... ;)

Anyway if anyone has any suggestions they would be much appreciated!

P.S. - we wont be able to do any workshops in Brissy but we will be doing our 'A Home Based Craft Business' seminar. Dates to come soon :)

Update: Thanks everyone for your response. We've booked ourselves a nice apartment 5 minutes away from the show and will be staying a little longer to enjoy Brisbane :) Thanks Kelly, for doing the search for us.

The studio that Like Butter built

The last couple of days at work have been très fun, albeit tiring - Bee and I printed 100m of fabric in 2 days. But we wouldn't have been able to do it without our new toy:


Printing Birch in Deep red

Our new drying system! Built and installed by the very talented Like Butter (of course).


Printing Ginkgo in Teal

The new system is sooo good! It basically doubles our efficiency (or more) because we can hoist fabric off the table and keep printing without having to wait for the first run to dry.

And it looks so pretty, with the fabric hanging like that :)

We also had our first Open Studio yesterday - thanks to everyone who came along!! We had no idea what to expect, who might turn up and if they might buy things, but it went really well! Next time we'll be more equipped with more stock and maybe some tea and coffee and biscuits. And maybe a printing demonstration, but we have to think about that a bit more...

Natural unbleached linen/cotton

It's finally here, our natural unbleached linen/cotton basecloth! Beautiful plain fabric for you to use in your crafty projects... together with one of our gorgeous prints of course ;)


... in our shop now @ $22 per metre.

Studio Home Creative

The lovely Julia Atkinson from Studio Home Creative sent us an email this morning to let us know about a compilation she made for World Sweet World. Have a look at all these wonderful finds... just devine!

Thank you Julia!

Admin Tuesday - sounds exciting, right?

Where are the weeks/days/hours going? (Aside from being spent trying to avoid Facebook?) We didn't do ANY printing today... or ordering... or packing - neither did we eat lunch! In fact no one, not even you, called us (and yes, we are feeling unloved)! And already the day is gone.

So, what were we doing? Basically a wholefatlotofnothin'. Well almost. We spent the day dealing with our shop, photographing and editing and uploading and editing again... and then editing again... and weirdly, it's been a long day - usually we're all like "Holy crap! It's 6pm already! We better go home!!" but today just draaaaaaged. Gah for admin.

But the good news is we have put some brand spankin' new colourways up in the shop! We printed these ones specially for the Stitches & Craft show - and if you like 'em we might print them again. Coz there's only a few bits and pieces of things left.


Antique Keys in Plum & Cream


Antique Keys in Olive & Chocolate


Blue Wrens in Chocolate


Blue Wrens in Honeysuckle (a notoriously difficult colour to photograph)


Ginkgo in Olive & Teal


Bonsai in Snow


Acacia in Inky Blue


Bonsai in Robins Egg

P.S Did you see we got a mention in The Sunday Age M Magazine's cover story? What fun! Thanks to Pip for recommending us!

Ok.

So. We're back from the show, and we've survived our brush with fashion, and now it's time to return to the land of printing and blogs.

A round up of the show: we had THE best time! It was awesome getting to meet so many fab peeps, our immediate neighbours included Kristen Doran (K-Diggity-Dawg), Nicolle Mallalieu (Nikki-we'll-swap-you-our-allen-key-for-your-screwdriver) and further along the Incubator secion we had Jodie from vintage ric rac (y'know the crazy one, down there, the one that brings us food! The one with the zipper mouth monsters that say naughty things!), Leslie (who swapped with us and now we all have treasured Oobee's - mine is Leroy!), the gorgeous Audrey & Maude ladies, Louise & Cathy (I'm sooo making those fab softies any day now and I love my new tote!), Johanna from one red robin, with more fab peg bears... and so many other fab people that I'll be here all night if I keep going!!

I need Lara & Bee here to help me remember all the great conversations we had!

xx Teegs

Refabricated Salon Show...

We'd like to share some pics of last Tuesday's 'Refabricated' Salon Show & Exhibition. The exhibition is on until the 22nd of March, don't miss out on seeing heaps of lovely textile based artworks and fashion.


Lara, Teegs & Bee - having a well deserved drink at the 'Refabricated' salon show & exhibition

Seeds in Plum & silk blend 50's style skirt - designed by Teegs


Wrens in Plum & denim skirt - designed by Lara


Ginkgo 50's style skirt - designed by Teegs


Acacia in Inky Blue & Grey denim skirt - designed by Lara


Bonsai in Robins egg & natural linen skirt - designed by Bianca


Sumor & denim skirt - designed by Bianca


Ink & Spindle wall art

Photography by Marcel Lee

In case anyone's interested... we will get our skirt patterns graded so you'll be able to make them at home :) They're super easy!

Open Studio...

We've had so many requests from people about where we sell our products, whether we have a brick & mortar shop, or if they can come by the studio to see our range, that we decided to open our studio to the public. Yay!

We've only scheduled one date so far but we plan to setup a small section of our studio for retail purposes and have an open studio about once a month. The rest of the time we'll still be open by appointment, but we figure this is a good way to setup some sort of shop without being taken away from our work during the week. (especially now we're so busy... getting ready for the Brisbane Stitches & Craft show) (edit: We'll also be coming to the Sydney show)

Our first open studio will be on:

Saturday the 28th of March 2009, 10am - 1pm

Please come and visit our 'shop'. We're at Suite 206/10 Elizabeth Street, Kensington.



Cash, eftpos & credit card facilities available.

We're Back

But exhausted... also, our brains are functioning at a much lower level than usual, so we can't make with the funny's or the pretty's! More later in the week....

xx Teegs

We'll see you at the Stitches & Craft show...

Just a quick post to let you know that our shop will remain open whilst we're away. Your order will be posted on the 27th of March.

See you at (or after) the show!

tree-mendously awesome to the max

I came in to work this morning and as I walked around the corner to our entrance I was greeted with this amazing, spectacular, fantabulous sight at our front door:


Come to the Stitches & Craft show and look for Ink & Spindle beneath the big tree!

Somewhere between us leaving the studio at 10:30pm last night and arriving early this morning, the lovely and talented Jem from Like Butter delivered and set up our tree. We'd commissioned this tree for the upcoming show, the prerequisites being that it could stand on it's own, and also be dismantled into pieces that would fit in our car.

I had the honour of getting to actually design the thing (with some great art direction from Teegs) and it's amazing to see it come to life.

Thanks Jem!!!!! (in chorus from the three of us)

Book yourself a spot...

Bookings are now open for the Stitches and Craft - Craft Labs.

To book a Craft Lab, please visit the Learning Centre Booking Desk, at the entrance to the centre, or book through Ticketek Telephone Bookings or any Ticketek Outlet. Bookings must be made at least 30 minutes prior to the start of the session and you should arrive five minutes before your session starts. Please note tickets are limited, so the earlier you can book, the more chance you have of attending all the Craft Labs you desire!

So if you're interested in any of our workshops, book yourself a spot today. Don't miss out, because spots and workshops are limited.

We'll see you next week!

earth quake

we just had an earth quake and it felt like our quadruple brick building was made of jelly!

a quick Facebook check told us that it was felt all the way from Frankston to Ascot Vale (and maybe more!!)

... update: from Bundoora to Cranbourne too!

2nd update: s'ok, it only went for a few seconds, we're fine, nothing even fell off any of the expedits!

Toile-y Thursday

So, as I'm sure you know by now (coz it's all we've been talking about) we're all 'Stitches & Craft' atm, BUT we have also got this rather exciting exhibition opening/salon show on Tuesday the 17th of March.

The deal is that we've gotta make some real-live, actual clothes to show off our totally awesome prints, pretty much by tomorrow! EEP!! There'll be a whole bunch of other awesome, local, indy, No Sweatshop designers gear there, so if you're in the vicinity come to NMBQ @ 57 Smith St before 7pm to catch the show!!

Saying that, we've known about this for months, but y'know how time just slips away and all of a sudden - BAM! - it's March and oh crap, there's those two big shows within two days of each other...

Anyhoo, so we've been having fun designing skirts and playing with toiles and I thought you'd like a peek at the craziness!


Lara's toile in Acacia - white on natural


Teegs's toile on ladder with finished Seeds skirt (about version 4) on mannequin


A close up of the fancy linen/silk blend skirt with Bee's Seeds print


Larz kickin' that zips butt for me! (I really suck at zips, Lara has the skillz)


Speaking of butt's, here's Bee wondering if hers looks big in my poofy toile, version 2 (no Bee, it doesn't)

xx Teegs

Pretty promo picture

It dawned on us last week that we better get some flyers printed for the show, quick smart.

But what photo to put on them??

Inspired a little by the front cover of this book, and with the aid of some books of varying thicknesses (I know, clever huh), here's the result:



It could definitely look more pro, but not bad for an hour or so's work.

P.S. - big thanks to scoutie girl for this really lovely post about us :)

Crafty learnings shall be had by all!!

Ok, people - we have the finalised details!

For the WHOLE FIVE DAYS of the Stitches & Craft Show Bee, Larz and I will be dividing our time between manning (womanning?) our stall at numbers 228 & 229 in the Incubator section, and running daily workshops and seminars.
Yes, I know - we're insane!! So if you come say hi to us and we only communicate in caveman-esque grunts, or alternatively, babble incoherently, then you'll understand why.

It'll be funsies as, tho!

Bianca will be presenting:
A Home Based Craft Business [Module 25]
Tips and advice on starting a home based craft business. Covering blogging, photography, marketing, online sales, pricing, wholesaling & approaching retailers.
45 minutes. Wednesday 12.30-1.15pm in Studio 1. Friday 1.00-1.45pm in Studio 1.

Lara will be presenting:
Glass Etching [Module 26]
Learn how to etch a simple design onto a glass or jar – recycle your jars to create something cute / modern / stylish ... and useful!

You can draw your own design in class or choose from some modern & cute designs we’ll have available on the day. You can also bring your own readymade artwork - it just needs to be simple enough to turn into a stencil which you will be cutting by hand (and around 10cm x 10cm in size or smaller).
Kit $27.00. 1 hour. Beginner. Adults/Teens.
Wednesday, Friday 9.30-10.30am in Craft Lab 6
Thursday, Saturday 11.30am-12.30pm in Craft Lab 6
Sunday 9.30-10.30am in Craft Lab 6

I will be presenting:
Acetate Etching [Module 27]
How to etch a hand drawn image to create multiple prints onto paper.
Kit $32.00. 1.5 hours. Beginner. Adults/Teens.
Wednesday 2.30-4.00pm in Craft Lab 6
Thursday & Saturday 1.00-2.30pm in Craft Lab 6
Friday & Sunday 11.00am-12.30pm in Craft Lab 6

And:
Screen Printing [Module 75]
Straight from the Ink & Spindle studio, create a one-off, hand screen-printed hemp tea towel or carry bag [or bring an item of clothing or accessory from home!] using your own design. The printing technique and skills you will learn allow you to easily replicate the process on your own kitchen or dining room table.
Kit $47. 1.5 hours. Adults/Teens
Friday 300-4.30pm in Craft Lab 6

Get in quick, coz there are only about 15 places for each workshop!!

Hope to see you there! :)

xx Teegs

Note: booking for the workshops must be done through the Stitches & Craft Show, not through us :)