Mokuyobi Threads Bedford Bag Kickstarter

If you haven't heard, my company Mokuyobi Threads is running a Kickstarter for our new Fall 2012 bag line.  It's called The Bedford Bag and is an all in one backpack, over-the-shoulder, and tote bag.  There are 2 pattern bags and 2 solid.  The solid bags come with 3 travel themed iron on patches for all of you DIY enthusiasts to make the bag yours!

Click the image below to go to the Kickstarter to see our video and pledge!

Solid: Blue Nylon

 Solid: Red Nylon

Pattern: Lighted Arrows w/ yellow nylon

Pattern: Rad Sack Limited Ed. Print by Adam Smith w/ black nylon

The transformable Bedford Bag covers all ground for wherever you day takes you.

NYC Crafty Classes Part 2

Recently I have been exploring the world of crafty classes in NYC. So many that I had to do a 2 part blog post! I thought I'd give them a bit of a review in case you were looking to step up your crafty skills and take a class. This is part 2!!

Beginning Knitting- Purl Soho

459 Broome St, Manhattan

Three 2 hr. classes - $140

Thomas Duncan was the teacher in my class. He was great! Amazingly helpful and patient. Both me and the other woman in the class (there were only 2 of us, yay!) hadn't knit before and with his guidance we picked it up so quickly!! This class is perfect for someone who has never knit and wants to learn everything to start their first knitted project. It's 3 classes so you get a lot of info.

 

Your materials aren't included but everything you need you can buy right there at the store (just not during class, have your materials beforehand).  Above is the first thing we knit, just some stitch practicing.  First we learned how to knit creating a garter stitch and then we learned how to purl and we had a lot of time to practice both.

Next I moved onto knit 2 purl 2 which creates a really nice texture that I hope to continue on this piece until it resembles some kind of scarf. Knitting is very time consuming compared to sewing. I hope to post about it again when it's done but it'll be a while...

Intro to Woodworking 3rd Ward
195 Morgan Ave, Brooklyn
Six 3 hr. classes

Members- $485 Non-members- $585  

Buck Jackson teaches this super sweet class that no matter what level you're at you get comfortable with using all of the machines and safety surrounding them. You make an end table which takes up the majority of the class but you also make a wood mallet where you learn some techniques you don't learn making the table. All of your materials are included and you get a 'tool bag' that has very useful items like a set of chisels, ruler square, safety goggles, dust mask, tape measure, sandpaper, and earplugs. All of which you get to keep post class.

 

Here's one of my classmates working in the student workshop designated specifically for classes.  They have a whole new beautiful woodshop upstairs that you can use after the class is over and you go through the safety info with Jeff the woodshop manager.  

I wish I took more photos of the process and the finished product before I painted it, but I didn't so you can just imagine it half built and not painted. In the class you have time to get the table built but the finishing/painting/staining is up to you on your own time. I did spray painted stripes by taping off sections.

I didn't paint the bottom cross bar and I think it looks pretty cool. The contrast of natural wood and bright colors is awesome. Even though it took a really like time to paint with all of the gesso layers and then I sprayed the paint with a UV matte finish so hopefully it will stay nice.

Now I use the side table as a place for my tools next to my work table so I'm not always losing them under the fabric I'm working with.  Perfect!!

Fire the Lazzzzor!!!- NYC Resistor

87 3rd Ave, Brooklyn

One 4 hr. class- $75

Having access to a laser cutter is always beneficial if you're planning to do any kind of project with small details that you can't cut out by hand or that are too time consuming.  This class teaches you all about the laser cutter and how to operate it.  You learn what materials you can and can't laser cut and how to test them if you're not sure.  You can bring an image file or idea to laser cut or you can think something up when you get there.  It helps to bring your computer and a flash drive. 

People in my class made things like a wooden bow tie, vinyl necklace, name keychain, and business card.  They provide all of the materials for cutting.  I made a stamp!!  After a few tries of figuring out the settings on the laser for rubber we finally got it!!  (I brought my own wood block to glue it on).

 

Now I have my very own logo stamp and thanks to this class I have the know how and tools to make another whenever I desire.  They have open hours twice a week where you can use the laser cutter and pay by the minute.  Very fun, you should try it out!!  Fire the lazzzzzorr!!

Cupco Bozwangler

For the release of Cupco's vinyl toy The Four Boob Bozwangler, they asked a bunch of artists (me included) to paint a Bozwangler to their creative liking for a show at Grass Hut Gallery in Portland.  Below on the left you can see what the original one that I received looked like and the complete transformation on the right!!

Firstly those four exposed boobs made me very uncomfortable so I had to make that poor Bozwangler a tiny shirt just for him!

So little!

Front View

Side View

 Back View

Top View

Foot & Claw

Head Detail

Arm Detail

Work in Progress

If you're in the Portland area on June 7th go check it out!!  If not be sure to check out Cupco's site in the near future for show pics!

Crafty NYC Classes Part 1

Recently I have been exploring the world of crafty classes in NYC.  So many that I had to do a 2 part blog post!  I thought I'd give them a bit of a review in case you were looking to step up your crafty skills and take a class.  

Embroidery Basics Stitch Dictionary- Purl Soho

459 Broome St, Manhattan

Two 2 hr. class - $95

Jessica Marquez teaches this super informative class on all kinds of different types of fancy embroidery stitches.  This class is perfect for someone who has never embroidered or someone who just wants to widen their embroidery vocabulary.  It's a very organized 2 week class (one class a week) that teaches you tons of different stitches and gives you time to practice each stitch.  You are required to bring your own materials but they sell everything you need in the store if you come a little before the class.

You start with a template and learn one stitch at a time.  If you have trouble getting any of the stitches, Jessica is super helpful (and patient).  At the end of the 2 weeks you have your very own embroidered dictionary that you can admire and look back at for a stitch refresher.

The different stitches create different shapes and textures that are each useful in their own way depending on what kind of embroidery project you plan on completing next!

Some of the more complicated stitches from week 2.

Embroidery 2.0- 3rd Ward

195 Morgan Ave, Brooklyn

One 4 hr. class - $65 member, $75 non-member

Artist Iviva Olenick teaches this much more free form embroidery class.  I would not recommend this class to a newbie embroiderer since there is hardly any stitch basics covered and lots more stitch experimentation.  This class is very learn as you go.  Iviva planned class depending on what each student was interested in learning.  

We learned some stitches that some students had requested and then the last half of this 4 hour class was free time for working on your own project you brought in.

She had brought a lot of embroidery books to look though for inspiration or to learn about different stitches.  The best part of this class is that all of the materials were provided but if you're working on a specific personal project I recommend you bring your own materials for work in class time.

I got a new macro lens which is AMAZING for close-up embroidery detail shots.

For free time I worked on a super secret embroidery project that I hope to share with you soon!


High Speed Tee Printing- Gowanus Print Lab
54 2nd Ave, Brooklyn
One 3 hr. class - $80

Corey Fleming teaches this screen printing class which is more about learning to use the 4-6 color manuel press than printing at high speeds.  Perfect for a screen printing refresher, definitely not a beginner course. All materials and ink are provided.  We did a 4 color process print on a white t-shirt but he accidentally burned 2 cyan and 2 yellow screens.  Whoops.  We ended up printing one of the cyan screens magenta just for kicks.  It turned out... interestingly.  Aside from the mix up it's a great course to get you ready to come in and prepare & print your own 4-6 color designs.  Bonus: you get to take your printed tee home although you really won't want to.  I would've rather taken a blank tee.

The End!!  Get ready for part 2!

Femke Agema

Super inspired by designer Femke Agema.  We all know from my last post that I love making ridiculous costumes but they aren't exactly day to day street wear so I can only showcase them on the internet.  The noodle monster knows that if I had one selfish wish it would be to have time only to fill an entire apartment with nonsense plush items.  Femke makes the fun borderline functional while still retaining ridiculous aspects as well as beautiful construction.  Have a look.

Pokemon Costume Party

Recently me and Axel were invited to a Pokemon birthday party for our friend Iain.  It was my specialty, a dress up party.  I didn't really watch Pokemon as a kid so I didn't know much about what character to choose.  Luckily Axel is a Pokemon nerd and decided that the best costume duo for us was Misty (me) and Togepi (Axel).  My costume was pretty easy and comprised of things I already had in my wardrobe.  There is no image because it wasn't even photo worthy.  Togepi was a little trickier but I'm always up for a costume challenge.

It was a pretty simple egg shape with red and blue shapes on the outside.  I made the top pointy like a half an eggshell and stuffed the egg body with stuffing to make it poofy and egg like.

The costume was not complete without a Togepi head piece with an elastic band.

I made arm holes on the sides to help hold the costume up and also obviously so he could use his arms.  It is a party after all.

There was a prize for different categories of best costume.  We won most accurate costume and the best possible prize (sarcasm) a bottle of Jameson.  Clearly I'm not a fan, lucky for Axel.

At the party with other various Pokemon/costumes

Good times.  Now Axel doesn't have an excuse next Halloween for not having a costume. Whee!

Front & Back

If you were to tell me a year ago to do an embroidery on paper I would probably have laughed at you.  Mostly because embroidering on paper is very temporary since the paper can easily rip thus ruining your embroidered hard work.  But after finding out about Art House Co-op's Brooklyn Art Library (see previous posts) I had to get involved.  They give you a book to fill with whatever you want inside the parameters of the theme you choose and when you're done you send it to them and it's on display there for all eternity so people can discover other artists and be inspired by their work.  

The theme I picked was thread and surface since when I went to the Art Library the books that stood out to me most were ones that you could get something out of it via touch and I knew that if I made it as a sketchbook it wouldn't be very interesting.  Tactile work is very cool that way and since it's not a painting hanging on a gallery wall you're totally allowed to touch it.  I titled it Front and Back because when you are done embroidering what you planned out on the front, you get to see the process on the back; something you can't achieve with a drawing without a time lapse video.

If I was going to make a project for myself I would want it to be very well made and long lasting so that I could have it and enjoy it forever.  But with this book once I send it in it belongs to the library so I thought I would try something that I wouldn't normally do.  And since the book already had paper in it I decided to embroider on paper.  Not surprisingly it is much more difficult than working with fabric.  Once you poke a hole you can't move the fibers around to get rid of it, that hole is there to stay.  It took me a few pages to perfect my back side paper poking technique since I embroidered as I went along instead of poking all of the holes in the beginning.  Paper is also obviously much more delicate and rips easily.  I like to think that this project made me more aware and grateful of how easy it is to embroider on fabric.

 The back of the cover is one of my favorite ones because it looks familiar but so foreign at the same time.

In the beginning I played with more abstract shapes since I thought it made the back more interesting because there was no logic for where you would start and where you would end.

I had a more freedom with ones that had a kind of grid because I could play with the madness inside of the order.  There was no right or wrong answer for what went where.

Once I did a few abstract embroidered pages I transitioned to more figurative themes to keep it interesting.

I really liked making the pattern on the shirt in this one especially when you realize how chaotic the back side is.

The wizard was engaging because when I made the drawing it was just a wizard and wasn't very exciting at all.  But when I embroidered him, the stitches came to life and made the same drawing more interesting to look at.  P.S.- embroidering small hands on paper is not easy.

I enjoyed working on the gems a lot because I used multi color thread so it looked like the shapes had highlights and shadows like the objects would in real life.  It's also fun to see on the back how the same pink and yellow gem shape looks different when I was trying to conserve thread.

The robot's party hat is just my favorite in general.

If you saw the back first what would you think it is?

My book as well as many others in the Limited Edition Sketchbook Project will be on display at the Brooklyn Library sometime soon at 103A North 3rd Street 12-8pm everyday.  Stop by and check it out!  It will also be included in a series of art books documenting the project that will be published in the fall of 2012.  If you're interested in doing a sketchbook, the Sketchbook Project for 2013 is open now!  Go sign up here to participate!