If I had a studio, I would call this a studio tour, but it’s really just a second-hand desk, a dining room cabinet, and the story of how getting organized with a few new-to-me pieces has changed the way I work.
I realize that I’m supposed to be running a business here, but nearly all of my “what should I make?” decisions come not from diligent market research, but from my own needs and wants. Right now I need and want a shawl pin 🙂
This is not my first rodeo with the squishy garter stripe idea, but each time I’ve improvised one, I’ve changed it up in some way. I like playing with this kind of design, where you take three or more colors, and alternate them in some way as to make a sort of stripey fade. This time, the shape is more crescent than triangle, due to the strategic introduction of decreases.
I have been kind of obsessed with improving the Polka Dot Cottage shopping experience this week. I’ve also made a few new things, continued my quest to get some storage space back, and had some experiences with nature.
It’s been a long month, LOL! Maybe two projects was too many, but I’m glad I did them. I’m ready to be done, and to be free to work on whatever I feel like working on (including nothing, if that’s how I feel)!
Here they are: all 31 styles from my August of Earrings project. 31 adventures in wearable art: post earrings, resin coatings, glitter, and upside-down U shapes; mokume gane, translucency, metal leaf, and texture; flowers, elongated rectangles, tear drops, and blobby egg shapes; hoops, twists, sculpted mushrooms, and cascading colors 😍
I’m not sure what I was thinking, taking on two daily projects in August. They’re taking over my life 😆 Both the earring project and the photo project have been good for me in their own ways, but I think I will be quite ready to devote my energy to other things, once this month is over.
My daily August creative projects continue: Earring of the Day, where I make a bunch of earrings in different styles than usual and add them to the shop, and Picture Elements, a photography prompt-based project I’m doing with Tracey Clark.
So many people slow down in August, take some time off. Maybe I should have done that, too, but instead I decided I needed a creative project to shake up my polymer clay world a bit. So I came up with the Earring of the Day project, a great excuse to play with lots of different techniques.
Then, just for kicks, I signed up for a photography project. I am taking part in Picture Elements, which is a prompt-based photography class, which explores 7 visual elements of art: color, line, shape, form, value, texture, and space. Having never gotten any official art education, I think the exposure to these concepts will be valuable to me in more than just a photography capacity.