adventures in leatherworking

i went somewhere in long island for my first leatherworking class. i am seeing parts of new york that i would never typically see...it was a nice suburban area, somewhat near queens (actually that's what the instructor told me; i can't point on a map where i went today).

i was the only one in the class, so it was a private lesson. fortunately, i convinced my instructor to move my private lesson to the daytime. now, i don't have to travel over an hour each way at night. i told my instructor all these bags i wanted to make and he told me i should learn to walk before running. :) good advice. therefore, my first project is to make a change purse by hand. i have homework already. i have to make my pattern and bring it in next wednesday.

more swatches

i painted some more swatches of beautiful hemp blend, textured fabrics to send off for testing. received a tidbit of good news today - the coating is starting to work on the painted cotton canvas!

fabric testing

testing hemps, hemp/organic cotton blends, twills... my holiday wish is for at least one of these to work perfectly with the coating!

'home' office space

my 'home' office space is nearly complete! i am very pleased with myself because i put together nearly all of the furniture, and i painted the raw pine desks with non-toxic milk paint and lacquer. this is basically what i look like: the only thing left to do is to add some wall shelves to create some dimensionality. i would also love to hang beautiful lighting or mobile from the ceiling, but i would probably break my neck if i tried that.

in case anyone is looking for milk paint, the non-toxic milk paint i used provides a nice, varied finish and is easy to use:

also, i finalized a schedule with the coating supplier, so now we have target dates for development! happy turkey day.

past pics

i was looking through past pictures. i came across this texture that i drew but didn't end up using. i thought it was a nice picture so decided to post. :)

paint paint paint!

i have done a LOT of painting the past couple days. so much so, that my arms are sore. i set up my home office space and painted two pine tables with non-toxic white milk paint and lacquer... they look byoootiful - i will put up pics once my office space is complete.

today, i received fabrics. i handpainted and printed them with various fabric dyes and paints before shipping them off to minneapolis for more coating testing. it harkened back to my middle school science fair days (yes there is an unfortunate yearbook pic of me in front of my project... and yes i was wearing blue nintendo eyeglasses) - of creating a control group and then testing all the different variations and combinations against the control. hope it works!

Dust Bag

i decided the nunu dust bag will have dual purposes 1. to prevent dust from collecting on each nunu bag and 2. a reusable grocery tote.

I found a perfect, very large one made from 100% bamboo (which is a rapidly renewable and biodegradable resource). it is super soft. atelier nunu will be printed on the front. trying to figure out now what size logo i like best on the dust bag.

in the meantime

The coating testing continues, but they require more fabric for testing. So, I ordered some more organic cotton canvas to send to them this week.

In the meantime, as I wait for fabric and coating, I have been brainstorming ideal website layouts and photo ideas for my preliminary website (that will be up by february... i hope. :P) And, I have been testing monogramming using silkscreen, stencils and fabric paint. I'm glad my past surface design skills are coming in handy. Tomorrow is my leatherworking class!

Ready, Set, Wait...

I have all the sketches and materials ready for sampling, except for the coated canvas. I am very impatient so waiting for the coating testing is killing me a little! The coating from last week adhered well to the cotton canvas, but it came out a bit "crunchy" which is not ideal for bags. So the testing continues in hopes that the resin can be tweaked to make it work.

In the meantime, I will try to focus on what is ready and prepare verbiage for the website. Also, I am very excited that in my downtime, I am going to take leathercrafting classess. By actually working and sewing leather with my own hands, I will learn more about the possibilities of construction and design to make the best bags. designers who can hand-make the items they produce tend to have an edge because they know all of the design possibilities and limitations. for example, oscar de la renta's sample makers said if necessary, he could make every single item by hand. that is pretty amazing and inspiring.

Testing 1,2,3

This week, the textured coating is being tested... fingers crossed! I also sent swatches to the coating manufacturer with fabric paint on them for testing (for monogramming).

When painting with the fabric paint, I had a new idea. If the coating works well on the fabric paint, I could potentially paint the whole bag before putting the coating on. But, I would only do this if 1) the fabric paint passes the coating test and 2) i can see some natural variation in colors from the brushstroke (if there are, it will be beautiful underneath the textured coating). I will paint some fabrics on my own this week to see if it is worth it to hand-paint rather than use pre-dyed fabric.