professional design & web portfolio of Cara McKinley

 

Play Multi-Disciplinary Creative Overflow

Viewing posts in: Play

Badass Duvet Cover (and I’m done with sewing for a while)

A couple years ago I got super ambitious about d.i.y interior decorating, during a period of frustration with the limited personality of mass market stuff available at everyone’s favorite chain stores (also, I got a subscription to Ready Made, which I’m sure had something to do with it). As a part of this, I tried my hand at quilting (why not?). The first quilt I made was a fairly simple patchwork quilt, which turned out nice… however, I also found out that even if you try to make your own things, you’re still limited by the also limited personality of the textiles and fabrics found in everyone’s favorite chain fabric stores. So, it struck me that maybe going back to basics and creating something unique not just with fabric and color, but with composition, was the way to go.

Finished!

Then, one day I stumbled upon this awesome art/type poster collection site called typographicposters.com, and saw a piece of work by the artist/designer Benoit Bodhuin (snarky note: I can’t link directly because it’s a flash site! *boo*), and the idea for this duvet cover was born. I did some fabric research, found some fairly thrifty cotton broadcloth fabric in solid colors from fabric.com, and got started in translating the graphic style of the posters to fabric form.

Since all the shapes are right-triangles, it’s fairly easy to recreate as a sewing/quilting pattern. I created a new Adobe Illustrator file, then made a grid of 3 inch squares, each square divided diagonally across both axes. From there, I filled in each part of the grid accordingly (see printed out version below)

plan mocked up in Illustrator, then printed out with each sewing block outlined & numbered

Next, I had to figure out how much fabric I needed for each color. This is probably the trickiest part, since you have to not only figure out how much yardage you need according to the design, but also factor in seam allowances and how to cut your squares to maximize use of each yard. Rather than try to do some fancy geometry maths, I just guestimated how many yards I’d need, and ended up running out of gray fabric toward the end (when I reordered, the gray was a slightly different hue than previously, so try to avoid this if at all possible). The finished size of the duvet cover needed to be 88″x88″, to fit the queen-sized comforter I already had. Since cutting and sewing so many little squares together inevitably leads to variations in my finished size by up to an inch, I planned to leave room around the edge for a white border that I could size accordingly once I had the bulk of the work done, to arrive at 88 inches exactly.

Everything after this point is just hours and hours and hours of cutting, measuring, and sewing. I really hate the cutting part, because not only is it super tedious, but it’s also the part where I’m most prone to slippage of the hand, uncorrectable errors, and wasted fabric. Having the right tools is extremely important, especially a rotary fabric cutter, and quilting ruler. Since I hate cutting so much, I decided it would be best to get it all done at the outset, kind of like eating brussel sprouts on your plate first so that you can enjoy the mashed potatoes at the end. I took a look at my design plan, then tallied up the amount of each size and color of fabric piece that I would need.

Fabric cut pieces tally

Finally after all the fabric was cut, I started piecing together smaller blocks according to their block number in the plan, then pieced those blocks into bigger blocks, and so on until I had the finished front of the duvet cover. I measured and added a white border to the outside, then quilted the whole front (without batting (padding)) to another piece of fabric, to hide the seams. Finally, I sewed the back of the duvet cover on, with buttons on the end to slip the comforter in.

Fabric needed for each block, as a guide and checklist

I couldn’t be happier with the final piece, and am totally excited about new variations on solid color patterns that I can make in the future – but it might be a while. After over 80 hours of planning, cutting, and sewing, I’m not about to jump right in again! All things put in perspective, those serious quilting hobbyists are crazier and more dedicated than any WOW player, in my book.

Categories: Needle & Thread
 1 Comment »

JS1k Xmas Demo Snowflake

Disclaimer: this post may be something that only a serious internets/javascript/web dev nerd can appreciate. Starting in the early days of software development, the ‘demo’ has been a way for a developer to show of his/her skills within a limited file size. In the summer of 2010, a javascript 1kb demo challenge was held to showcase the mad skills of participating developers, with a focus on using HTML 5′s canvas. If you’re slightly unfamiliar with technology, 1kb of file size is really small, like 1,024 characters small. In a word document, that would be the equivalent of a couple paragraphs.

Some of the demos created by participating developers are crazy impressive for being such small sizes. There are a lot of hacks and tricks that you can use to reduce the volume of code, including but not limited to compression with tools like Google Closure Compiler, creating one-character aliases for frequently used properties, defining multiple variables in one statement, and doing really naughty things like leaving semi-colons off of the last statement in every block. Each little bit(or byte) that you can shave off adds up to a lot in the end. For a really great walk-through of the first js1k challenge’s winning demo, see Marijn Haverbeke’s work.

The first JS1k challenge was a big hit with the development community, so a second competition was held during the holiday season, with a Christmas theme. I entered a little snowflake-maker demo – simple, but weirdly addicting. Click around on the white ‘paper’ wedge to draw shapes. Click on your starting point (noted with the little gray dot) to close a shape. Make as many cutout shapes as you want, and then click the button to make your flake! My original source code is below the screenshot (once compressed, the code is <1k).

My snowflake creation.

Source Code: (Click to expand)
Categories: Code
 1 Comment »

Dont’ Call It ‘Expresso’

Several weeks ago Threadless, a Chicago-based company that prints t-shirts from community submitted artwork, posted a design challenge called ‘Threadless Loves Coffee‘. Every month or so they create these design challenges, which usually involve a specific topic and some financial/material incentive from a third company. I don’t normally participate in design competitions since they are a little too close to spec-work for my liking, but Threadless really supports its artistic community, and the participants are really getting a chance to make the artwork they enjoy and have a chance to get something for it, versus trying to provide services to a real client.

Since this design challenge was about loving coffee, I couldn’t pass it up, because… I really love coffee. It gave me a goal to work toward, and after coming up with some idea/sketches for an infograph, I went for it. I called on my 3 years’ experience as a barista while in college, and created a conversation piece about making coffee the right way.

Don't Call It 'Expresso'

Categories: Digital Art
 4 Comments »

Crochet Tweed Handbag

Just a little something that I finally pulled out of hibernation and finished, after starting a year ago. There is a pattern floating around on Ravelry.com called the ‘p.91 crochet bag’, which manages to make crochet into something really trendy (photo here of one made by Ravelry member Roko). Unfortunately, the pattern is from an out-of-print Japanese magazine and is unavailable to me. However, there is a similar pattern in Happy Hooker, the ‘Fat Bottom Bag’, that has a similar look. I used the fat bottom bag pattern as a guide, and guessing some modifications where I could to make the bag look more like the p.91 crochet bag. To give the bag a little more structure, I also added a cotton lining with a pocket, hand-sewed in after piecing it together. Finally, I added a crochet flower detail to one side to add some romanticism.

I think a lot of crochet items have a 70′s craft project look to them, but I was really happy with the way this bag turned out. It has a vintage feel without looking cheap and fad-ish. Faddy? Fad-like.

Finished bag

Flower detail and inner lining

Categories: Fiber Art
 Comment on this post »
« Older Entries