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'
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
Pillows To Heighten the Lounging Experience
When you live in a small loft apartment, the majority of surfaces are unsuitable for lounging – large expanses of concrete and brick and little space for such luxuries as recliners and large sofas. And in the case of Austin’s apartment, seating is limited to a single futon with wooden arm rests. Frequent were the occasions when I’d find myself trying to lean to one side of the futon to watch a movie or read a book, only to find no soft welcoming reception or warm cushy support. This, obviously, had to change. Fortunately, my new sewing machine has given me the power to heighten this lounging experience by making some pillows for Austin.
Pillows are so easy to make! Each one was done in a night, if not a couple hours. The first pillow (left) is a solid fabric cut into strips than sewed back into a rectangle, with a few strips replaced with a patterned fabric. The second pillow is a…pinwheel? design with a fabric button in the center. I mulled over the best strategy for sewing the triangles together, and had a eureka moment when I found this quilting tutorial – creating triangles is actually a piece of cake, and this pillow took me the least amount of time. The third pillow features a cool optical pattern framed by neutral stripes with mitered corners. Each pillow was planned as a single piece, so they don’t really work so well together as a set, and they’re pretty basic. On the next run I’ll probably get more ambitious with the planning and design.
Some Simple Pillows.
All fabrics came from Fat Quarter Shop, an online quilting fabric store which so far has been the best variety I have found (unfortunately for local shops, which I would love to give business to, but the St. Louis area shops I’ve been to are pretty lacking in variety and searchability, which becomes really limiting to your designs).
404 Not Found: Now More Interesting
404 Not Found error pages are something often overlooked in the design of a web site, with most templates often left to their generic and somewhat intimidating output – the large Times New Roman error message. Inspired by Smashing Magazine’s review of some very lovely 404 pages, I made my own for this site. Since hopefully no one will actually be seeing the 404 page, I wanted to post the artwork here so that it can see a little daylight. A prettier collaged version sits below, but for the actual page I used a version that more closely follows the simple cleanliness of this site design. You can test the real 404 page here.
Textured version of the 404 art
