I'm off work for a few days, off sick and not up to much other than sitting up in bed with my laptop and surfing and planning projects and things to do when I'm back to myself.
Yesterday, I got immersed in sewing patterns... and blogs and fabrics... I ended up spending almost €100.
Today, it struck me that I should have a trawl around the web for local bloggers, and find out where they source their patterns and their fabrics and notions. How do they avoid paying overseas postage and packaging... etc.
I'm going to start off with a "disclaimer" and that is my disinterest in quilting and patchworking so I have quickly left blogs on those topics that I have come across rightly or wrongly. Wrongly, undoubtedly, because there is something to be learnt from everything but the sheer amount of blogs and postings causes me to impose some kind of 'rules'.
A great start: Etsy Ireland Crafty Team - but they seem to be quite beady and cardy and crafty orientated as opposed to sewing specific. Hmm. This sourcing is tough.
Fiona in Dublin has an Etsy shop called Threads2000 selling 100% egyptian cotton threads sourced from Greece.
Fabric Shops in Dublin:
Hickey's on Mary or Henry Street (can never remember where on starts and the other ends)
Murphy Sheehy's near the Powerscourt Shopping Centre and Grogan's Bar
Woolen Mills, near Ha'penny Bridge on North Side (upstairs for the big range of fabric)
TWI, 24 Mountjoy Square East - I haven't been here yet.
Ikea
Other crafty shops in Dublin:
The Yellow Brick Road, Bachelor's Walk (though I think it may have closed down?!)
Trimmings shop on quays near beside Crown Alley / Temple Bar / Ha'penny Bridge
Rubenesque in Powerscourt Shopping Centre (used to have shop next to the music shop but may have moved from there into bigger premises)
Knitting shops:
Craft Cottage, Ratoath, Co. Meath
Trim, Co. Meath
Winnie's Wool Wagon, Woodbine, Booterstown (near UCD), Co. Dublin
woolshop in Swan Centre, Rathmines, Co. Dublin
This is Knit, Powerscourt Centre, Dublin
The Gingham Duck, Sligo
Lots of info on Knitting Classes in Ireland. I keep getting distracted by information that is available as opposed to the information that I want.
The Crafter's Basket, North Sligo - have the facility for selling patterns but none in online shop as I look today. Sells fabric, vilene, a dressmakers dummy, sewing machines and other items.
Yay! I've found Pippablue. She's blogging from Galway, Ireland. Further investigation... there's an online Pippablue Shop - hurrah! The list of products is potentially very exciting... but the stock is very low. One to keep an eye on, I suppose. The real shop is on 1 Middle Street, Galway City.
Just Judith is in Belfast - a quilter though, not my métier!
A room in a cottage - sewing homewares made in Ireland
Sarah from Cork is also a quilter
Fluffy Sheep Quilting is based in Ireland... but I think the clue is in the name! She has blogged a brilliant list of quilting fabric stockists in Ireland
Emily lives in Ireland and she likes to make things... here's hoping there'll be a link or two to a whole world of Irish bloggers in her blogstream....
Linda Coleman is in Dublin. Her projects seem different to mine but I might steal a friend from her blogging community.
Cuada are a textile designer in South West Ireland... website seems to just sell finished products.
Millie (the same name as my Gran!) lives on a dairy farm in Ireland and she SEWS. Just like me. My hopes are raised again.
The Roma and Mary blog is kept by Amanda in Ireland who likes a variety of handiwork and crafts, including sewing, she says.
A lot of these links were found using the "Sew Irish" group on flicker. But many of the members of that group are not based in Ireland. I just think in terms of sourcing materials and fabrics and patterns, and sew alongs (for practical time-zone-related reasons!) that it would be nice to be part of a community of Irish amateur dressmakers. But maybe my expectations are too high. I have a few leads and will follow them later.
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Showing posts with label networking. Show all posts
Showing posts with label networking. Show all posts
Thursday 26 April 2012
Wednesday 25 April 2012
Sewing patterns
Wow! There I was thinking that sewing patterns were limited to
But oh! My delight today in discovering other pattern brands / companies / drafters:
Bags:
Curious to know more about The Lutterloh System of pattern making.
- Burda
- Butterick
- Simplicity
- New Look
- Vogue
But oh! My delight today in discovering other pattern brands / companies / drafters:
- Sewaholic
- Lisette
- Colette
- Sewing Workshop
- StyleArc (nice tunic dress with large pockets but postage from Australia is $16!!!)
- Anna Maria Horner
- Betty Kingston
- Megan Nielsen
- Sew Liberated
- Eva Dress - accurately reproduced vintage patterns
- Jamie Christina
- Ottobre magazine
- Farbenmix
- Make It Perfect
- Neue Mode
- HotPatterns
- Rebecca Ruth Designs
- Favourite Things
- Victory Patterns
- Modkid
- Jalie
- Marfy
- Fishsticks Designs
- Serendipity Studio
- Sis-Boom
- Indygo Junction
- Imagewear magazine
- Sewn Square One
- Simple Chic Dress Patterns by Machiko Kayaki
- Feminine Wardrobe
- Stylish girls' clothes
- I Am Cute Dresses by Sato Watanabe
- Linen Wool Cotton by Akiko Mano
- Simple Modern Sewing: 8 basic patterns to create 25 favourite garments by Shufu To Seikatsu Sha
- Clever Charlotte
- Figgy's
- Peek-a-boo
- Oliver and S
- Leila and Ben
- Olabelhe
- Sewbaby
- The Handmade Dress
- Ellie Inspired
- Brynnberlee
- Frog Legs and Ponytails
Bags:
- Amy Butler
- Ali Foster
- I Think Sew (including shoes - for adults and kids - and bags)
- Artsy Crafty Babe (Rebeka Lambert)
- Keyka Lou / Michelle Patterns
- Lazy Girl Designs
- Studio Kat Designs
- Patterns by Annie (I chose the yoga bag as a lot of the others are very quilted-y)
- Atkinson Designs (bags and other 'projects')
- Betz White (I especially love the Sidekick Sling)
- Charlie's Aunt (esp. The Poacher's Bag; Melford Messenger)
- Hemma Design (lots of bicycle bags!)
- Make your day designs
Curious to know more about The Lutterloh System of pattern making.
Wednesday 17 October 2007
AAI Lecture
Only getting around to writing about this now. Randomly turned up at an Architectural Association of Ireland lecture in Trinity college on Thursday 11th. Eero Koivisto, a swedish architect gave a talk. He was amusing, had a good sense of humour.
He talked about many of his projects: converting a water tower to a house in Notting Hill, a design shop etc building in Japan, designs for the Italian company Cappellini: sofa with moving middle, and saucepan; an art exhibition space in Marfa, Texas (which is this town in middle America with thriving art community if I remember correctly), amongst others.
The auditorium was packed. It's fab how interested architects are in listening to each other and keeping up-to-date and it's not your civil-service do-a-course-during-work-hours - actually it probably is, cos it's not unusual for architects to still be at work well after the lecture finished at about 9!
Eero's parting words were what he views as vital for any practising architect or indeed designer:
He talked about many of his projects: converting a water tower to a house in Notting Hill, a design shop etc building in Japan, designs for the Italian company Cappellini: sofa with moving middle, and saucepan; an art exhibition space in Marfa, Texas (which is this town in middle America with thriving art community if I remember correctly), amongst others.
The auditorium was packed. It's fab how interested architects are in listening to each other and keeping up-to-date and it's not your civil-service do-a-course-during-work-hours - actually it probably is, cos it's not unusual for architects to still be at work well after the lecture finished at about 9!
Eero's parting words were what he views as vital for any practising architect or indeed designer:
- Curiosity
- Self-criticism
- Passion
Thursday 20 September 2007
Urban Sprawl
Dublin City Council and the Institute of Public Administration hosted a conference in Croke Park Conference Centre on Successful Apartment Living - Combating Urban Sprawl.
The speakers were:
Tom Collins, Maynooth University (chair)
Paddy Bourke, Lord Mayor of Dublin
John Gormley, Green Party, Minister for the Environment, Heritage & Local Government
Frank McDonald, Irish Times
Dr. Jane Gray, Social Sciences, Maynooth University
Henk van der Kamp, School of Spatial Planning, Dublin Institute of Technology
John Tierney, City Manager, Dublin City Council
John Bowman, RTÉ (chair)
Lars Fränne, Stockholm City Council, Sweden
Alex Ely, mæ architects
Hubert Fitzpatrick, Irish Homebuilders Association
Daithí Doolan, Sinn Féin councillor, chair of Strategic Policy Committee (SPC) dealing with planning
Mary Murphy, Labour councillor, chair of Housing, Social & Community Affairs SPC
There were about 220 people present and there were contributions from the floor from other Dublin City Councillors and the RIAI president, James Pike, amongst others.
I was extremely impressed with John Tierney and Alex Ely. I think John has great vision and ideas for leading the city of Dublin. Unfortunately, Alex spoke architecture-speak and I think it may have gone over the heads of a lot of the audience. He showed drawings of a scheme which displayed "permeability" and a variety of public-private spaces. A councillor in the audience commented that he was "in favour of gated housing schemes"! I think architects sometimes need to really explain drawings to clients/audiences. Point out the stairs on the street frontage where the resident enters their home and then can go out the back to the shared garden in contrast to a resident driving through a remote-controlled gate, to park their car in a shared space and scuttle in their own door. People without experience can't read all this from a drawing. There was also misunderstanding about high density=high rise. Alex argued it didn't, in fact density could drop with high-rise (I didn't take in the detail of this argument) but people weren't able to take this on board. I arrived home, to my one-and-half-storey on-street terraced city-centre house and it dawned on me that I am living in quite a high-density residential area myself. Look out my bedroom window at a tiny yard with bedroom extensions hanging off neighbouring houses. And there are 3 of us living in this 2-bed house so we're making good use of space. I should figure out the density in terms of floor area/footprint etc. I was also walking around the Peppercanister church area of the city and was amazed by the amount of mews houses and use that is made of laneways.
Departmental (D/EHLG) draft guidelines regarding minimum room sizes/ storage space etc were discussed a lot. And how they compared with the council's guidelines. Architects I spoke to afterwards claimed that the social housing they are designing is of a better standard, in terms of dimensions and thought, than those available on the market. Van der Kamp's talk was of the hierarchy of development plans (and guidelines). The order should be: national, regional, county, local; they lower ones adhere to those of a higher standing and are more specific.
Jane Gray has done research on people living in Ratoath, Leixlip, Mullingar and Lucan/Esker. She concluded they all like where they are living. And the commuter travelling from Mullingar-city centre Dublin isn't that extremely common.
Lars Fränne mentioned vacuuming-rubbish collection and how Sweden have abolished guidelines for minimum room dimensions etc.
Hubert Fitzpatrick gave the expected industry response regarding the financial loss homebuilders will make with the introduction of these new guidelines; apartments now have to be bigger. He also referred to the heating recommendations in the Building Regulations as if they were optimum and not absolute minimum. Worrying.
Frank McDonald related a nice story about growing up in the city centre and living there now. Pleasant.
As is proably usual with such conferences, there was very little conclusion.
The speakers were:
Tom Collins, Maynooth University (chair)
Paddy Bourke, Lord Mayor of Dublin
John Gormley, Green Party, Minister for the Environment, Heritage & Local Government
Frank McDonald, Irish Times
Dr. Jane Gray, Social Sciences, Maynooth University
Henk van der Kamp, School of Spatial Planning, Dublin Institute of Technology
John Tierney, City Manager, Dublin City Council
John Bowman, RTÉ (chair)
Lars Fränne, Stockholm City Council, Sweden
Alex Ely, mæ architects
Hubert Fitzpatrick, Irish Homebuilders Association
Daithí Doolan, Sinn Féin councillor, chair of Strategic Policy Committee (SPC) dealing with planning
Mary Murphy, Labour councillor, chair of Housing, Social & Community Affairs SPC
There were about 220 people present and there were contributions from the floor from other Dublin City Councillors and the RIAI president, James Pike, amongst others.
I was extremely impressed with John Tierney and Alex Ely. I think John has great vision and ideas for leading the city of Dublin. Unfortunately, Alex spoke architecture-speak and I think it may have gone over the heads of a lot of the audience. He showed drawings of a scheme which displayed "permeability" and a variety of public-private spaces. A councillor in the audience commented that he was "in favour of gated housing schemes"! I think architects sometimes need to really explain drawings to clients/audiences. Point out the stairs on the street frontage where the resident enters their home and then can go out the back to the shared garden in contrast to a resident driving through a remote-controlled gate, to park their car in a shared space and scuttle in their own door. People without experience can't read all this from a drawing. There was also misunderstanding about high density=high rise. Alex argued it didn't, in fact density could drop with high-rise (I didn't take in the detail of this argument) but people weren't able to take this on board. I arrived home, to my one-and-half-storey on-street terraced city-centre house and it dawned on me that I am living in quite a high-density residential area myself. Look out my bedroom window at a tiny yard with bedroom extensions hanging off neighbouring houses. And there are 3 of us living in this 2-bed house so we're making good use of space. I should figure out the density in terms of floor area/footprint etc. I was also walking around the Peppercanister church area of the city and was amazed by the amount of mews houses and use that is made of laneways.
Departmental (D/EHLG) draft guidelines regarding minimum room sizes/ storage space etc were discussed a lot. And how they compared with the council's guidelines. Architects I spoke to afterwards claimed that the social housing they are designing is of a better standard, in terms of dimensions and thought, than those available on the market. Van der Kamp's talk was of the hierarchy of development plans (and guidelines). The order should be: national, regional, county, local; they lower ones adhere to those of a higher standing and are more specific.
Jane Gray has done research on people living in Ratoath, Leixlip, Mullingar and Lucan/Esker. She concluded they all like where they are living. And the commuter travelling from Mullingar-city centre Dublin isn't that extremely common.
Lars Fränne mentioned vacuuming-rubbish collection and how Sweden have abolished guidelines for minimum room dimensions etc.
Hubert Fitzpatrick gave the expected industry response regarding the financial loss homebuilders will make with the introduction of these new guidelines; apartments now have to be bigger. He also referred to the heating recommendations in the Building Regulations as if they were optimum and not absolute minimum. Worrying.
Frank McDonald related a nice story about growing up in the city centre and living there now. Pleasant.
As is proably usual with such conferences, there was very little conclusion.
Tuesday 31 July 2007
Design Ireland Network
Last Wednesday, 25th July, The Design Ireland Network held their summer party in Café en Seine. Myself and a friend went along. We met Deirdre the project manager/ co-ordinator of Design Ireland. She was very friendly and told us about a masters programme in design practice that the Design Ireland Skillnets is trying to start up with DIT. We also met Garrick, the chairman of Design Ireland Skillnets. I believe they have many events, up to 12 throughout the year and they run courses for designers to upgrade their skills. It seems like a really useful group to be a membership of for someone working in the design field and dedicated to training and staying up-to-date.
I was hoping for the opportunity to "network" or to get chatting to other designers. It happened a little bit! Another girl was hoping for a job to come out of it but I doubt she had any success. The layout of tables, the distribution of food and drink wasn't conducive to meeting people. There were up to 50 people present, many students I thought. I found it funny how designers talk about "design" regarding their own field only. For me that idea has always been associated with buildings, furniture, objects but people were saying sentences that I had to translate as relating to Websites, graphic design, packaging. It was an insight into another world of designers!
www.designireland.ie
www.skillnets.com
I was hoping for the opportunity to "network" or to get chatting to other designers. It happened a little bit! Another girl was hoping for a job to come out of it but I doubt she had any success. The layout of tables, the distribution of food and drink wasn't conducive to meeting people. There were up to 50 people present, many students I thought. I found it funny how designers talk about "design" regarding their own field only. For me that idea has always been associated with buildings, furniture, objects but people were saying sentences that I had to translate as relating to Websites, graphic design, packaging. It was an insight into another world of designers!
www.designireland.ie
www.skillnets.com
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