Tuesday, August 26, 2014

How I tame leather. Mini-tutorial

Please be kindly informed that we have moved! To read new blog posts, purchase our floral pieces and learn more about how to make flowers you are welcome to visit out new website here
Those of you who have tried working with genuine leather know how temperamental it can be. Leather is a natural product and as a result may have imperfections such as holes or scars, the thickness and stretch can vary too. And it is completely unpredictable when it comes to shaping it with hot flower iron.
For my floral pieces I stiffen leather is several ways. Today I am going to share one of this ways with you. The result is a flat stiff piece of leather that can be shaped with a flower iron. I use flat stiff leather to make a range of flowers including my camellias, gerberas etc.

So here is how I do it. But first of all the kit:

1. Measuring jug
2. A piece of genuine leather for stiffening
3. Bowl
4. White (PVA) glue
5. Measuring spoon
 and a piece of plastic or a glass board as seen in the picture.
I use a rather thiсk PVA glue intended for craft purposes. The ratio of glue to water can be from 1 to 5  to 1 to 10 depending on how thick your leather or glue are and how stiff you want the leather to be. You might need to experiment with the quantities, but the general guidelines are: the thicker the leather the weaker the solution (less glue). The ready to use solution should look like milk.

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Saturday, August 23, 2014

CHARITY SALE TO HELP UKRAINIAN KIDS WITH SCHOOL ESSCENTIALS

Please be kindly informed that we have moved! To read new blog posts, purchase our floral pieces and learn more about how to make flowers you are welcome to visit out new website here

Click here to get to my shop


My dear fans and friends!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I did not think that I would be ever writing this but here I am offering you to buy some of my flowers so that I could help refugee Ukrainian children with school uniform and stationary. I understand that I can not do much but in this situation everything matters and every little helps. I am sure you will agree with that.

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Tuesday, August 19, 2014

One wedding, three creations

Please be kindly informed that we have moved! To read new blog posts, purchase our floral pieces and learn more about how to make flowers you are welcome to visit out new website here
Last week we went to a wedding, my husband's niece was getting married.
To prove the well-known proverb "The shoemaker's son always goes barefoot" wrong, I decided to create a cocktail hat for myself (for once! :-D) to wear at the wedding. It gave me a chance to try my new hat block, a mini beret. I covered the base with a beautiful quilted dupioni silk and decorated with a spray of rumbling roses in purple. 


Floral cocktail hat
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