do what you love Page 92 of 94

Do What You Love interview – Suzanne Woolcott of Gorjuss™

Posted on 2010-07-15 at 6:18 pm.

This week I am delighted to share a conversation with Suzanne Woolcott, the inspiring creative brains behind the Gorjuss™ empire. Some of her fans are so crazy about her work, they have had her designs tattooed on their bodies! Suzanne’s Gorjuss™ Girls are licensed by Santoro, a brand creator, design and publishing company with distribution in over 50 countries around the world.

Suzanne runs her company with her husband Grant, from their studio in Glasgow, Scotland, where they live with their three children. Her work has been exhibited in galleries across the globe, but most regularly in Hollywood, LA , New York, NY, and Hong Kong (how cool is that?!)

All images used with kind permission of Suzanne Woolcott

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The power of photography

Posted on 2010-07-13 at 7:02 am.

Written by Beth Kempton

“When we look with our eyes, from our hearts, through the lens, it’s a completely different photo and something really powerful can happen” Jen Lemen

Check out this awesome video of Jen’s story on her journey from happy snapper to $50,000 world photography prize winner…

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And if you are in the mood for wishing, please help me make a dream come true here!

A dream about to come true?

Posted on 2010-07-12 at 1:18 pm.

Written by Beth Kempton

I do believe in the power of wishing, and of visualisation, to help make things really happen (like it did here a few months ago). But sometimes some things just seem that little bit too big and too important to say out loud. I always have a niggling fear that speaking about the dreams you really really want to come true will somehow jinx them, and make them not come true after all.

That is why I haven’t mentioned anything about our dream house until now.

(cute stitched keyring from the lovely Dear Emma)

My man and I have been living together for some time, but in his place, not in our place. To his eternal credit, when I moved in he let me change a few things around (read ‘new wooden flooring, new doors, new paint on every wall, new furniture…’) and we have been happy here. But for a long time we have wanted a home of our own, that we chose together, with a little garden, space to spread out, and maybe even a nice big studio for me(!).

And then, all of a sudden, a couple of months ago, we found it. The perfect house for us, right now.

And then one serendipitous thing after another happened, which brought us closer to actually buying the house. And guess what? If all goes to plan, it will be ours next Thursday!

I cannot tell you how excited I am about this!

There is something very comforting about a house, with actual staircases. Having lived in a flat for so long, I cannot wait to go upstairs to bed! And downstairs in the morning, to make a brew and then sit in the garden having breakfast and chatting to the birds.

So please, wish hard for us that everything goes right and we get the keys next week, as is supposed to happen according to our dream. And then I can invite you round for tea!

Adventure is good for the soul

Posted on 2010-07-09 at 5:03 pm.

Written by Beth Kempton

I’m back from my little African adventure.

Energised.

Refreshed.

Inspired.

I went alone but travelled in good company

with people I found along the way.

I visited a prison,

played with a lion,

hung out with new friends and old.

And I soaked up the energy of the world’s football fans

dancing on African soil.

New places, new faces.

New perspectives.

New memories.

Nothing like a little travel to shake it all up.

What little adventures have you lived recently?

Do What You Love interview – Niel Jonker

Posted on 2010-07-05 at 4:00 pm.

Written by Beth Kempton

Today’s Do What You Love interview comes hot off the press from South Africa, where I am currently on a little adventure of my own. Niel Jonker is an artisan breadmaker, bronze sculptor and painter living in the remote village of Baardskeerdersbos, in the Western Cape. He shares his deep love of creating, his view on the business of art, and his favourite aspects of being an artist. Enjoy!

Do What You Love interview - Niel Jonker breadmaking2

Image courtesy of Niel Jonker

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Back to basics

Posted on 2010-06-27 at 10:02 pm.

Written by Beth Kempton

Imagine the scene. Ten people sketching furiously to a strict time limit of ten seconds, one life model pose after another, papers flying everywhere, tossed to the floor on each ring of the bell for a new pose, new piece of paper, new sketch. A veritable storm of drawing paper and charcoal dust…

10 second sketch (10 seconds is seriously quick! I’m not sure I even looked at the paper in that time!)

I spent most of Saturday at the Northern Film School taking a fascinating workshop on Drawing Figures for Animation. Five solid hours of live drawing, with the longest sitting at 20 minutes – exhausting but exhilarating. And seriously good practice. We did a mixture of contour drawings, gesture drawings and charicatures with charcoal, pencil and marker pens. I came away with about eighty sketches, and a whole lot more confidence in figure drawing.

30 second sketch

Sometimes it is worth putting a time limit on your work to focus your attention and really make you look. Then it’s up to you whether you stick to the rules, break the rules or abandon the rules altogether!

2-minute sketch

When was the last time you played around in your sketchbook?

Do What You Love interview – Dimitri Kolioussis

Posted on 2010-06-26 at 8:09 pm.

Written by Beth Kempton

Today’s Do What You Love interview isn’t really an interview. It is more of a conversation, with one of the last real professional Icon Painters in Greece. I dropped in to visit Dimitri Kolioussis in his studio on the beautiful island of Santorini when I was there on holiday recently. Dimitri learnt all the important things he knows about painting from the elders in his village.

His work is so revered that he has been commissioned to paint 14 icons for the legendary Panagia Episkopi Church on Santorini, a church which has existed on the island for over 1,000 years.

He is the first artist I have ever met who expects his work to last ‘for hundreds of years’. That in itself is a lesson to us all to have confidence in the longevity of what we produce (and use archival quality materials!)

Dimitri’s cave studio

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Doing nothing

Posted on 2010-06-22 at 8:31 am.

Written by Beth Kempton

Doing nothing does not come easily to me, but island hopping in Greece was the perfect opportunity to take a step back, get some much needed rest, soak up the sun and have no schedule for over two weeks (except ‘swim time’, ‘ice cream time’, ‘dinner time’ etc – you get the picture). It has been time for:

… ice cold watermelon

… cool swims in sparkling seas

… dancing in the sand

… long chats over dinner as the sun set

… and a time to wander and explore tradition and modernity

It has also been a time for clearing out my head, which arrived in the baking heat of Athens jumbled and full, noisy and impatient.

The gentle breeze, clear skies and luxurious sun have calmed it, and made space for new ideas, plans and adventures. I have made real progress on two exciting projects I am working on (more on this soon) – baby steps towards a big dream.

I feel healthier, energised and ready to play.

It’s funny how quite a few of us have been talking about rest recently, as Louise pointed out.

It’s half way through a big year, spring is turning into summer, and we all need to take time to replenish our energy reserves every now and then.

Are you taking care of yourself?

Do What You Love interview – Kresse Wesling

Posted on 2010-06-14 at 9:33 am.

Written by Beth Kempton

Waste not, want not: creative business tips from a leading social entrepreneur…

Meet Kresse Wesling, young sparky British creator of unique accessories for Hollywood superstars. Kresse is not your average fashion designer. She is one half of the very cool ‘Elvis and Kresse’ brand which took London Fashion Week by storm and has recently announced a collaboration with apple. She is one of the British Prime Minister’s Ambassadors for Social Entrepreneurship and a champion of responsible business practices. And the belt she made for Cameron Diaz to model in a Mario Testino shoot for American Vogue used to be a piece of fire hose.

Kresse takes what others throw away and makes beautiful high end fashion goods from them – handbags and belts from hose discarded by the London Fire Brigade, purse linings from parachute silk rejected by the military, and eco-friendly shopping bags for a major UK supermarket chain from old coffee bean sacks. Not only does she reuse and recycle what would otherwise go to landfill, she ploughs a chunk of her profits back into charities which support the people who have contributed the ‘waste’ in the first place, so 50% of the profits from her fire hose line (see picture below) go to The Firefighters’ Charity. Although the company is still quite young (launched in 2007), it has already taken London Fashion Week by storm, and unveiled the 2010 collection at legendary auction house Sotheby’s.

Do What You Love interview - Kresse Wesling ek+tote

I had the good fortune of being invited to do a job swap with Kresse as part of the Social Entrepreneurship programme, and was so inspired by what I saw and heard, I wanted to share her story with you.~ Beth
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Are you living your best life?

Posted on 2010-06-10 at 4:07 pm.

Written by Beth Kempton

Friends are so precious, and losing one is so painful. An old university friend of mine was killed in a hit and run accident on holiday last week. I wanted to take a moment and use this space to honour his memory. Part of me feels this is too personal to share, part of me thinks it is too important not to. I hope you don’t mind.

Matt was one of life’s good people. I hate it that I have written that in the past tense. He should have had much much more time.

He was a big strong rugby player with a heart to match. I have been reminiscing about a big adventure we shared several years ago when I joined him and two other guys on a crazy road trip around New Zealand. We were three strapping lads and a wandering girl with a rucksack bigger than herself packed into a tiny car. We got stuck (in a ford), got drunk (on cheap beer), got lost (in the mountains), and I even got a shoulder ride into town. Those boys gave me the courage to do my first terrifying bungee jump, and wisely advised me not to look down as we sped around narrow mountain paths. We traversed a glacier, ate mooncake at a stranger’s party and hung out on a kiwi farm. But more than anything, we laughed. A lot.

Along with the gripping shock and hollow sadness of losing a friend to a freak accident comes a deep questioning and reflection on our own lives.

Do we tell those we love that we love them enough (and do we love them enough?)
Do we really spend our precious moments doing what we love, making ourselves happier and bringing more happiness to others as a result?
Do we pick up the phone, write that letter, get on that plane, live that adventure, follow that dream?
As Oprah would say, are we living our best lives?

I’ve been here before (in my very first post on this blog), but I am back again.

It shouldn’t take a tragedy for us to do just that, but often, sadly, it does. There is nothing anyone can do or say to make loss any easier to handle or understand. There is no fairness, and no reason. Three are many questions, but no answers.

To honour and celebrate the big life of my friend, I want to revisit that question and commit to making a few small changes (and maybe a couple of big ones) that will allow me to completely and absolutely say YES, I am living my best life, every day, every hour, every minute.

Won’t you join me?

Goodbye MD, you will be missed so very much