[Image courtesy of Jessica Swift]
I love happy people.
And Jessica Swift is definitely one of life’s happy people (see here for the Do What You Love interview with her).
Have you heard she is making rainboots covered in her gorgeous designs and carrying secret messages?
We would call them ‘wellies’ here in England.
She needs your help to get them manufactured – and bring puddle-splashing happiness to people all over the world.
Check out her fun Kickstarter video here – only six days to go!
Sometimes I find myself overthinking things when I am trying to create something.
Usually when I find myself stuck, or frustrated with what I am making, it is because I am thinking about it too much. And when I am in the zone, not really thinking at all, it always works out better.
Last week my little nephew – who is five years old – took this photo of me with my ipod. He didn’t think about it at all. Just aimed it at me, moved it around a bit then hit the button. And for someone who doesn’t usually like photos of myself, I love it!
And it really made me think that sometimes we just need to ‘hit the button’.
Have you found yourself overthinking things lately?
Here are a few of the lovely stationery and supplies finds I made at the gorgeous Salts Mill in Saltaire. Just love the way they are displayed…
See here for yesterday’s post about the lovely building that houses all these finds.
This is my kind of shop… what’s yours?
One of the things I love about the north of England is the old industrial beauty of some of its buildings. This place used to be a thriving hub for the textile and other industries, and many of the old buildings have been saved and converted – and are still very much loved. I lived in Manchester for several years, firstly in a converted cotton mill and then in a lovely area of the city by its working canal, where the old wharfs now serve restaurant goers and picnickers. Now I live in Leeds I have fallen for buildings like the Corn Exchange, a 150 year old Victorian building which used to be centre for trade and is now a beautiful home for independent shops, delis and cafes. Today I wanted to share another gorgeous building with you – the Salts Mill in Saltaire, which has been converted into an art gallery (featuring David Hockney) and huge open space selling paper, books, stationery – all things I love!
I love the way they use a hotchpotch of furniture – from this designer sofa…
… to this old school desk
… and even a garden bench.
Their displays are wonderful, with everything laid out as if it is in someone’s home being shown to friends.
They sell all sorts of things – from artists’ palettes to potted plants.
If you ever find yourself near Leeds it is definitely worth a visit, and if you are feeling energetic it can be reached by a lovely long cycle up the canal towpath…
Pop back tomorrow to see what gorgeous papery finds I discovered…
Is the blue paint peeling away or being revealed? Depending on how you screw your eyes up, either could be true. It depends which way you look at it.
Ahh perspective. Been thinking a lot about this lately, and how important it is to seek out and listen to other people’s perspectives, and then make your own call on things.
There is so much wisdom all around us – and so much inside. It sometimes just takes a few words from someone else to make us think about things in a different way, or from a different angle, and that can be so valuable.
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What about you? Have you found someone else’s perspective helpful lately?
Today’s shared stories come from American photograher Kat Sloma.
You don’t have to do what love to make a living, but you need to do what you love to truly live.
A few years ago, I had a conversation with a good friend. She and I worked together at the large corporation where I’ve earned a living as an engineer for the last 19 years. She asked, “Do you want to stay working here forever?” I laughed and said, “I don’t know, I don’t have anything I’m passionate about. I don’t know what I’d rather do. I guess I’m here until they don’t want me anymore.”
Looking back, that conversation is a significant indicator of how I was living (or not living) my life. I was floating along, letting other people plot my course. I was expecting someone else to fulfil me. Was I alive or just going through the motions of life? I had given up my power. The power to choose, to decide, to own my life. I wasn’t even seeking to find what I would really love to do.
Since then, much has transpired. Layoffs at work made me realize I couldn’t float along any longer. Watching the same friend leave the company for something she truly loved forced me to acknowledge there are other ways to approach life. Such as, approaching life with intention. I was ripe for a change, so when the opportunity to live and work in Italy for two years came along, I took it. And it cracked me wide open.
I finally did the work I needed to do, digging through the hidden corners of my soul, to find what it is I love. I discovered I love to create. I love to capture the beauty of the world around me, through my camera lens, words, paint and pencils. I also discovered, more than anything else, I love to teach and encourage others to create too.
Today, I’m still at the same corporate job. It is still how I make my “living” and support my family. But I’ve found what I love to do as well. I’ve taken back my power and the ownership of my life’s happiness. Along this journey, I’ve found it is doing what I love that makes me truly alive.
[All images courtesy of Kat Sloma]
Kat is an artist and photographer with a passion for inspiring others to find their unique vision of the world. For the last two years, she has been living in Italy and traveling Europe with an eye to finding the beauty of the everyday, whilst also working in the corporate world. You can see more of her photographs, read about her creative journey and learn about her e-courses at The Kat Eye Studio.
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Would you like to share your story on Do What You Love and reach a new audience of creative souls?
Please contact me for details.
Something Vivienne McMaster said in a recent lesson in her photography e-course ‘You are your own muse’ really struck me. She said that when you take self-portrait photos you have all the control. Kind of obvious, but I had never thought about it before. It’s a really powerful thought if you don’t normally like pictures taken of yourself. So with that in mind I have been experimenting.
Here are a couple from my recent trip to Greece – I loved the way the shadows from my floppy sun hat fell on my face.
What do you think about taking pictures of yourself? Have you taken any lately?
[Images edited and altered using Picnik and Camerabag]
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PS – Read my new interview with Vivienne HERE!
[Image: NavyBlur]
In a sunny lodge on a hillside strung with vintage bunting, with floor-to-ceiling windows letting the light pour in, and a wooden deck perfect for tea breaks, a group of lovely ladies worked some kind of creative poetry. The delicate dreamy work that came out of Priscilla Jones’s class wouldn’t be out of place in Alice in Wonderland. It took a variety of fascinating techniques – painting with feathers on tissue paper, sculpting with florist’s wire, adding hot wax and a little bit of love… and beauty emerged. Here’s a sneak peek at a unique and inspiring class from a very gifted teacher…
[Image: NavyBlur]
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[Image: Hannah Nunn]
[Image: Hannah Nunn]
[Image: Hannah Nunn]
For more blog posts from participants in Priscilla’s class see: Hannah Nunn / Rachael Taylor
For more of my posts about the retreat see: Gathering /Full of Love / Reflecting / Bloom True with Flora Bowley / Paper heaven with Rachel Hazell / No (wo)man is an island
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Missed the retreat? Why not join the Do What You Love e-course?
This online adventure starts on June 6 and will take you step-by-step along the path towards doing what you love.
Find out what participants who took the course last time had to say HERE.
Find out more and register here.
This is your life we are talking about…
Today’s shared story comes from costume-maker Jane Grimshaw who has made costumes for films which have gone on to win Oscars for Costume Design.
When I was first asked to write this piece about myself I thought, “How hard can that possibly be?” Well it turns out quite flippin’ hard actually. So I decided to tell you a story. Are you sitting comfortably? Then I’ll begin.
Some time in the early 1980s a young girl was rummaging through the sewing cupboard. In a dark corner she found the cut off bottoms of a pair of enormous embroidered purple flairs her hippie mother had owned with pride some time in the not so distant past. Now this was the 1980s, every thing to do with the previous decade’s fashion was defiantly passé. Anyone with an ounce of self-respect would have stuffed these abominations back in to the dark corner from whence they came. But not this little girl, she took them, cut them up and made them in to a very interesting skirt.
Fast forward to the summer this now-not-so-little girl turned 18. This time she kept herself in beer and crisps for the long break after A-levels and before college by making patchwork shorts for everyone she knew (and a few she didn’t). She even made some with a padded bum for a bicycling boyfriend. And what did this little girl want to do for a living? Social work. Oh come on! Thankfully the aforementioned boyfriend with the padded bum had other ideas. His mother ran the costume department at our local drama school and he talked her in to giving me a job.
A year later I am at London College of Fashion, having a whale of a time, meeting lifelong friends and apparently training to be a costume maker.
This is a costume made in Nora’s workroom last year for the production of Adriana Lecouvreur at The Royal Opera House in Covent Garden
20 years later here I am, still making costumes. Big ones, small ones, thin ones, very very fat ones. Some of its glamorous, some of it isn’t. Glamour comes in the form of films (Elizabeth, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, The End of the Affair, soon-to-be-realised John Carter on Mars, you get the drift). I have in fact made costumes for not one, not two but three films that have gone on to win the costume design Oscar: Shakespeare in Love, Gladiator and Elizabeth the Golden Age. The non-glamourous bit comes in the form of constantly having to remake the same set of costumes for West End shows. (Phantom of the Opera, We Will Rock You, Lion King, Chicago – again you get the picture).
I am currently working on Tim Burton’s new film ‘Dark Shadows’, Lion King and Phantom of the Opera. Somehow even after all of this time I do still enjoy it. Well most of the time. Constant deadlines can get to even the best of us from time-to-time. But then that is why I write my blog. It helps to have something else to focus on that isn’t costume related! It helps to keep things in perspective, and join the disparate parts of my life, -costume making, family and constant side projects.
I do feel very lucky to think that what was once my hobby has become my way of making a living.
[All images courtesy of Jane Grimshaw.]
Find out more about Jane by visiting her blog Flaming Nora.
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Missed the retreat? Why not join the Do What You Love e-course?
This online adventure starts on June 6 and will take you step-by-step along the path towards doing what you love.
Find out more and register here.
This is your life we are talking about…
Have you ever gone searching for treasure on a beach? It is so much fun to seek out sea glass, collect lovely pebbles and bring beautiful shells home as a reminder of a trip to the sea. On the way back from Bressay to Aberdeen I spent a couple of hours poking around Lerwick, finding tiny treasures everywhere. My heavy rucksack was literally ‘full of rocks’!
Jeanette and Sarah with their treasures
A perfect end to a lovely trip away. What a discovery the Shetland islands was – I shall be back to Scotland’s bonny isles…
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More posts from this trip: