I'll show you mine...

Hello and welcome to the studio of Little White Dog. I'm Suzie and that ball of white fluff trying to charm the socks off you is my dog, Milo, who keeps me company while I work.

I'm still pretty excited about my studio because I've only moved in recently. I live in a tiny cottage where space is pretty tight, and I used to work at one end of a desk (The Messy End) while my husband, Gareth, worked on his computer at the other end (The Tidy End). All my crafty bits and pieces were in boxes on top of the wardrobe and I was spending a lot of time standing on a chair rummaging for ribbons and paper etc. I won't even go into the details of the War of the Cardboard which involved me squirreling away cardboard & packing boxes behind/under/in the wardrobe and Gareth subtly relocating it to the recycling bin when I wasn't looking!

So when my parents suggested I use their spare room as a studio I jumped at the chance, and before I knew it Gareth was enthusiastically helping me pack my boxes into the car. A trip to IKEA for some desks, shelves and boxes, and a day or two of assembly later my studio was ready to go. A throw and some nice cushions made a bed into a daybed - perfect for sitting and sewing, for visitors to sit and chat, or for Milo to snooze on (mostly for Milo to snooze on, in fact!).

I'm a bit of a magpie so I have lots of boxes filled with pieces of material, ribbons, different kinds of paper, cut outs from magazines and some things that defy classification that end up in a box with “bits & pieces” on the label. I can't resist pretty paper and at the moment I'm experimenting with lots of different types of vintage and scrapbook papers for making my 3D letters & boxes.

My ideas for the things I make often begin as gift ideas for my friends and family, and they usually occur to me at about 2am. They tend to start out really simple and snowball into something hideously complicated before ending up relatively simple and a little bit different. If I ever have an inspiration drought I'll have notebooks full of scribbles to fall back on! I think my training as an architect leads me to design things that are functional as well as looking attractive: my iPhone cases may be made of pretty ribbon but the ribbon is also a handstrap, and my 3D letters can also be used as little boxes. I like surprises, secret compartments and things that have to be figured out, so that tends to come out in my designs too.

I work at two desks and I tend to switch between them a lot during the day. One has all the computer equipment where I draw and print templates for a lot of my designs, and the other is for the more hands on work like cutting out and assembling.

My window looks out over the park behind the house, where Milo takes me for walks, and beyond that I have a pretty spectacular view over Dublin City. I feel unbelievably lucky to have such a great space to work in. If I'm dreaming please don't wake me up, I like it here! I think Milo would like to bring you out to the garden for a game of fetch now, but if you'd like to see more of my work you can visit my website www.littlewhitedog.ie Thanks for visiting!

New members join the team

Another batch of stunning talent to step on board this week. There is a bit of an art theme this week too.

I'm continually delighted that there is so much interest in the group and also impressed every week with the variety and expanse of talented artisans out there. Here are this week's delicious debutantes:

• Top left: Original Mixed Media Collage Painting by Jolie Dennison of Jolieart
• Top right: Painting of Dingle, Co.Kerry Ireland by CraftyV
• Bottom left: Champagne Victorian Inspired Silk Bolero by Bonzie
• Bottom right: Print, Dia De Los Muertos, (Dead End Job) by MariposaVintage

Click over to their shops and say hi, leave some hearts and love and of course, welcome to the team!

I'll Show You Mine

Hi guys,
We are absolutely chuffed to be contributing to the Etsy Ireland Blog, it's a really exciting development having sold on etsy for a couple of years now to see the Irish Etsy community growing. My name is Yvonne and my Aunties name is Ger and together we make up the etsy design duo "bonzie". We came upon the Irish Team recently and jumped at the chance to join in the fun, we are looking forward to meeting you guys at one of the next meet ups and hopefully contributing in whatever way we can to help the team! We are excited to begin with a studio tour on the blog, and hope that you enjoy our creative space.

Above is a recent book cover in the US by Jo Packham and Jenny Doh where our wee Irish studio was featured, we were contributing artists in the book and have been over the moon to reach the cover too!

Here's Ger at work on one of our "coquette" scarves, I'm a little camera shy so poor Ger ends up in most of the pics! lol

The walls of the studio are adorned with antiquated bits and bobs, I like to collect trinkets and flippery and create a nice environment to work in, we feel a bit more inspired if the area is full of interesting bits and bobs.

Here's the shelved area for all of the fabric storage, truth be known its never quite this tidy and I'm not sure it will ever be that tidy again! I also collect vintage sewing machines, I think they look really pretty and you can see a couple here amongst the shelving.

Here's a picture of the cutting table. My father made this from scratch and it's by far my most treasured studio item. I love that we are creating with our hands on something that my father created for us by hand!

The studio itself is a large wooden cabin style shed, we gave it a wee makeover to take the shed look off it. Flooring, some cosmetic work, insulation the works. However, that been said its still a little chilly in our Irish Winters as you all well know!!

I love to find objects or pieces of furniture and do them up to suit the space. Both of the french looking dressers here were finds that have been shabby chic'd up to suit the studio decor. The taller dresser is covered in vintage pattern paper to give it an antique look. I really enjoy the freedom in the studio to do whatever one wants! Not sure I would get away with that kind of tom foolery in my house aswell! lol

It's been a pleasure showing you all our studio, we are looking forward to getting to know you guys and also seeing into your creative spaces too. :)

Thanks to Ruth and Alex for introducing us to the blog and helping us set up our membership, we are truly proud to be Irish Etsy Team Members now and look forward to our future together. ( insert olé, olé, olé here! lol)

All our Love

Yvonne and Ger

http://www.bonzie.etsy.com/

The Craft Nations Unite Map needs you!

The Craft Nations Unite map needs some Irish input. Craft Nations Unite is an open collaboration mapping tool for artisans worldwide. We need your help to spread it & share.


As you can see the Irish section looks a little, um, minimalist, to put it politely.

To add your mark onto the map, you need to:
- log into your Google account
- after you have logged in you will see an EDIT button is visible above the text and to the left of the map
- Click "Edit" then add your placemark, add you text and photos from the placemark
- and make sure you click "Save" & "Done"
- then logout when finished

Easy peasy. Let's use Ireland as a proverbial pin-cushion and get loads of markers on there.

****UPDATED with some HOW TO instructions!! ***
On the map page, you log in top right (see the red boxes on my markup). Once you are logged in your account name will appear in bold like mine has so you know you're logged in.

The EDIT button will appear on the left hand column of text on the page. Click this to start making your mark.
Once you've done your thing, make sure you click DONE and SAVE. And then log out again top right corner.

Hope that helps!

A Box For My Treasure Artist Interview and Jewellery Giveaway on Dandelion Daydreamer!

Hi everyone, Sorcha from Dandelion Daydreamer here! Just dropping by to let you all know that Judith from A Box For My Treasure has featured in a designer interview on Dandelion Daydreamer this week. If you are feeling lucky do stop by the blog and you might even win this lovely necklace kindly offered to one fortunous reader by the lovely Judith! Goodluck ;)

Introducing: Nice Day Designs

Hi all, my name is Ruth Crean of '...Nice Day Designs', and I'm one of the new members of the Etsy Ireland Team. If you've got a few minutes to spare you can fritter them away while I self conciously babble about myself and my work.
I'm originally from Celbridge in Kildare but I moved down to wonderful Limerick 9 years ago to attend the art college here, and a mix of a great social/cultural scene and the love of a good Limerick man has kept me here since. I originally studied Fine Art: Printmaking, but in my final year I dabbled in photography and model making. Since graduating in 2004 I have tried my hand at many aspects of visual art, having a few exhibitons in photography, painting and digital collage. I spend about two years working with a great company, Impact Theatre, doing all their graphic design for them. With them I learned tonnes about design and creativity as applied in practice in the real world. It was while working with them that '...Nice Day Designs' was originally born, as a label for my design and for my handmade cards that I had started making.

In 2007 I started selling my cards and illustrations at a local craft market here in the city. It was after a year of this blind optimism that I realised that I would never make my first million selling cards, so I decided to capitalise on my life long hobby of sewing and customising clothes. My mother is a dress maker and it was something I always did on the side, either brightening up a jacket with a few buttons, or making halloween costumes. Things started out very small and tentatively, with one rail of clothes, and a few listings on Etsy. But quickly things grew and there was a growing demand for the clothes I was making.

At first to be honest I didn't have much focus but after a few months I realised that I should promote the fact that they were recycled clothes, as I started to see the growing trends in greener products. Since those first couple of steps I have started selling in a few boutiques around Ireland, and I was lucky enough to be on RTE's Nationwide earlier this year. In Autumn this year I had my first fashion show, which was a daunting and amazing experience. Since the show finished I've been catching up on custom orders and trying to get my cards and accessories sorted for the Christmas rush. Since then I also got my hands on a large lot of vintage buttons which led me to set up my second Etsy shop nicedaysupplies. I was really fortunate to find them, and I know it will take me years to get through them but I am a complete button addict!
It's been a tricky balance with all the different things that I work with, but that's what I love most, one day I could be sewing an evening dress, the next designing my pocket mirrors, and another day making Christmas cards. It means I never get bored and all the different techniques keep me inspired for the next project. I know this sounds nuts but I'm happiest when I'm working away in my studio, with a hot cup of coffee, and listening to a good audiobook.

Unfortuneately I don't have any of my clothes in my Etsy shop at the moment because I have prior commitments to shops to get through first, but check out my blog for more pics from the fashion show.
http://www.nicedaydesigns-ruth.blogspot.com/
http://www.nicedaydesigns.etsy.com/
http://www.nicedaysupplies.etsy.com/

Thanks for reading!