A Great Man, A Great Chair

Pt. 2 of god knows how many in the catch-up game.

So about a month ago, we got our second assignment in Projects. The new President of our college, Mr. Sean T. Buffington, has taken an interest in the Crafts Department ever since we showed work at his inaugural gala (not to mention dressed up in 50's outfits and helped serve and usher) So he came in and gave us a commision--make a piece for him that both represents him in some way, as well as our own way of working. He gave a short presentation on Crafts objects he already has in his life as a starting of point...but sadly there was no fibers work in it, unless you count a cheesy, etsy-esque stuffed owl his partner got for him...lame!

But in anycase, I didn't find the generic antiquey things and personal effects, or the ubiqutous scandanavian mid-century design all that inspiring. Instead, I decided to work from the man himself. Every since I saw the hand-made t-shirts emblazoned with his face and the words "Buff Daddy" on students at his inauguration, I knew he was a personality to contend with. So I made a portrait of the man, of the 'chairman of the board,' so to speak.




Behind every great man, there is a great chair.

Sitting happily in his office now, it stares at the interns and office workers whenever he's not around to do so.

'Chair for Buff-Buff'
Found chair, new upholstery, applique


Behind the scenes:

The original chair, already half disassembled. I found it in a little side-hallway off of our 'student gallery' down by the ceramics studio. It was with a bunch of other junk, so I decided to assumed it was trash. By the way, taking the upholstery off of this piece of crap was a pain~! So many little freaking staples.


The old cushion. The fabric was this really awful fabric that was almost like a burlap. The arm cushions, when I pried them open, leaked this pollen-colored powder that I can only assume was once foam. (it's worth noting that before I got this chair, I was working on another, only to find some very noxious looking green and peach-colored mold under the fabric. Old furniture is pretty gross)


Unfortunately I don't have any other 'inbetween' shots but here's a rundown on how I got to this stage.
1) Paint--two coats of white, one failed attempt to mix liquid pigment with paint to get orange (got a nasty fleshy color) then two coats of Bright Pumpkin. Orange is Buff's favorite color
2) Replaced upholstery on the actual framework of the chair (under the cushion.) More difficult than I imagined, I had a hard time restuffing it.
3)Did the armrests twice--the first attempt is in the picture, in gray, I later re-did it with the teal fabric and more stuffing, looked much better.
4) Re-did the cushions
And not shown, but
5) Appliquéd the face. Three dang times before I got it right. Finally had to use reverse applique to get the finer black lines to work. There's actually 2 faces, a serious one (shown) on one side, and a happy (sort of 'special') looking one on the other, no picture of that yet, sorry! And now I have 2 creepy almost-faces hanging in my studio.


Alright, that's 2 projects~! I'll try and keep going tomorrow~

ooooookayyyyyyy

I'm a terrible blogger. It's only now, probably because I have a paper due tomorrow, that I'm updating things! And I know have a backup of about 40 pictures. Oh jeez.

Where to start? How about with our recent symposium? The American Crafts Council (publishers of American Craft) came to our school to have 1 of 3 symposiums about "Making, Meaning and the Marketplace." From my limited amount of experience with the larger craft world, we sure do love to talk about what is and isn't craft. I don't get it~

Anyway, the sweet part is that me and my mate Diana were ushers at the event, and were asked to wear some of my costumes for the occasion. Which means beautiful photos by the official Crafts Dept. Photographer, Ken. You've see the white piece before, but the red one is new, it was for my 'Lost in Translation' assignment. The pants on the white piece are new as well!


Diana in her red ruffly long-johns. These were a pain to pattern, the ruffles are acutally a part of the construction and seamed into the leggings (so the pattern for them had about 20 pieces to keep track of.) They're surprisingly comfortable though!

A clearer photo of my white jacket than I had before. And now it has pants. Also very comfy, but very, very hot.

Both of us and my good friend Kali (on the left) and her 'bathing beauties' coffee filter bikinis. Oh, and see those railings? Funny story. Building maintenance decided to paint them with oil paint 3 hours before the show. So they were still wet and sticky, and people would be walking their artwork through them--not good! So me and my teacher freaked out a bit, then brainstormed and ended up covering the entire length of the railings in iridescent cellophane (we have a massive roll in the studio that someone found in the trash about 5 years ago. Still going through it!)

Okay! So this is entry #1, I'm going to split these up a bit so they're not massive post. Hopefully I can get another one up tonight.

School Daze

Back in school, and back to the crazy schedule of class/work/studio. But now I've got my own space, which is absolutely grand, even if it is already crammed full of supplies. I'm a terrible packrat when it comes to fabric...and yarn...and trim, and anything I can get my hands on.

Some pictures of where I spend just about every night:

I've got a desk for sewing, and a fabric-covered table for drafting/drawing/pinning/putting my computer on. I have about 30 yards of that red knit, so now it's my decor as well. I believe it came from some gala my school hosted, and it's been kicking around for a few years.


Supply madness--so much stuff!

So that's the space. What have I been working on, eh?

Well, in Into to Jewelry, I'm a big old newbie. Never touched metal in my life, but I really love it, and I think I'm picking it up okay. Our first lesson was a riveted brass piece for our notebooks.

Front Cover

Inside cover--you can see the rivet on the bottom where I messed up, but it's a small thing. I'm learning!

Advanced Fibers--our first assignment is "Drawing"

Some samples.

The one I'm going with-it's going to be a full length dress with a design like the tree drawing above. The leaves are going to be a big, gathered collar around the person, and the length of the dress will be the intertwining trunks. It's worked with 4 strands of thick string on a very loosely woven fabric, so it goes pretty quickly.

For Experimental Costuming, we did a quick t-shirt remix, then a thrift store remix. I did the same things last year, but they're always good to warm up with.


I patchworked my t-shirt--it got very small very fast, and I ended up using the scraps to make an open meshy shirt to go with it.

And my remix--I got an awful pair of short-overalls. Shortalls? And made a rather kinky looking vest.



I liked this project because I really broke away from my usual flat-patterning method. I let the shape of the pieces dictate the form.

And for Projects--no in progress pieces, it's sort of a mess right now, but here's the sketch/instructions I wrote up for myself.

Long story short, I scanned a comic, drew it with pixels, and I'm now knitting it. Then I'm going to felt it. It's going to be immense, the first panel is more than 2 feet wide. Crazy amount of work there.

I'm still here

Unfortunately, I've been feeling awful lately, so I haven't been doing too much--or updating too much, as you can probably see~! But school's less than a week away, and I promise there'll be plenty of things to talk about then.

Looking back, while I may not have gotten much in the way of finished projects this summer, I certainly have explored a good deal of techniques I think I'll be putting to work this year.

I've been keeping up with my knitting, and here's some of the thing bits and pieces (god, I hate having to admit my teachers were right, samples are essential) I've been playing around with.


I was trying out the idea of using multiple strands of yarn and adding them as I go to create a flared shape with cables. This one didn't quite work because it got twisted on my circulars, so I tried out a new idea. Chrissy Day had spoken to me last year about introducing new textures and materials into the soft, pillowy sort of work I've been doing, so I took my cables, and sprayed them with an aerosol rubber coating (it's made to re-coat tool handles) I love the result, it's flexible but still, and still looks like knitting.


Work in progress--a skirt that uses the the same idea as above, keep adding strands as well as increasing stitches to create a flare. I think at the end I might decrease it really quickly and make a tight-fitting bottom.

I've also been fooling around with quilting up the scraps of the t-shirts I've been using all summer. It's gotten much bigger since I last posted.


For scale purposes. Such tiny little blocks~~


What I've got so far. It's been slow going, the knit's a little hard to work with at this size. It's also a fair bit bulkier than a woven quilt because the seams get so thick. But I really love it. Sadly I'm running out of scraps, anyone want to send me some old t-shirts, gimme an email. I want to make this thing as large as I can, I think it'll have a real impact king-size. And then I want to quilt it with as many colors of thread as I can~

Sewing allll those little triangles in big long chains (I haven't finished these blocks yet)


Also doing a little bit of embroidery, after avoiding it all summer. It'll eventually be icebergs.


Next time I get a chance, I'm putting up whatever I have left from the flea markets for cheaps, I need to get it out of here.