Connect the dots…

Or join the dots, as I fondly recall, were actually, 

as opposed to word searches which were honestly like some kind of form of kiddy torture.
If you’ve been bad, a word search, and if good, a join the dots.

Or at least the was my first impression.
It was a bag found in one of the cheap bag cages at the back of the shop, I didn’t buy the bag obviously, I mean it didn’t look very sturdy, but the surface print was just so interesting I had to have a good look. Snuck in a few photos too. 

The forms are fairly abstract but clearly butterfly like in shape, and some looking like flowers or petals, made out of this strange cross hatching and black simplified petal shapes.

A closing note this interesting scale like pattern
made from petal like shapes with this 

cross hatching that is reminiscent of netting and structures of grids.

Fabric Selection

A few photos I found weeks ago that I never posted but really should have. 
Below is a border design like piece on
a dress styled kameez (tunic top), which is a detail I love.
The whole suit puts purple alongside orange,
and then the touches of brown on the embellished
areas help when it comes to looking for matching jewelry and shoes. 

Just brilliant, two colours rarely worn in my opinion that are brought together.
The trim uses pink, white and brown shiny rayon like threads,
looking into damask like designs that
surround the flower shapes.
Lotus like blooms horizontally lined up.
The light plays with the shiny thread;
creating areas of shade, of light and dark.

The embellishments to the above neck area of a top are quite interesting, using thick black thread to create this beautiful leaf motif
and these splodge like flowers drops,
alongside swirls with sequins dotted around the shapes.
Leaves venation in gold thread – lush!

White curls, dots and webs

Ah! First post in 2012, I wonder if there will actually be snow.
I was going through charity shops again,
it is the simplest way to find interesting pattern sources
(what one magpie chucks, is another magpie’s treasure),
and I came across some interesting use of circular motions and motifs.
Take the snail shell like swirl above,
it takes the form of the centre of a flower,
whose petals are marked with stamen like shadows.

 

The neckline of this top makes excellent use of
the continuous chain of circles going from large to small to large again,
with each curve connecting to another through itself or by a tiny circle. 

Pretty Packaging: Herbal Essences

A free sample in Marie Clare, January issue - £2
Such pretty packaging I oculdn't 

resist scanning it into the computer.

This packaging has a great use of colour, 

such a tropical looking blue that has great impact, 

then on top the grunge like marks in silver and green. 

I just looked up what grunge actually means, 

one of its definitions is dirt and grime, 

the other being a type of rock music. 

But now I finally know.

The beautiful flowers adorning the packaging are orchids

and look at the detail of venation and marks on the petals. 

A short post this is, yes, but I'll be collecting some stuff 

to talk about in the next post. 

Oh and the shampoo and conditioner were amazing. 

Smelt lovely too.

Covered: The Yellow Wallpaper

The Yellow Wallpaper and Other Stories by Charlotte Perkins Gilman
is an amazing collection
a writer who accomplished great things for Utopian feminism.

The cover itself is what really caught my eye,
I first saw a copy of this book at the DLI in Durham,
at the Pattern exhibition,
a collection of work relating to pattern
by various amazing artists. 

There was also a collection of reading material 

relating to pattern or the artists - or in most cases both.

The cover plays upon this piece of wallpaper in the book's namesake story, 

in which a woman is thought to need rest to 

be cured of her mental problems, this doesn't really work 

of course but she is deeply interested in the wallpaper 

on the walls of her room which she is given whilst on this 'holiday'. 

To her it is alive.

it certainly looks that way form the cover.