Great Gatbsy Inspired Jewellery by Australian Designer, Samantha Wills

Beautiful jewellery by Australian born, Samantha Wills who now resides in New York!  Fitting for the current Gatsby trend but timeless enough to outlast any fashion craze.  These through the window earrings are my favouritel!

Gorgeous, gorgeous Entrance at Sunset necklace - these would go perfectly with any Gwendolyn Burkin frock!

The Whiskey and Lace bracelet which would cover a few wedding genres; beach, bohemian, nouveau or glamour.  Which is your favourite?

All images courtesy of Samantha Wills website

Feather Hair Accessories: Canberra Etsy Seller

Steering away from my usual pale colours and metal bands, I have made this very cool headband from beautiful natural-coloured feathers.  They were mistakenly ordered and have sat in my cupboard for a while as I wondered what on earth to do with them... but I pulled out my black beaded buttons the other day and bingo, a match mad in heaven.

The beauty of elastic headbands are you can wear them either way, feathers down as in image one or the feathers going in the opposite direction like this piece.  How would you wear it?

Art Deco Hair Piece and Jewellery: The Great Gatsby

This gorgeous head piece, "The Savoy" is from Tiffany's and Co. designed for The Great Gatsby, which opens here in Canberra next week, 30th May.  Tiffany's worked closely with our own, Catherine Martin to produce some amazing pieces for the movie.  The Savoy is worth a cool, $238,000AUD, view more of their pieces on their website.

Vogue Australia have a cool spread on the jewels from the movie and Tiffany's collection. If you can't afford any of these hair pieces for your Great Gatsby event, you can always buy one of mine!!

Images 1, 3 & 4 via Vogue Australia.  Image 2, Tiffany's.

Useful Tips for Painting Aluminium: A Mothers Day Craft

This was the mothers day craft for my daughters class this year, which I help organise, they were filled with mints although mine holds my small earrings.  I learnt a few new things about aluminium in the process that I thought I would share with you.

• You need to prep the surface you want to paint by sanding lightly with fine sand-paper
• You also need to apply an undercoat of appropriate paint, white worked best for this project
• You can paint with acrylic paint (these were pearl paints from Eckersley's)
• Aluminium dents quite easily

The badge on the card was inspired by this mermag animal brooch, I am working through my old stash of acrylic felt from when I very first started making kids hair accessories three years ago!   

Handmade Crepe Paper Flower: Lilly

Can you pick which is the crepe paper flower I made?  Yes, it's the one at the back.  It was my first attempt using a cheap crepe paper from the dollar store which tore a bit when painted or shaped.    

I am going to attempt a few more flowers using both coffee filters and some quality paper I bought from the art store as the crepe paper didn't cope very well with long petals, they needed to be supported with individual wires but they would probably have torn the paper. 

I started by pulling apart my Lilly, then sketching the petals to make a template.  I used some rolled up green crepe paper for the stigma and some millinery/cake decorating stamens I had on hand.  I pinched in the petals when putting it together, then wired and taped it to give it a stem.   What do you think? 

Basic Millinery Book: Mildred Anlezark

My lovely friend scored this gorgeous book at a garage sale for me!  I was thrilled at such a great and thoughtful find.    

When I first bought my French flower making tools I found there wasn't much visual information on how to use them, this page would have been useful!  I have since found a fair bit of content on you-tube and millinery blogs, Myra Callan has also put out a gorgeous book called Adornments if you are just starting out and want tips on how to make hair accessories.

This book is filled with lots of hat making patterns and tips but also some finishes and trimming tricks.  I have had a play around at a couple of flowers but need to spend more time devouring each page.  Enjoy!

 

Art Deco Inspired Hair Pieces: Canberra

A new handmade piece made from some lovely vintage sequin trim I found.  Inspired by the era I love!  This is newly listed in my Etsy store, gorgeous for day or night don't you think?   

This feathered piece would look fabulous with the feathers sweeping toward the front of your face.  It would really bring the blue out of your eyes and a dose of sparkle for good measure! 

I'm trying to carve out some time on the weekends for a small amount of production as things have been very slow in that department.  I have a head brimming with ideas but this seems to be the 'time poor' time-of-life for me, thus is the life with small children and a travelling husband.  I just remind myself it is for a season but man, I have really missed creating - it makes me.... something similar to 'hangry'.     

Useful Advice for Creative Small Businesses

Ceramics: Susan Frost,  Photo: Grant Hancock

When I read advice useful to my own business, the first thing I want to do is share it with my friends as I think it could resonate with fellow Mum-preneurs or other creative small businesses.  Recently I have come across a few interesting articles about online success and driving sales etc.. 

Fellow Australian, Jessica Van Den has a great blog called Create and Thrive, which I am sure helps her business Epheriell do, just that. 

Dave Conrey has a great blog called Fresh Rag which I inadvertently found yesterday while diving down a rabbit hole.  Dave gave some hefty praise to a book by Gary Vaynerchuk called, Crush it.  I've added it to my wish list but went on to check out some of Gary's short video's on Youtube - an interesting guy with lots of good advice :-)   

Both Jessica and Dave offer free e-books on subscription to their newsletters etc, also a great tactic for readership straight to one's inbox!

Magazine editor, Amy Flurry has written a book called Recipe for Press, specifically for entrepreneurs, basically a DIY on how to pitch like a pro - also on my list :-) 

There are also countless e-courses on offer, you have probably come across them in your browsing travels but the first ones to mind are courses by, Holly from Decor8 and Kathleen and Tara at Braid Creative.

Feel free to share any other great sites or posts you have read lately. 

If you read my blog through google reader and haven't switched over to a new feed reader, your time is running out!  I am using feedly and it is working out great.

Unique Jewellery by Mezereem

Some very cool pieces from Dutch designer, Daphne Van Der Meulen in her Etsy store, Mezereem.  This is the potato ring, made from Silver, no moulds are used for her jewellery so every piece is unique.

The Pear ring pictured is made from Silver but also comes in Gold! 

Finally the Felt ring, I really like the texture on this one.  I looked at getting a textured wedding band back in the day but had to go for a split wedder to go with my engagement ring.   The minimalist style of Mezereem is very appealing to me, how about you?

Gorgeous Gift Idea: Flower Book by Andrew Zuckerman

Yesterday part of my mothers day was spent having a mother-daughter date with Anya.  We went to the National Library in Canberra for the first time, it is mainly a reference library and not all of it was open being a Sunday but we had a nice visit anyway. 

Ornamental Chinese lantern flowers

The library has a decent sized coffee shop and a beautiful gift shop filled with gorgeous books and this was one of them.  Flower, by New York based photographer and film-maker, Andrew Zuckerman.  It is a large, hardcover book with 149 pages of stunning, crisp images and I oohed and ahhed over every one of them.

Tulip

This book would be a lovely gift for the keen gardener, photographer, florist or someone who has everything they need and you simply want to spoil them!  They really are breath-taking images by an exceptionally talented photographer.  Available here and here.

Images via Architectural Digest.

Artist Susanna Bauer

I first saw the work of model maker, Susanna Bauer in Frankie Magazine and was taken with the detail in her unique projects.  All of the leaves above are Magnolia leaves which have been crocheted, darned and patch-worked.  How cool are they?  Susanna works with stones, wood and fabric and other mediums, largely inspired by nature.  Her career as a model maker has seen her work on movies such as Wallace and Gromit!  Making a living out of making, that equals the good life in my eyes.

All images courtesy of Susanna Bauer.

One Bowl Chocolate Cake Recipe

This recipe is my go-to, one bowl chocolate cake recipe which NEVER fails!  Josiah had a couple of mates around to help him celebrate turning three last friday, it was a lovely morning.

I also used the same cake, slightly revamped the following day with some more visitors, you can do that with good friends, slap a bit more icing on, make a three out of m&m's - done!  It was just as delicious the next day :-)

One Bowl Chocolate Cake

Ingredients

125g butter, chopped

1 cup caster sugar

1 cup milk

1 self-raising flour

⅓ cup cocoa

½ teaspoon bicarb soda

½ cup almond meal

2 eggs beaten

Method

1. Heat butter, sugar and milk in a med to large saucepan until melted and combined - take off heat

2. Sift flour, cocoa and soda together into the saucepan

3. Stir in almond meal and eggs, until smooth

4. Pour into a greased 20cm round cake tin

5. Bake in a moderate oven (180 degrees) for 45-50 minutes (I usually only do 40 minutes in my fan forced oven).

Ice with icing of your choosing!  Ganache, glaze or butter icing - yum!

Fresh Faces in the Australian Wedding Scene

Photography by Tim Coulson Photography

I have stumbled across some new finds (to me) in the bridal industry over the last six months and I thought it was time I shared a few.  Hello May is a lovely Australian blog featuring cool vendors and weddings!  Sophie and Emma published the first issue of their Hello May wedding magazine in February this year!

Photography by Eric Ronald

Nouba is a lovely fresh blog which was birthed by Graphic Designer, Tamarin (pictured above) after planning her own stunning wedding.  Frustrated by the lack of creative resources for Australian brides, Tamarin started her own site!  I couldn't agree with her more, in my opinion there is enough talent in Australia to have a really great showing of creative businesses that are not mainstream and predictable.

Photo: via One Fine Day

Finally an alternative to the good old bridal fair, One Fine Day looks like a beautiful event to attend if you are lucky enough to live in or close to, Sydney or Melbourne.  I've attended a few bridal fairs in my time as a florist, bridesmaid and business owner - an 'interesting' event - enough said!  I love the whole concept of The Not Wedding and would love to see something like that done here in Australia.

Photo courtesy of New Best Friend

Lastly, the lovely new kid on the block, Hitched wedding magazine and blog, founded by Renee Douros.   I'd love to have a flick through this one, it looks Frankie-esque.  A cool Canberra based creative firm, New Best Friend are responsible for the design.  If you know of any other cool sites, pop a link in my comment section or on my Facebook page.