Coeurs de fleur...

There's something I have been wanting to do for a while : a year and a half ago, at the Fab Fair, I had bought some pretty ceramic buttons handmade by a local artist, Eikcam, who became a good friend of mine soon afterwards...

At first, I thought I would use these flower buttons for necklaces but there was also the option of using them for brooches...

A year and a half later, I finally took my sewing kit out... and I am really happy to introduce my new "Coeurs de fleur" brooches : )



The idea here was to keep the design simple to emphasize the details of the buttons.

I chose to use two layers of felt of the same color to make a flower around the "flower heart" but, as I love to play with colors, I decided to introduce bright colored embroidery threads to sew the button to the felt flower... and then, I let the threads loose to give a poetic touch to the composition : )

Et voilà!

Eikcam

Last weekend was super busy, there was the Greek Festival on Sunday (10 hours of selling my stuff on the street, no thank you, I don't think I will ever do it again!) and the "Studio warming" of my friend Grace, aka Eikcam, on Saturday. Grace's work is so beautiful and colorful that it makes her white studio look like the coziest place in town!

Grace and me, wearing my freshly acquired "Baroque" pendant by Eikcam : )

Multicolor

The Spring Fab Fair? It went well, very well, thank you! I had a good time, I met lots of nice people, saw some friends, couldn't resist to buy a few things (look at this beauties by Eikcam) and I had a very emotional moment the first time I used my new Visa card machine and saw the little "Olala design" receipt coming out : )

Now, I am preparing for another fair that will take place next Sunday (June 27th) in Vancouver. Here's the info if you live in the area. I am working on summery items using different shades of blue (turquoise, aquamarine, lapis), white (rock crystals, freshwater pearls, mother of pearl) and some fresh greens, pinks and purples like in these quartz nuggets bracelets :

"Weekend napolitain", a bracelet made of multicolor quartz nuggets, one golden Venetian bead, 2 lepidolite beads and light peach Swarovski crystals.

A very summery version of "Fleurs des bois".

One of my personal favorite color combination for "Frou-frou de fleurs".

Now, let's hope for summer to finally come, it's been so grey and chilly lately... Brrrr...

A Midsummer Dream

It's been months now that I have been looking for a color to repaint my bedroom walls - the color we had was called "nude" so it was light, peachy, very dull... I had visions of dark purples or sexy plums but wasn't too sure it wouldn't be too dark... So I kept on searching...

...until a few weeks ago, when I went to see my friend Grace from Eikcam who was attending the Portobello West fashion and art Market (held in Vancouver on the last Sunday of every month) and spotted on her display table THE color I wanted in a beautiful little purple-glazed Korean Dasik salt and pepper dish with a tiny flower motif! It was love at first sight and I took my little dish to the paint store to find a color that would go well with it : )

After deliberating with my husband (he was the one who was going to paint...), we decided to go for "A Midsummer Dream".... and it looks WOW on our bedroom walls!!!!



You can visit Eikcam at : www.eikcam.etsy.com

Meeting Grace

So, as I was saying earlier, I met two special ladies at the Spring Fab Fair last weekend and one of them was Grace, alias Eikcam...

First, I saw her display -empty because it was Saturday at 5.30pm and she had packed up her pieces and left- but I had to stop to get her card when I saw that she had moss on her table... well... fake moss! I've been looking for fake moss for a while because I thought it would look great with my "welcome to my garden" theme to display my jewelry.... I have to ask her where she found that...



On Sunday, one of my friends was helping me at the Fab Fair so I quickly ran to Eikcam's table and oooooh!, everything was soooo lovely!!!! You see, I've been into porcelain and ceramic jewelry lately and guess what, Grace makes very pretty ceramic jewelry and dishes!!! She had pendants, earrings, rings, barrettes, all representing leaves or flowers... it was heaven for me!

I couldn't resist : I bought a pair of earrings and these gorgeous ceramic buttons that I want to use in future Olala creations - of course, I asked for Grace's permission : )

We chatted a little and discovered that we were almost next door neighbors! Grace is a lovely person and since I met her, my head has been bubbling with new ideas so, I'll keep you posted but there will certainly be some ceramic pieces in my Fall 2009 collection.......................

http://www.eikcam.com/