Brains ~ The Mind as Matter ~ Wellcome Collection

     A few weeks ago I took a detour to the Wellcome Collection, which consist of an extraordinary mix of medical, art, curiosities and brains.  This collection was begun by Mr. Wellcome who was widely traveled, rich and able to pick up objects he found interesting, his interest were medical instruments, art and odd bits of curiosity. 

Among the items I found interesting enough to note were,

Napoleons toothbrush

Darwin's Walking Stick

Disraeli's death mask

Slice of the human body (head to toe)

All sorts of Medical oddities including ~
a part of Einsteins brain
and
Chastity belt

      In one room of interactive exhibition's there was a computer that took a photo of my face and compared it to the data base -- the result was -- "there is no one in our data base that compares to you", He He...then it showed my face shape compared to the "average face" shape and mine was very thin --- it morphed my face to look more average and I looked really bad!  I am thinking differently about my looks now.

It was a really fun exhibit!

Almost a Hat!

May 17^th  ~~~  Nearing the end….

Oh dear, I am having a hard time realizing that this next class will be the last one!  I could keep on doing this … yep just keep on … I love sewing and talking and this class allows both.  We chat about our week and tell fantastic stories about things we hear or saw… and we keep sewing! 

I got a lot done this week even though again, I spent the entire class sewing four seams.  I seem to have a heavy hand with the thread and it shreds after a short time of sewing.  I think it is a combination of the delicate silk thread and my pulling to quick and hard on the stitch.  Here is a photo of my hat as I began today.

First loop attached...

Second...

here a little pile os shreded thread :)

Third and almost done....

Next week is it!

Wow Hats!

E E E E E E E e e e e e e e

May 14, 2012… EEEEEEeeeee.

Today at class we became aware that there is only one more class!!! Yikes, the bank holiday last week and the busyness of the past couple of weeks … suddenly the pressure is on! 

Our Photo shoot today was for Escada, especially perfume.  The current theme for their advertising is a garden hedge and roses, with the model sitting on the hedge and roses around the bottle etc…. I was determined not to do flowers.  The color of the liquid reminded me of pink champagne so I began to work on that idea. 

Here is a sample of the result.

Journal of the Hat - Slog On!

May 10  2012… Sew Sew Soooooo……

  Today I took up the entire class to sew three seams… by hand.  The thread kept shredding, with infuriating often-ness. Here are a couple of photos that show some of the progress and I have pinned up the bits to give an impression of what the hat will look like when finished.  Hopefully I will finish next class!

Marie Antoinette... in person!

May 4… Wallace Collection

     Marie Antoinette, was in full costume and described her life at court… she was so good and interacted with the visitors like they were people at court… It was fun

Royal Feathers ~ Reign Royal Insane!

April 30… Sunny Day Outside…

Reign Royal Insane ~ Inside, with a side of steam!

  Todays photo shoot was fun.  The “kids” were giggling and I was too at times. The model was a man and the challenge given by the teacher was to make something for him.  I made the hat, the bow tie and the gloves.  I used left over feathers from my “WEAR the wild things” shoot, and purchased blanks of the top hat, bow tie and cut off gloves from the costume shop.  I had to hand sew everything because I could not get time in the Lab.

     I explained to the model, the idea….he woke up on a tropical island and the natives had made him king, and feathers were the jewels in his crown.

      I tried for an intense Royal reign, with just a bit of insanity, boarding on anger, and silly poppy cock.  I hope it worked… here are a few of the photos...

 I think it was a success.

     

Journal of the Hat Continued....April 26th.

April 26 … Moving forward … The Fabric…

   Today we had a great time in class!  I learned much more about using my fabric, and got quite a lot done. 

 

     In between working on hats scary stories began to circulate….. It started by talking about the movie “The Gray” with Liam Neeson, so scary!  Then we moved on to personal horror stories, it included everything from giant splinters in someone’s backside, to a perfectly illustrated story about someone’s eye popping out… there was some muted screams and nervous laughter, I had a great time in class!

     Here are some beautiful petals, several of the other girls are making flowers for their hats and I am going to catch up and do that too.  So I am following their work… they used an egg iron to press these shapes into the fabric petal pieces.