Posts Tagged ‘custom design’
Silk Scarves
During December, I’ve been enjoying the privilege of a front-row seat for an art project by one of Santa’s loveliest elves. I didn’t even know that painting silk scarves was a thing. Cyndie manufactured a rig to suspend the scarves so she could draw on designs before filling them with wonderful brushed colors.
Each one is unique and custom-designed for the person she was thinking about. I wish I had taken more pictures when she was doing the painting but I was hesitant due to the hush-hush nature of the project.
Wednesday night she and her friends celebrated with a holiday dinner and an exchange of gifts so I have now been granted permission to share some clips of the finished scarves.
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It brings me so much joy to see how Cyndie has been experimenting with different techniques to bring about beautiful artistic images with a variety of media. These silk scarves look really great. I love how she managed to mix a whimsical energy with an almost business-like calmness worthy of silk.
I’m very familiar with Cyndie’s artistry in the kitchen but her increasing proficiency in producing creative art from many different methods is showing me a whole new side of her. It thrills me to no end.
It shouldn’t surprise me that Cyndie continues to master new accomplishments, but her artistic creativity of late has. Her art projects since retiring stand out in contrast with her previous lifetime of more academic pursuits. Instead of cramming a world of ideas into reports and professional articles, she is now letting them flow freely into shapes and colors.
I am truly honored to have the pleasure of watching her work and then being able to gaze upon the finished pieces. I’m so happy when she allows me to share samples with the rest of you here.
I wonder what she will find to tackle next. You can bet I will strive to take more pictures during the messy phases.
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Custom Masks
Way back in April, when Cyndie was down at her parent’s place in Florida, she started sewing face masks to share with others. When the state of Minnesota mandated wearing facemasks in the workplace, I began putting Cyndie’s designs to a full day’s test. I wear glasses almost the entire time I am at work, so a mask fit that minimized fogging became a priority for me.
The earliest version I wore became uncomfortable behind my ears so I lobbied for styles that didn’t wrap around the back of my tender lobes. I figured the neck gaiter would be super convenient and I already wear a lot of Buff® headgear, so I convinced Cyndie to sew added protection into one of mine. I have read that relying on the material in most conventional neck gaiters alone is actually worse than not wearing any face-covering at all because the porous fabric will shred exhaled breath into greater amounts of aerosolized particles that, because of the small size, float around longer.
We also cut up another old Buff® to experiment with adding strips sewn to the front covering which then wrap around the back of my neck, instead of around the ears.
To eliminate needing to pull it over my head, we tried cutting the gaiter and adding several kinds of hook & loop sewn into the fabric. That allows me to wrap it around the back of my neck to secure the mask.
Yesterday, Cyndie accommodated my desire to try another customization. I want to keep all the advancements she has made with extra filter fabric in front and removable inserts for washing, but give another try to a more relaxed loop around my ears.
Earloops, if they aren’t under too strong an elastic pull, are less confining than having the gaiter material all the way around my head. After weeks of the prior versions, I’m interested in returning to the simpler design.
It was a cloudy, blustery November day outside, which made an indoor sewing project that much more inviting. I was able to contribute a tiny bit of my own labor by cutting out fabric using the patterns Cyndie made for the style I prefer.
Thanks to her ingenuity, I already had enough masks that I could wear a different one each day, and every mask is unique. I have a wonderful collection of prototypes.
Today, I have two more custom masks from which to choose.
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Relative Something 