dumpster diving – Ornamento

Resource and Treasures

By: ornamento.blog January 12, 2017January 8, 2017

Art, art from recycled materials, art, creativity, crafts, inspiration, dumpster diving, Found Objects, Green Decorating, phladelphiaArt, green grafting, Music, recycling, repurposing, resource exchange philadelphia2 Comments

I am so cold today! Yesterday I had to go out in a whirling snowstorm to deliver a sick portable hard drive to the computer hospital. Today, the computer doctor called me with the happy news that the files on the drive would live. I feel like I dodged a bullet. Fortunately, I already had the pictures for this blog post ready to go.

Which brings me to the Resource Exchange. I heard about this wonderful place a couple of years ago as a space where film and play companies deposited their leftover props and set equipment when production was finished. Then I leaned that the collection of leftovers had grown to any kind of material that could be used to make art. Which includes everything when you think of it but we won’t go there, will we?

No, the Resource Exchange offers all kinds of reclaimed arts and craft supplies that you can mention in polite company AND use to make art. These supplies would otherwise end up in the trash. The Resource Exchange gives them new life. Let’s see, conservation, art, creative reuse-looks like a win/win situation to me.

And if you have a bunch of discarded art supplies, builder supplies, tools, and old sewing machine, a stuffed animal, a bolt of cloth a case of paper clips, bring them to the Resource Exchange. Someone, somewhere will want them.

On my trip to the Resource Exchange, I found some bead storage boxes, jute webbing that I used to Boris-proof my foot stools, gold thread, giant wooden beads, and some more things that I can’t remember-all cheap and in good condition.

Beading Yoda was thrilled because now she has a place to bring all her Strawbridge and Clothier Bags because the people at the Resource Exchange know the difference between trash and vintage.

Be sure to check out the Resource Exchange’s web page and follow them on Facebook. In the meantime, here are some enticing pictures.

Jewelry from the Trash Can

I have been exploring textile arts and learning techniques for incorporating them into jewelry. And making up a few of my own. The bracelets below are from recycled materials: old clothing dyed, stamped, painted and shredded, cast off electrical wire stripped and straightened, scrap stained glass tumbled and drilled, some gilded twigs from the sidewalk, pieces of old jewelry, and old plastic bangles or wire forms, There is no plan; I just start to wrap and embellish. I hit some of the bracelets with a heat gun to see how it would affect the fabric. Depending on the fabric, it will burn, seal the frayed edges, or melt the fabric to reveal what’s beneath. I got this idea from a video by Textile and Mixed Media Artist Maggie Ayres. There is so much information out there. Don’t limit yourself to what you already know or think you have to take a class (unless you are learning how to use a torch, or another technique where proper safety instruction is vital). Don’t be afraid to try something new!

Summer’s End in Sara and Susan’s Garden

September

O GOLDEN month! How high thy gold is heaped!

The yellow birch-leaves shine like bright coins strung

On wands; the chestnut’s yellow pennons tongue

To every wind its harvest challenge. Steeped

In yellow, still lie fields where wheat was reaped;

And yellow still the corn sheaves, stacked among

The yellow gourds, which from the earth have wrung

Her utmost gold. To highest boughs have leaped

The purple grape,–last thing to ripen, late

By very reason of its precious cost.

O Heart, remember, vintages are lost

If grapes do not for freezing night-dews wait.

Think, while thou sunnest thyself in Joy’s estate,

Mayhap thou canst not ripen without frost!

Helen Hunt Jackson

Embrace Autumn! If you’re in Philadelphia this weekend, try to catch one of these special events

My Old New Couch

OK, so it’s not really new, but the cushion covers are. I also made floor pillows (shown on the couch here) throw pillows for the couch and leather chairs, and covers for a couple of bed pillows (the pillows slip in a slit in the back) that are good for lounging. I heard someone say that being “green” does not mean that you throw away your belongings and buy new things made with organic materials; it means you find a way to reuse what you already have. That’s what I did. One less couch in a land fill.

These are called “hamburger cushions. My mother-in-law had them on her sofa and I always admired them. My mother taught me how to make box cushions and piping, but I had no idea how to make hamburger cushions and could not find a pattern. I don’t sew enough to be able to figure it out. Then, one day, someone on my block threw out a sofa with hamburger cushions. I swiped one of the covers and figured out how to make my own. Saved by my not-so-inner dumpster diver.

I tacked the striped material to the front of the couch.

Throw pillow on leather chair. Brown fabric on reverse

This is the back of the bed pillow cover.

I had to make miles of piping for this project. I learned a wonderful new way to cut and sew the fabric fast and neatly. Here are the YouTube videos.

I hereby nominate Karen Erickson for a Nobel Prize in sewing!

One last thing. Most home decor junkies are lamenting the passage of Domino Magazine. The good news is the former editor of Domino started Lonny Magazine which you can only read on line. Check it out!

Jewels from the Sidewalk

I walk to and from work every day and I constantly scan the sidewalk for treasures I can use to make something. Trash day is the best day of the week!!!

Awhile ago, I wrote about making lampworked beads from glass I found on the sidewalk. Now I have added brown beer bottles to my cobalt blue wine and aqua Bombay Gin bottles. And a co worker contributed too! She had a beautiful yellow glass vessel sink in her powder room and when it cracked and she had to have it replaced, she gave me the broken glass.

The pictures below show each kind of glass, plain, fumed and fumed with stringers on top.

Since I don’t know the COE of the glass, I don’t mix the colors. I cut the glass as best I can and hold it in the flame with a long hemostat. It’s loads of fun and you never know what you’re going to get.

Make Clasps from Found Objects

I’ve been thinking a lot about jewelry made from found objects lately, probably because I have been asked to give a talk on the topic at the April meeting of the Main Line Bead Society. So this morning as I was brushing my teeth, it hit me: Why couldn’t I make a clasp from those cool copper washers I got at Harbor freight? I always get my best ideas in the morning. I had to wait until I came home from work to give it a try.

I took two washers about 18 gauge thick and sawed a slit in one just big enough for the other one to fit through. Then I made jump rings from 18 gauge copper wire and soldered them on the washers. Then I pickled, cleaned, punched a pattern on the clasps, gave them liver of sulfur bath, and polished them up. The placement of the opening relative to the jump rings is critical; you want your necklace to stay on. I don’t recommend this clasp for bracelets. It has kind of an old Roman feel, don’t you think? Here are the pictures.

This last clasp is from an object I found on the street- a sheaf of 10 gauge copper wire encased in black electrical tubing. You can take off the tubing and use the wire. I made a clasp out of mine. Here’s that picture.

What I Learned from Susan Lenart Kazmer

: Mike Models Susan’s Bracelet

If you read this Blog last week, you know that I was heading down to Damascus, MD to take a class with Susan Lenart Kazmer at Polymer Clay Express. The two-day class was fantastic. Here’s some of the things I learned:

I learned how to drill a hole in a stone.
I learned how to fabricate a cone out of metal.
I improved my torch enameling skills.
I learned how to make and use different kinds of rivets.
I learned a cool way to put a red patina on copper.
I learned how to preserve found items like paper and twigs with resin and incorporate them into my jewelry.
I saw an ingenious way to make hinges that I’m going to try because now I am more confident in my sawing skills and I think I can do it!
I saw how to make dapped forms to turn into cool rings and pendants.
I learned new ways to incorporate fiber with beads and metal.

Now every day the sidewalk holds more treasure than ever before.

Thanks Susan for teaching this class and Terri for telling me about it and giving me a ride!

Some Web Sites I Like

For interesting takes on Metalsmithing and Metal Jewelry, check out the work of David Paul Bacharach, Barbara Briggs and Connie Fox’s wonderful site, Jatayu

To learn to make just about anything, check out Instructables and the Ready Made Magazine web site.

No matter what kind of art you’re into, you’re sure to find something that interests you on Wet Canvas.

Happy Surfing!

My Lust For Rust

I came upon Altered Curiosities by accident. It’s not the kind of book I would usually buy. But boy, I am so glad this book made it to my door. Don’t pass it by like I almost did. It’s packed with information on all kinds of crafts that seemingly bear no relation to one another. Yet author Jane Ann Wynn pulls them all together, with unconventional materials, and makes art. I didn’t try any of her projects, but I read through the book more than once and am taking inspiration from it for my own work.

For example, I love the look of rust (but not on my appliances, please! ) and patinas. I picked up a rusty washer on the street the other day and struck up a conversation with it. When I was finished, I had this pendant. I added a silver plated spoon hammered flat, gold filled wire, turquoise and copper. I think that Altered Curiosities got me thinking in a new way.

While running errands today, I found all these cool rusty bits on the sidewalk. These are going to end up in something. I’ll wait for them to talk to me first, like the washer did.

If any of this appeals to you, check out the art of Annette Tacconelli’s Urban Artifacts. If little washers talk to me, bridges and pieces of buildings talk to her. Not only is her art beautiful and hard to forget; it will stoke your creative juices even more.

Repurposing Revisited

This necklace is made from part of another one of my Grandmother’s silverplated spoons. After I made the bracelet I showed in an earlier post, I decided to try something new. The cabochon is polymer. The spoon is dapped, pierced, and patinated. The cab is held in place with gold filled wire. The pendant is strung on rubber cord and finished with Balinese style vermeil spacers and a vermeil clasp. I am exploring more ways to make jewelry from spoons and found objects. I will post the more interesting results.

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