This year's
Create Mixed Media Retreat was held on May 29 through June 2, 2013 in Orange County at the Hyatt Regency in Irvine, California. For those of you who may be unfamiliar with the "Create Mixed Media Retreat", it is a great event put on by the people from Interweave Press and Cloth Paper Scissors. The Create Mixed Media Retreat events take place in various locations the U.S. and offers a variety of
classes which can vary from making art journals to jewelry making. They also have a great selection of technique based classes like art journaling methods, surface designs (including metal work), sewing, collage, polymer clay, power tools, and more.
Joanne Sharpe (author of
Cloth Paper Scissors Workshop Artful Lettering: Tools and Techniques for Discovering Your Style
)
taught a "Free Motion Tapestry" class where students learned to
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| Joanne Sharpe |
design and create their own hand painted fabric. They also got to learn some free motion sewing techniques that brought dimension to the finished pieces. As you can see in the picture below, the pieces came out gorgeous.
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| Hand painted material by Joanne Sharpe |
Lisa Englebrecht (author of
Modern Calligraphy and Hand Lettering: A Mark-Making Workbook for Crafters, Cardmakers, and Journal Artists
), also taught three classes at this venue.
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| Lisa Engelbrecht |
Lisa taught a fun class on how to write on fabric and make some pretty terrific banners. Some of the projects can be viewed on her flicker account. She also taught a really cool "Hand Lettered" t-Shirt class. The students got to create their inspiration t-shirt using the techniques that Lisa taught them in class. In the past Lisa has also taught a variety of calligraphy classes and lettering techniques. Below is a video that is a sample of one of her writing technique demonstrations.
The third class she taught at this show, was a fun "Fascinator" class.
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| Sample Fascinator from Lisa Engelbrecht's class. |
In this class the students learned the basics to designing their own Fascinators from a variety of materials, including feathers from sustainable farm grown flocks. They were quite impressive to see in person (for pictures from her class, just check out
Lisa's FB page to find a link).
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| Assorted materials and sample Fascinators for Lisa's class |
They also have a great "Artist Faire" which is free to the public. This is a great opportunity for the public to go and make purchases from a wide variety of art materials as well as work from the various artists in attendance. One set of tables had four different authors in attendance, showing off their their artwork, crafts and books.
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| Amy Morinaka, Stefanie Girard, Jeannine Stein, and Lisa Englebrecht |
I had a chance to talk to each author and take a few pictures of their work. The first author is Amy
Morinaka, who's first book "
Zakka Handmades: 24 Projects Sewn from Natural Fabrics to Help Organize, Adorn, and Simplify Your Life
" was just released. For those who are unfamiliar with Zakka style, it is a fashion and home good designs style that has spread from Japan. It specifically refers to hand-sewn items for the home, as well as simple clothing. On her blog "
Chick Chick Sewing", Amy has some great projects that vary from simple to advanced. Like her book, the projects include some very clever and lovely designs made from some beautiful fabrics.
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| Amy Morinaka |
Amy is an accountant who's love of fabric combine with her sewing abilities has inspired her to design some very fun projects for this book.
I also got to spend a few moments speaking with
Jeannine Stein, the author of two books
(
Adventures in Bookbinding: Handcrafting Mixed-Media Books
and
Re-Bound: Creating Handmade Books from Recycled and Repurposed Materials
). Recently, her work has also been featured in the "Pages"magazine from Cloth Paper Scissors.
Below is a beautiful examples of the many creative ways, Jeannine uses ephemeral to accent the handmade books she makes.
This is another great example of the books she makes with both new and recycled materials.
The next picture is of a recipe book she made from a recycled box of chocolates.
Here is a peek at the inside of the book.
And a look at some of the ephermal kits she had on hand.
The kit below has some cool recycled materials from books, labels, and more.
Stefanie Girard, who blogs for
Craftside blogger and
Craft Gossip (recycled crafts), was also on hand.
If you have never visited the "Craftside" blog or the "
Sweater Surgery" blog, you are in for a treat. Stefanie often posts some tutorials and other tidbits from the new books that are being released.
Stefanie Girard, is also the author of the book "
Sweater Surgery: How to Make New Things with Old Sweaters
". In her book, everything is made from recycled sweaters with a fun variety of projects like the messenger bag below and the cute red cowboy boots for infants (behind the purse).
If you like learning new technique from some great teachers then I highly recommend the "Create Mixed Media Retreat". Check their website to find out when one is coming to your area.
Disclaimer
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" and was pleased to find some really easy to follow recipes. I tried out the Cinnamon Scone recipe and my kids love them. I have to say that this book has a really good selection of allergy free and gluten free recipes for baked good, cupcakes, scones and more.
