Lines and Blocks – Cardiff Bay Architecture

I wouldn’t describe these images as Christmasy but I was in Cardiff Bay the other day and happened to have an hour to spare. The architecture there creates some interesting patterns and I had taken my camera.

I had a bit of an argument with the security guard for the building with the lines and bars (he wasn’t very polite!) but that just added to the interest. Personally, I really like the concrete wedge! More of these photos are available on the StillWalks PhotoShelter site.

Cardiff Bay Architecture

Lines and Bars

Cardiff Bay Architecture

Bar Reflection

Cardiff Bay Architecture

Bars Perspective

Cardiff Bay Architecture

Wedge

Cardiff Bay Architecture

Wedge and Rectangles

Fibre Connections – Metal and Weaving

Continuing with my textural link to StillWalks, these and other mini woven tapestries are available on my new Etsy Shop, ACMDesign – each one is unique. I have described them as “tapestry notes”, and in doing so, I was thinking back to when I started using wire in my work as an artist.

One of the first tapestries I wove that included barbed wire can be seen here. It and another are also on the Etsy shop. However, barbed wire is not the starting point for my work with wire and my interest in metal.

I originally started working with wire in a similar way to which I am now doing with these mini tapestries – as design notes. I think of them in the same way as I think of drawing in a sketch book, and as I work on them, I develop my feel for the wire and find out how it interacts with the soft fibre of the warp and weft. More on this tomorrow.

AD Mini Tapestries-14

AD Mini Tapestries-13

AD Tapestries-23

You can use the Donate button below to help StillWalks. Pay how much you want and receive a high quality download of this week’s featured StillWalks video – “After the Tide” which is from the marshes on the Loughor Estuary, South wales. Click the image below to watch the video. DVD Collections are available to order in the StillWalks Shop.

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Fibre Connections

When I started out developing StillWalks, I had already realised that the photography I was doing was informed by my other life as an artist and tapestry weaver. So when I mention my new Etsy shop, ACMDesign, for my tapestry weaving, it is not without reason.

The main reason of course, is to try and sell the tapestries, but I am also going to take the opportunity this week, to explain a little about what goes into them.

Starting at the end – today’s photos show you how I am presenting the mini tapestries which I am calling “tapestry notes” – double mounted in a box frame. The weaving measures approximately 5 cms or 2 inches square(ish) and the frame is 25 cms square.

Mini tapestry box framed

Mini tapestry box framed

Mini Tapestry in situ

The tapestry hanging above the box framed piece is one I bought from the Wissa Wassef School of Tapestry in Cairo.

You can use the Donate button below to help StillWalks. Pay how much you want and receive a high quality download of this week’s featured StillWalks video – “After the Tide” which is from the marshes on the Loughor Estuary, South wales. Click the image below to watch the video.

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Another Side to StillWalks

Many of the photos I take for StillWalks videos are influenced by my interest and enjoyment of texture. I am sure this comes from the fact that I am also a tapestry weaver.

My most recent tapestries are small in scale and produced as “tapestry notes” and can be seen on my new Etsy shop, ACMDesign. Each one is unique and presented in a box frame and at £38 / $60, make fantastic Christmas presents 😉

Some of my other tapestries incorporating barbed wire are also available at the Etsy shop.

Mini tapestry box framed

Mini tapestry box framed

Freeform Foam

High Winds in Swansea Bay High Winds in Swansea Bay

You can use the new Donate button below to help StillWalks. Pay how much you want and receive a high quality download of this week’s featured StillWalks video – “Moss Wood Walk” which is from Gnoll Park in Neath, South wales. Click the image below to watch the video.

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Leaving a Mark

Swansea sea wall, like many others, takes the form of an inverted wave . . .

High Winds in Swansea Bay

You can use the new Donate button below to help StillWalks. Pay how much you want and receive a high quality download of this week’s featured StillWalks video – “Moss Wood Walk” which is from Gnoll Park in Neath, South wales. Click the image below to watch the video.

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Weaving, Wine and Wonderful Food

Weaving – I had a great week last week with a bunch of wonderful women taking my tapestry weaving course as part of the Association of Guilds of Weavers, Spinners and Dyers. Samplers were completed if not all the designed tapestries but we were able to go into detail about all the different aspects of controlling the tension in weft and warp and I hope that you will benefit from this in all your future weaving.

One of the highlights for me was when they gave me a present of two brass tipped African and Brazilian hard wood bobbins – they were so generous and I am very, very grateful 🙂

Wine and wonderful food – the catering at the summer school was good and I have no complaints but now I am home again and we are doing our own cooking. Having worked on equestrian photography all day Sunday with the help of my daughter and her boyfriend, today was my first “free” day (sort of). Tonight Julie made a fantastic Pilau Rice with which I stuffed red and green peppers (capsicums) along with chestnut mushrooms, spring onions and feta cheese. I pretty much followed this recipe and it was absolutely delicious and washed down with a very nice Portuguese red wine.

So thanks everyone for an excellent and enjoyable week and especially for those lovely bobbins.