An Arts & Crafts Day Out

Following the recent Tate Britain Pre-Raphaelites exhibition (which I thought was ace), I've been on a bit of a Victoriana tip. And so, last week I took a little trip to the William Morris Gallery in Walthamstow. Now, we all know how fab Walthamstow is for fabric shopping. You only have to see the great textile scores that Karen from Did You Make That? makes on a regular basis to know that it's a total mecca for sewing lovers. But if you can tear yourself away from the shopping, the gallery is well worth a visit.

As a graphic designer by day, I loved all the typography dotted about the building, as well as that that Morris himself designed for his printing venture, Kelmscott Press.

But of course, the real stars of the show are the fabrics and wallpapers with Morris's distinctive and beautiful patterns. Morris aimed to colour all his fabrics with natural dyes and spent ten years perfecting the process, which is amazing when you see the vibrancy and depth of colour in real life.

All in all I'd definitely recommend a visit, despite the fact that the gallery doesn't have a guide book for sale. What a missed opportunity, I love a guide book! It's not a huge gallery, so a couple of hours is enough to have a good wander round and a cup of tea in the cafe afterwards, leaving plenty of time for those fabric shops on the way back to the station...

Pattern testers wanted

Well we're starting off 2013 with a call for help! We're now looking for some pattern testers to help us test out our first Gather dress pattern.

The dress is a lovely, chic day dress with a sleeveless or long sleeve option, in sizes 8-18 (UK). We're looking for all levels of sewers although the pattern is aimed at ambitious beginners. We will send you out the pattern with full instructions absolutely free, all you'll need is the fabric (appox 3 metres of cotton - full details will be provided) and notions. All we want in return is your invaluable feedback and comments!

So are there any budding dressmakers out there who want a FREE dress pattern? We're looking to send out the pattern packs within the next couple of weeks so if you're interested then get in touch with us as soon as possible on info@gatherkits.com or you can tweet us @gatherkits

UPDATE: we've had a really fantastic response, thanks so much for all the interest and we now have enough testers. Watch this space for future opportunities though!

Christmas tree decorations - a tutorial

This is possibly the quickest and simplest way to use up your fabric scraps and make some toddler/cat proof decorations for the tree! They take very little time to make and all you need are some fabric scraps and stuffing - I used toy stuffing but if you don't have any you could easily use cotton wool.

Take your scraps (around 3" x 3" is best) and lay them together with the WRONG sides facing. Draw the shape that you want to make using a fabric pencil or marker - I used a glass to draw round mine.

Using the edge of your presser foot as a guide, stitch inside the line that you've drawn, leaving a small gap so you can stuff later.

Remember to backstitch at the beginning and end. Using a small amount, gently push the stuffing into your decoration, taking care not to overfill as it's then tricky to sew closed! When you've filled it, sew the opening closed and tie off the ends by hand.

Using pinking shears, trim around the shape using the line that you marked earlier. Thread a piece of cotton through the top, knot and hang on your tree! So simple.

Tada! This is our last post before Christmas - we hope you all enjoy the festive season. We'll be back sometime in the new year with exciting pattern testing news!

A list for Santa

Really? Is it that time of year AGAIN? It seems like no time ago at all that we were prepping for last Christmas. Not that I'm complaining - I absolutely adore the festive season. And as we're feeling pretty smug, with most of the xmas shopping complete, it's time to think about what's going on our xmas wishlists. You know, just in case anybody feels the need to buy us armfuls of presents...

Some might say that the ombre trend has had its day, but these tights by Virivee are AH-MAZ-ING. In my naivety I tried to make myself a pair of these in the summer, only to discover that lycra doesn't dye that well...

A sweet acorn necklace by Antonia Ross, to wear on wintery walks in the woods with loved ones.

Obviously not for me (although if they came in bigger sizes I would be tempted - even if I'd look mad), this lobster hat and mittens would make any little dude in your life look more adorable than they already are.

It's pretty chilly out there and apparently it's going to be the coldest winter for years, so wrap up in one of Bless the Weather's cosy cowls. The lady who makes these also has a wonderful blog featuring
beautiful photography of London life - a lot of it South London based (whoop!)

Oh, I do love the V&A. I could spend HOURS in there. Ok ok, so a lot of that time of it would likely be in the shop, but when I'd managed to prise myself away from the retail therapy, the Hollywood exhibition looks sumptuously amazing.

So, that's what we're wishing for this Christmas - what's on your wishlist?

A few me-made presents

Seeing as it's coming round to 'that' time of year again (I can't quite bring myself to say the big C word...) I thought I'd get cracking early with some little me-made pressies for some of the little people in my family!

You can't get simpler and easier than some pretty name bunting for nurseries or bedrooms and this is a great way of using up some of those larger scraps of fabric. All you need is some triangles of fabric - I double sided mine but you can easily use just one piece and cut out with pinking shears. I cut the letters out from felt and stuck down with fabric glue. So easy! If you wanted something a bit more detailed you could appliqué the letters on to the flags.

The recipients have obviously not yet seen these so here is just a sneaky peek!

I decided to make some bags to present them in as well as I've been wanting to try out some transfer paper that I bought a while ago. I'm starting to see a lot of these calico bags in the shops now with initials or pictures printed on and so whipped up my own version for a fraction of the cost. I used Lesley Riley Transfer Artist Paper which is brilliant and can be used for printing on to lots of different surfaces, not just fabrics. Again, these bags were very quick and easy to make but add an extra touch which makes the whole present look really special.

Sandra's also been crafting and has made a tote bag from the Cath Kidston 'Sew' book as a present for a certain someone - we won't mention who just in case she's reading!

So, the Christmas crafting has begun! Are you making any of your presents this year? Or is all your sewing time devoted to yourself?!

Where have we been?

It's been a rather long time since we've been able to update this space - apologies for our absence!

We're still here, we're still working away! We got our pattern back from the graders back in August and sadly it had to go straight back to be re-graded as there were a couple of issues. Since then we've been busy testing to ensure everything is perfect and all our measurements are ok. We've also been hard at work adding all the detail to the pattern and transforming it into something beautiful. We spent a very enjoyable evening brain storming names (all will be revealed soon!) and have been drawing diagrams and re-working our instructions to be as clear as possible.

Sadly, Gather HQ was burgled a few weeks back and amongst various things taken was the laptop which contained all our precious hard work. Heart breaking. We had backed it up a few months back so all is not lost entirely but certainly the most recent version of the instructions has gone and will have to be rewritten. Luckily we still have the file with the finished pattern otherwise I think we may have both suffered a nervous breakdown! As you can imagine this has been a frustrating time and we are now waiting on the insurance company to decide to pay out so we can purchase a new mac and get back on it!

But we're excited still and raring to go with this pattern - now we're approaching the crazy Christmas season we're not planning on doing any pattern testing until the new year. Keep an eye out if you're interested in doing this, you can check back here or follow us on twitter: @gatherkits

Hoping to be back soon with a couple of Christmas crafty posts. That's all for now!

Slowly but surely...

It's been a while since we updated our progress in this space - not because we haven't been hard at work, simply that we've fallen behind our original time plan and things have taken a lot longer than we originally thought.

When we began this venture, we sat down, planned everything out with a clear time frame and gave ourselves deadlines. This promptly went out of the window as soon as we started!

We had wildly underestimated the time involved in the designing, drafting and testing of our pattern - a process frustrating at times but ultimately one worth taking the time to get right. This, coupled with the fact that neither of us are able to spend as much time as we'd like on our project, meant we found ourselves a little behind where we had wanted to be at this time. A brilliant (and rather steep) learning curve though. I suspect that there are very few small businesses that are started up on time and exactly as planned, I feel it's almost part of the process!

So, where are we now? Well, the very exciting news is that our first pattern is currently at the graders, being magically transformed from a one size set of paper pattern pieces into a digital nest of 6 sizes. We're expecting to receive them at the end of this week and, assuming all is well and correct (a rather large assumption I know!) will be putting the call out for pattern testers next week.