IT'S BLACK FRIDAY!

It's Black Friday and I am doing a sale on my Etsy online shop. If you would like to purchase any of my work, here it is your chance to do it with a 10% discount. Sale continues until Monday the 28th of November.

http://www.etsy.com/shop/nanafro

HOLIDAY SEASON WITH GREAT ART AND CRAFT SHOWS

We artists and artisans are starting to get ready for all the end of year events around the city. There are quite a few fairs in Vancouver where you can find unique hand made Christmas gifts for your family and friends. In two weeks time you can visit my studio during the 3 days of Culture Crawl, and you can also find me at the 12th Shiny Fuzzy Muddy holiday show in December. I am preparing some great hand dyed products for women and children for both occasions! Please, come and say hello!

CULTURE CRAWL IN NOVEMBER

We are getting excited about one more year of the big event. This is a great chance to meet Vancouver artists with studios based in East Van. Grab a map, choose the buildings you want to visit and enjoy! I am located at the Mergatroid Building on Vernon Drive. I would love to see you here. Come and say hello! 

MAIS UM PONTO DE VENDA EM SÃO PAULO!

Se você já comprou alguma meia-calça da minha coleção e deseja adquirir mais uma, ou se nunca teve a chance de enfeitar suas pernas com estes coloridos acessórios, agora tenho mais um ponto de venda em São Paulo: a belíssima e tentadora loja de sapatos Ciao Mao, na Rua Melo Alves, 368.
Formamos uma bela parceria, você não vai se arrepender da visita!

As meias também continuam disponíveis na IT, loja de design e acessórios do Instituto Tomie Othake.

LAST FARMERS MARKET OF THE SEASON!

It is coming o the end...
I will be doing my last Farmers Market of the season this weekend. If you haven't visited me in one of these fun events or if would like to visit me again, I will be in Kitsilano this Sunday. Last weekend my hand dyed tights and leggings were a great success at the Trout Lake market so there is a new batch for this week. For the first time some children decided to get some, I am sure they will look super cute on them!

Kitsilano Farmers Market  Sunday - July, 3rd
10am - 2pm
2690 Larch Street at 10th Avenue, Parking Lot of Kitsilano Community Centre
 

WORKSHOP DE BATIK EM SÃO PAULO

Não percam esta oportunidade, será a única vez no ano!

VANCOUVER FARMERS MARKETS ARE GREAT!

Nothing like a beautiful sunny day to launch my first season at the Vancouver Farmers Market. Last Sunday I had my booth in Kitsilano and had a wonderful time. It is such a friendly small market with lots of people walking around. Dogs, babies, and pregnant women are a great part of the public, which brings lots of life to this fun Sunday event. If you have never been to these markets, it is time to visit one. And if you usually go to them, please come and say hi! I am the lady always standing there selling leagwears, organic cotton baby t-shirts, and linen scarves, all hand dyed! This coming weekend will be a double journey for me: I will be at Trout Lake on Saturday and back to Kitsilano on Sunday. Lets hope for great weather again!

This is Jun, a market visitor leaving my booth wearing a linen scarf she had just bought from me. 

SHWE SHWE FABRICS - PART II

                In the beginning of April I did a post on Shwe Shwe fabrics including images of some of the ones I bought in South Africa. Here there are a few more to show how large the variety of patterns can be! There is something pretty amazing about some of them: they are printed on both sides with different patterns. If I had to make a choice on which side to use it would be a tuff call... I better think on reversible objects!

reversible/double side shwe shwe fabric

reversible/double side fabric

one side

the other!

detail

THREE STUDIES: ITAJIME SHIBORI ON LINEN

Since I decided to make scarves again (last ones I made were long ago...) I have been testing several kinds of fabric trying to find the ones that I like the most in terms of beauty, touch, and drape.

My studio partner  kindly offered me some pieces of linen to try. I cut them in square shapes so if the tests turned out nice she could use them for cushion covers. This are the three results, which I was quite happy with. I started with an orange color, which I overlaid with raspberry followed by brown. The fabrics have been also folded and clamped twice. 

Linen scarves will definitely be part of the new collection!

AMARIA IN SÃO PAULO

If you live in São Paulo and admires textile and wearable art it is worth getting to know in person Amaria's work. The company was idealized by designer Mayumi Ito. Mayumi works together with weavers, sewers, embroiders and artisans from Muzambinho, at southweast of Minas Gerais. Amaria's clothes exalt the importance of traditional craft at the same time that they keep original and contemporary aesthetics.

Their site shows all the collections: Amaria

Se você mora em São Paulo e é um(a) admirador(a) de arte têxtil não deixe de conhecer pessoalmente o trabalho da Amaria, companhia idealizada pela designer Mayumi Ito. Mayumi trabalha junto aos tecelões, costureiras, bordadeiras e artesãos de Muzambinho, do sudoeste de Minas Gerais. As roupas de Amaria exaltam a importância do artesanato tradicional ao mesmo tempo que mantêm uma estética original e contemporânea.

Veja o site com as coleções: Amaria
Se puder veja também ao vivo!

SHWE SHWE FABRICS - PART I

         Few weeks ago I did a post on wax print fabrics from Africa, which I brought back from my trip there in the beginning of the year. The other kind of fabric that impressed me (and of course I couldn't resist buying a whole bunch of them!) was the Shwe Shwe.

         Shwe shwe is nowadays the most typical South African fabric and it was introduced to the country by European settlers after a seaport was first established at the Cape of Good Hope in 1652. The fabrics are still done traditionally by using the method that was used one hundred years ago: the fabric is fed through copper rollers which have patterns etched on the surface, allowing a weak acid solution to be fed into the fabric, bleaching out the distinctive white designs. This creates a beautiful pattern that cannot be artificially reproduced.

         All fabrics are 100% cotton and the designs are very detailed and intricate. Traditional shwe shwe fabrics are    printed in three colours: indigo blue, red and chocolate brown. They are typically stiff when new. This is because starch was historically used to preserve the fabric on long sea voyages from the UK to South Africa. After washing, the stiffness disappears, leaving a soft cotton feel.

        The term “shwe shwe” apparently established itself for being the swishing sound made by the long skirts used by South African woman when they walked.

Shwe shwe, shwe shwe.....

        Each pair of images below tries to give a sense of the proportion of the designs (quite small!), followed by a zoomed in photo to show the patterns intricate details.

CREATIVE TOOLS FOR PRINTING FABRICS

         Quite a while ago I had a fun experience visiting for the first time a shop on main St. called Urban Source. It is a place that attracts art teachers, artists, designers, students, and families, and it is definetely worth a visit. They offer a variety of alternative materials from local industries, diverting safe, usable off-cuts, discards, misprints and over stock from the land fill.
           In my visit there I found some small foam cylinders being sold by bulk. I immediately visualized them being used to stamp on fabric, foreseeing some beautiful printing outcomes. It took me a long time to create and construct the actual tool, but it is finally ready and approved after having done the first tests! I have to  thank my husband for doing his part on it since he has kindly assembled the door handles for me. Aren't they perfect as stamp handles as well? Check it out!

        

WAX PRINTS FROM AFRICA

      I finally managed to photograph some of the fabrics that I brought from South Africa in January. I had to do some digging to find where the vibrant colorful wax prints were. I couldn't find the most beautiful ones in fabric stores but I did find them around street markets. Sellers in markets do not expose them among the products they are selling, so you really gotta ask around. Surprisely I found out the doorman from the hotel I was staying was from Congo and he had some fabrics himself! Aparently Congo is one of the great producers of wax prints in Africa. Would that be the next stop???

Nana Fro Textile Art on Facebook

You are invited to visit my new page on Facebook.
Become a fan to receive some great tips and lots of useful information!
I will also be posting new photo albums as the work progress.

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Nana-Fro-Textile-Art/185832318119178?sk=wall

SUNSET FROM THE STUDIO

These photos were taken during sunset viewed from the studio yesterday. I am glad I had my camera with me. Just a simple automatic camera in the night setting. I was so impressed with the number of shades and colours that were kindly offered to me on a cold winter day!

Estes dias descobri por acaso pela internet uma artista com um trabalho belíssimo em tecido. Seu nome é Cristina Haberl e ela parece que vive em algum lugar no Rio Grande do Sul, se não por outras bandas no sul do Brasil. Em seu trabalho mais recente Cristina desenvolve estampas esclusivas utilizando-se da combinação entre técnicas de tingimento (principalmente shibori), carimbos e stencils criados e feitos por ela.

Vale a pena conferir o site: http://www.cristinahaberl.net

HANDS OF KOREAN ARTISTS

South Korean fiber artists play an important role on the development of the textile scene around the world.Capable of producing complex yet delicate and sensible pieces of work, artists are able to successfully combine elements of their traditional fabrics with with new media and contemporary approaches. Here are some examples of the amazing works that they can do.

Korea featured as guest of the last European Patchwork Meeting held in France last year. If you would like to know more about participating Korean artists and the event, go to their webpage at http://www.handsofkorea.com