Ladies Afternoon tea

In the spirit of life as art, My birthday party this year was a delightful tea party in the garden with ten lovely ladies. Poor Hubby was banished for the weekend but i did save him some cheese scones...

I baked many cakes and biscuits and got a bit carried away with the icing! These sweet Bollywood flower biscuits were inspired by Peggy Porschens fabulous book on cake decorating and the main cake was created to reflect the dining room curtains! Which are gorgeous gorgeous fabric from Hyena...

Altogether it was just too beautiful to eat, especially when presented on my grandmothers tea set, but we did anyway. Cheryl gave us taster reflexology massage which was absolutely wonderful, then of course it was cocktail time and we chatted over mai tais and white russians till the early hours!

What an elegant and refined Party!

Wedding Season

Just finished Katie Ffordes new book "Wedding Season" which was partly inspired by, wait for it, Me !

It is a wonderful romantic romp through the world of the wedding planners and designers/florists etc with lots of thwarted passions, mistaken romantic intentions and great descriptions of gorgeous wedding fripperies. Perfect summer garden or honeymoon holiday reading.

I am so proud to be named as an inspiriation in the credits, I was able to give Katie some insight into the design and making process of a couture wedding gown as well as running your own studio.

The details Katie absorbed whilst on the Kindred Spirits corset weekend shine through in the character of Elsa, the wedding gown designer!

Those who were also on the corset course will remember Katie was not as bad at sewing as she claims either, despite keeping us all entertained for the weekend with hysterical stories... hurah for 24 inch waists ;)

Her description of the regency party in the novel also reminded me that tickets for the regency ball in Bath in September are now sold out!!!

I shall be there of course, with my delightful friends for cake and champagne and perhaps a smidgeon of dancing....

Although not in this gorgeous silk gown which was created as last year for Kirsten, who got married in a castle!

Just put up the new dates on the website for victorian corsets, tiaras and fascinators. I'm already swamped with excited emails and phonecalls! I do intend to run some more- flat fronted corsets and pattern cutting too have been requested, but I need to find a weekend to fit them in! I'm just sooo busy!!!

polymer clay cruise

O.K. This is my idea of heaven. A whole cruise dedicated to playing with clay and living in the lap of luxury, who could ask for anything more? Polymer Paradise Clay Cruise.... leaves from New Orleans on April 19th 2008 and sails to the carribean. Without me. Hmmm, maybe I could stow away, sigh.

Just been to see "The other Boelyn girl". Wow what smashing costumes, all designed by Sandy Powell, a favourite of mine.

It was particularly nice to see the mens costumes being really padded and HUGE sleeves all round ;) with Eric Bana looking very regal too.

The Tudor corsets were flattering to all the actresses which surely must be a first for a costume drama. Who can forget poor Kiera knightlys expanse of bony chest bared in "Pride and Prejudice"? Come on designers, if the actresses don't have the cleavage cover it up with something pretty, please!

Easter weekend Polymer clay extravaganza!

Just had a great time playing with clay and creating my entries for the bead and button magazine "bead dreams" competition. I'm really please with the objects d'art but it's the first time i've entered anything for competition so we'll see...

I used kato clay liquid medium on some pieces, which is awsome, by far the most transparent liquid clay on the market, really good viscosity too, no air bubbles and a wonderful smooth finish, as you can see by the piece on the right. I shall definitely be using it again! Donna Kato's new book The art of polymer clay surface techniques...is awsome as well, very inspirational for those serious about clay!

New Article in Beads & Beyond

I was pleased to see my latest article looking very pretty in the April edition of Beads & Beyond. It was a commission to promote the "Egyptian Treasures" competition in the magazine, the prize is a trip to the Tutankhamen Exhibition at the O2 center in London.

The gorgeous artifacts are well worth a visit, although I've been told they don't actually have the original king Tut sarcophagus in the exhibition...I was fortunate enough to see it at the Cairo Museum whilst on honeymoon and it was deemed just too priceless to be allowed out of Egypt!

The article is called"Egyptian Treasures: Jewellery set inspired by the scarabs and gems of Egypt", and uses polymer clay as well as some gorgeous beads from my stash! I took molds from some of the smaller sculpty scarabs I made ages ago, and made them up to look like pure burnished gold, adding a bunny in faux-jade as a centre piece. The rabbit, in Egyptian hieroglyphics, means 'no'. Any excuse for bunnies :)