Rabbit Tarot by Nakisha Elsje VanderHoeven. [more inside]
posted by cjorgensen on Oct 26, 2009 - 24 comments

Renowned blacksmith, Phillip Simmons, of Charleston, SC has died at age 98. [more inside]
posted by 1f2frfbf on Jun 24, 2009 - 16 comments

Your household probably gets something like 800 pieces of junk mail per year. Other than sighing and tossing the junk into your recycling bin, what are your options? Of course, I’d urge you to support any one of the numerous current anti-junk mail campaigns (do be aware of any possible conflicts of interest), but until those measures take effect, there is always crafting. [more inside]
posted by orange swan on May 24, 2009 - 29 comments

Etsy has a YouTube channel where they have all kinds of profiles of their users and how-to guides. My two favorite series are the Process series (e.g. New Books with Old Materials & Tin Toys) and Handmade Portraits (e.g. Armor Guitars & Wood Mosaics). In the description of each video there is a link to the corresponding entry on Etsy's blog, The Storque. The blogposts have more information on the users and sometimes further links and videos. [via Work in Progress]
posted by Kattullus on Apr 20, 2009 - 5 comments

If you have too much mismatched cutlery to fit in your kitchen drawers, take a stab at crafting with it! Make a wind chime, fork key ring, fork cup rings or coat hooks, make cutlery clocks, or light fixtures such as these by designer Ali Siahvoshi. Or you can make jewelry: fork bracelets, a fork necklace pendant, or collaged spoon necklace pendants like those made by SpoonFedArt. Forks and spoons make groovy rings. Here’s how to make spoon rings. For more inspiration, check out this cutlery chair sculpture by Osian Batyka-Williams, this cutlery table by Toni Grilo, some sculpture by Matthew Bartik, Vince Pompei’s whimsical silverware flowers, clocks and sculptures, or the items at Forkometry. Just don’t get so carried away with your new craft that you find yourself having to eat with your fingers.
posted by orange swan on Mar 8, 2009 - 9 comments

You can’t make an omelet without breaking eggs, and you can’t buy eggs without winding up with egg cartons. What will you do with the empty cartons? Well, you could make a string of flower lights, lamps, or a pendant light. If you refrained from drinking too much egg nog over the holidays, you might be lightweight enough to make use of a egg carton seat. This company makes footstools out of egg cartons. [more inside]
posted by orange swan on Feb 23, 2009 - 15 comments

What can be done with worn, outgrown or single socks? Well, if you want to wear those favourite socks awhile longer, you can darn them. If your baby’s feet are no longer so tiny, make a baby sock purse or sachet, baby sock reindeer, or baby sock corsage or bouquet decorations for a friend’s baby shower. You can make a hat out of your child’s outgrown socks, or your kids can make Barbie clothes. You can use single socks to make a foot massager, potholders, slippers, a dog rug, a snowman, sock puppets or cute critters. Or sock art installations. See these articles for more pedestrian ways to use socks.
posted by orange swan on Jan 15, 2009 - 18 comments

So, you have some old books lying around you don’t read and that you're pretty sure no one else will ever read because they have pages missing or they’re hopelessly outdated technical manuals or they never should have been published in the first place. What to do? As always, crafting is an option. You can make a wrist cuff, or a purse. Book covers can be made into clocks, or photo frames, or photo and card stands. They can become CD and DVD cases, or a hiding place for valuables or necessary contraband, Shawshank Redemption-style. [more inside]
posted by orange swan on Jan 4, 2009 - 20 comments

Audio visual technology changes so fast that if you’re of a certain age you’ve been left holding the bag of cassettes, VHS tapes and vinyl records. What will you do with these AV artifacts if you no longer want to play them? Have no fear; you can have lots of crafty fun with your real audio. You can make a cassette tape mini journal, a cassette wallet or cassette coin purse, or a mini cassette lamp. If you’re into melting stuff, you can make a sculpture, such as this skeleton, from the plastic. The tape can be crocheted or knitted into items like totes, evening bags, Barbie halter dresses, or baby booties. [more inside]
posted by orange swan on Dec 21, 2008 - 11 comments

If people who have a lot of time on their hands and inner demons to exorcise turn to art as an outlet, the results can be startling, even if they have had no prior art instruction and have to make a paint brush out of their own hair and use coffee as paint, or weave things out of hoarded chip or Ramen bags. Drawing elaborately on handkerchiefs became so common in the mid 20th century it's become known as panos. Welcome to the world of prison art. [more inside]
posted by orange swan on Nov 26, 2008 - 12 comments

Got some old leather articles lying around that have become dated, worn, or too small? Well, happy days are here again for your old leather goods, because here are some ideas on how to make old leather items into new items you can use. [more inside]
posted by orange swan on Nov 16, 2008 - 4 comments

You've been getting your sweaters out for the cold season, and finding that moths have been picknicking on them all summer. Or your significant other did the laundry and threw your favourite handwash-only sweaters into a hot water wash and/or the dryer. Or your children have outgrown the sweaters Grandma made them. However your sweaters became unwearable, it's time to make like a surgeon and do some cosmetic reconstruction. (If the old sweaters are at least 50% wool, you may be able to felt the material first.) You can make extra long gloves from sweater sleeves, mittens, a scarf, or slippers, legwarmers, a tote bag, a few handbags, or a coin purse. If the kids don't want to let go of their favourite sweaters, they can be pacified with building blocks, a bunny, snail, or seahorse, or diaper-coverup pants. If the cat feels left out, make it a pet bed. Or you can make things the whole family can enjoy: throw pillows, a quilt, or felted bowls. Since Christmas is approaching, Christmas stockings or a wreath might come in handy. If you want to get into needle felting and start sculpting with the felted fabric, you could make virtually anything, including, oh, say, a robin in a nest, Anne of Green Gables, a zebra, or art for the wall. And best of all, by the time you're done you no longer want to throttle your laundry-challenged significant other! As much.
posted by orange swan on Oct 19, 2008 - 11 comments

As most women know, nylon stockings don't last. They run, they snag, they rip, and they can't be mended. And they take 40 to 50 years to decompose in a landfill. I was sure as I began researching this post that there must be some great pantyhose crafting and art ideas out there. But the results were, um, mixed. If you are into weaving, you can make some wall hangings or rugs from nylons. If you're a Klondike Kate type who sews, you can make a skirt. If you work in a corporate environment but want to keep your edge, you can abide by your company's dress code AND sport temporary tattoos. If you're a crafty bride-to-be, you can make flowers or dragonflies for wedding decorations. If you're into the less practical kind of art, you can create semi-wearable pantyhose art, or construct pantyhose art installations like artist Mary Nicollet. You can even make pantyhose dolls, and stick them in a jar if you want to. Just be prepared for the fact that most people will never understand why you'd want to. But beware, because pantyhose arts and crafts are either underexplored or instrinsically strange, and can go from “interesting” or “kind of cute” to “bizarre” and “kind of disturbing” faster than a run can make its way from your thigh to your toes. [more inside]
posted by orange swan on Oct 1, 2008 - 38 comments

So, as a fashionista or due to your upbringing, you don't want to use wire coat hangers. Yet they keep accumulating in your closet. And perhaps you don't have a thrift shop or dry cleaner in your vicinity that will accept them. You can only use so many weenie roasters and dowsing rods, and your old talent for unlocking car doors is useless on modern locks. What to do? Well, some people improve/camouflage their hangers by covering them with braided strips of plastic bags, fabric, or yarn. But there are other, non-clothes hanging, uses for wire hangers. At the simplest end of the spectrum, you could make a toilet paper holder, or wool sock blockers. You could use the wire as a frame for decorative wreaths (or a wreath for your stitch and bitch party), or little Christmas trees or a Christmas card display rack. You could make a light fixture, or a chandelier. If you have a surplus of plastic hangers, they can become a light fixture too. Or you could make a chair. If you're feeling especially artistic, or just want something to fill in a blank space on the wall, you might follow the lead of artist Lawrence L'Hote, or of artist Philippa King, and make, say, a portrait of Queen Elizabeth, or a sculpture based on a Picasso sketch. And if you're really enthusiastic about the possibilities of wire hangers, try your hand at making a gorilla, a spaceman, or a hooker like artist David Mach. Just please be particularly careful not to put an eye out, since that's not an improvement on mashed clothing.
posted by orange swan on Sep 24, 2008 - 34 comments

Uh oh, you smashed a dish while you were washing up. But you don't get upset, because you know what to do with the pieces. Being both cultured and crafty, you not only know about the long and illustrious history of mosaic art but also that you can make mosaics from china and ceramic shards as well as pebbles, beads (new or removed from old jewelery), shells, marbles, or even lego or Scrabble tiles. So you take those pieces of your broken plate (and others that klutzy you has broken in the past) and, following some basic instructions, make numbers for your house, a fireplace surround, a birdbath, a flowerpot, a table or two or four, a tray, picture or mirror frames, a wall mural/homage to Hitchcock, or even a floor. By now you're wishing you had a spare basilica or Roman villa so you could really go nuts. And, besides planning on picking up some thrift shop china, you're eyeing that 48-piece reindeer-and-elves Christmas dinnerware set your mother-in-law gave you a few years back and thinking it's really too bad you're so clumsy and likely to break it in the very near future.
posted by orange swan on Sep 16, 2008 - 20 comments

NetFlix Origami The fun way to recycle your NetFlix flaps
posted by ColdChef on Sep 12, 2008 - 13 comments

Papa Palmérino Sorgente, the Pope of Montréal [more inside]
posted by XMLicious on Feb 28, 2008 - 8 comments

Howl's Moving Castle - in papercraft. Stop motion animation of the assembly here, flickr set of the finished product here, details on the kit here. Found via.
posted by jonson on Feb 25, 2008 - 12 comments

Scandinavian Grace's beard cap has inspired the internet. Now plans are available to make your own bearded cap. Have a large head? No problem! Skeleclavas lack a beard, but make warming your head a little more hardcore
posted by betaray on Feb 17, 2008 - 15 comments

TOKYO International Great Quilt Festival 2008, a photo collection of beautiful Japanese art quilts. From Moonstitches via CRAFT.
posted by artifarce on Jan 30, 2008 - 7 comments

Join a community commitment to make a thing a day for the month of February. "knit cook draw paint sodier (sic) write install destroy invent document" are presented as ideas to demonstrate that anything goes. Last year's contributions are currently down, but did run the gamut of media and topics.
posted by artifarce on Jan 21, 2008 - 8 comments

VADS is a resource for visual art, a huge range of things from students' work to collections of historical art and design. [more inside]
posted by paduasoy on Jan 4, 2008 - 6 comments

Tiny Buildings - "a collection of tiny buildings handcrafted from business cards, packaging and other nice papers."
posted by dobbs on Dec 25, 2007 - 10 comments

Toy art: tribal scooters, spider car, little animal robots out of broken electrical parts, a color changing house designed by a 14 year old boy, of wood, wind-up, MunkyKing, Ugly Dolls, out of beer cans, with balloons, Cute Things, artoyz, toys from trash, tiny knitted dolls clothes and accessories, vintage and retro at Tick Tock Toys.
posted by nickyskye on Jul 7, 2007 - 15 comments

Miniature motorcycles, made from watch parts. [via It's Knuttz]
posted by mediareport on Jun 28, 2007 - 17 comments

Bag Ladies and Gentlemen.... Yes, you conscientiously refuse plastic shopping bags and use enviro bags as often as you can, but still the plastic bags manage to breed like roaches. How many plastic bags do you have stuffed in (naturally!) a large plastic bag somewhere in your home? And do you despair of ever using them up? Fear not! If you have more bags than home furnishings and décor items, you could make a chair, a few throw rugs, cushions, a chandelier, or a Christmas wreath. If you’d like a stylish yet waterproof wardrobe, you could make a cape, a raincoat, or a bra. It would be less utilitarian but equally cool to make your own menagerie: chickens, a zebra, more chickens, sea creatures, and still more chickens. [more inside]
posted by orange swan on Jun 11, 2007 - 35 comments

How could you make the TARDIS even cooler? First, strip away the whole "bigger on the inside than the out" part, and second, get rid of the ability to travel in space & time. Finally, add the ability to play every arcade videogame ever invented.
posted by jonson on Mar 13, 2007 - 17 comments

My Misio - a site for a pet crochet bear cat. Some nice pics in the diary section and a vid, too. {It be Flash}
posted by dobbs on Nov 28, 2006 - 8 comments

What to do once your beer is all gone All right, so you’ve finished your beverage. You’ve discreetly released the gas from your digestive tract via your mouth. And now you want to dispose of the empty can. You consider your options. Public-spirited as you are, you are too savvy to believe that you can redeem the pull tab for a wheelchair or a dialysis machine, or that an aluminum beanie will protect your brain from alien forces, and you are far too civilized to smash the can against your forehead. As a responsible, ecologically minded person you could recycle, but you’re also creative, and recycling would leave that artistic urge unsatisfied. So, perhaps you whip up a morning glory wreath for the front door. Or an airplane. Or a honeybee. Or the Starship Enterprise, a shark, a knight in shining aluminum armour, a piano, a hot rod, a Christmas tree, roses for your beloved, or Easter lilies for your mother. Or whatever else strikes your fancy. Then you have twin epiphanies: that you’ve entered the wonderful world of aluminum crafting, and that after emptying all those cans you urgently need to pee.
posted by orange swan on Nov 6, 2006 - 22 comments

The Toymaker offers over 40 free paper toys and pretties you can print out (PDFs) and make yourself, as well as "Stories to be Told by Firelight" - online versions of author/illustrator Marilyn Scott Waters' children's stories and lots of other fun goodies. For people who have kids, people who know kids, people who are kids, and people who love papercraft, illustration, toys, and tales. [more...]
posted by taz on Jul 24, 2006 - 18 comments

Robots, rockets, and rayguns, oh my!
posted by Robot Johnny on Apr 7, 2006 - 11 comments

2-inch books (flash) is a delightful exhibit of tiny hand-crafted books. The 2005 winners (pdf) of the Miniature Book Society's annual competition offers a sampling of little books that have been published. Tiny tomes have been delighting readers and collectors for 4,000 years. If these tiny treasures intrigue you, perhaps you'd like to collect your own vintage or contemporary library.
posted by madamjujujive on Mar 18, 2006 - 11 comments

Fantastically obsessive & detailed recreation of Bag End (Bilbo's home from The Hobbit) in dollhouse scale. Pictures from the start of the project here.
posted by jonson on Jan 15, 2006 - 14 comments

Ultimate Recycling Rug hooking must be one of the simplest and cost-effective of crafts (basically, cut old clothes into strips, use burlap, insert hook, pull up loop of fabric), and so it’s all the more amazing that it can be used to achieve such cool, painterly and stunning results. If you click on just one link in this FPP, make it this one, made by a Japanese woman out of her grandmother’s old silk kimonos. I’ve selected just one excellent, comprehensive rug hooking web site, but there’s a lot of resources and information available on the web for this craft if you’re interested.
posted by orange swan on Jan 17, 2005 - 12 comments

The art of being Kuna - the Kuna, an aboriginal people living off the coast of Panama, are perhaps most famous for their colorful fabric panels called molas. The Kuna women wear these embroidered appliques on blouses. The most prized specimens are those that show some sign of wear, such as fading, distress, or stitch marks, indicating authentic and traditional molas rather than ones produced for tourists. If you'd like to try your hand at making a mola, the 5th grade class at Highland Park can show you how.
posted by madamjujujive on Jun 30, 2004 - 4 comments

Have some extra free time? Why not try your hand at some paper craft?
posted by Robot Johnny on Apr 13, 2004 - 7 comments

Mille Fiori by Chihuly - a sweeping glassworks art installation marks the opening of the new Tacoma museum building. Dale Chihuly, one of the great masters of our time, also has an exhibit in Hamilton, NJ through July. Not content with stunning windows, walls and chandeliers, Chihuly creates towers, gardens, ceilings, and more, often weaving his work within natural elements to create fantasy waterscapes and landscapes. - more -
posted by madamjujujive on Apr 26, 2003 - 12 comments

These are not your grandmom's type of crafts. Twice a year in NYC and Chicago, SOFA (Sculptural Objects and Functional Art) holds spectacular exhibits to showcase the best contemporary sculptors and craftspeople throughout the world. The Chicago show is coming up October 25-27. Even if you can't attend, why not browse through images of past shows and links to more than 85 participating galleries?
posted by madamjujujive on Oct 12, 2002 - 5 comments

Sand Art: it's everyone's favorite preschool art activity, now on your PC! Go sand art! Still, with this version you can't get into sand throwing fights with your friends...
posted by unreason on Sep 21, 2002 - 5 comments