Kanzashi Fairy Godmother

Helen's first-ever outdoor selling event is less than a week away, and she's nervously trying to take care of details, but I wanted to tell you a fun little story of serendipitous luck which has already resulted in some lovely new kanzashi pieces!

Helen's friend Kas has a Japanese-Polish cousin who lived for a while in Japan.  Kas's cousin has a Japanese friend whose son attended an English language program in Madison, WI. Every weekend, he would come to stay with Kas and her husband, and do normal American family type things with them. Eternally grateful, Kas's cousin's Japanese friend has been sending Kas lavish gifts for years. Well as it turns out, the lady makes kimonos.

One day, Kas casually asked Helen if she would like some more fabric for making kanzashi, explaining that she has a Japanese friend who might have some of the stuff to send. Helen said sure. Then they both forgot all about it.

Until about 3 weeks ago, when a beautiful box stuffed with primo kimono remnants arrived in the mail. Gorgeous, colorful chirimen silk, silk linings, cotton remnants, obi scraps, silk that Helen doesn't know what to call or how to describe. Fabric that Helen can use and fabric that she's giving away to her friend Angela. For a kanzashi maker, this is like dying and going to heaven.

Just to show you how crazy beautiful some of these Japanese textiles are, I made Helen take some pictures. First, here's a remnant that Helen couldn't bear to cut up....it's going to Angela....

Photos cannot do it justice. At least, not Helen's photos. Similarly, here's a gorgeous piece that Helen also hates to cut up, but might anyway.....a big pattern with beautiful flowers. Here's a detail...

So. Helen wanted more colorful silk for making pendants,and that is what she received. Here are only the first six long ribbon necklaces...

Buy them this Saturday, August 17th, at the Walk for the Animals, benefiting the Washington County Humane Society here in Wisconsin. We'll be at Jackson Park, in the village of Jackson. All day.

There are so many more possibilities in that box full of fabric, so carefully packed by its sender. It's a silk candy store. Helen is so grateful to her kanzashi fairy godmother, somewhere in Japan, and planning on including a pendant for her in the next care package that Kas sends.

More Necklaces and a Pin

Helen and I have both been very busy, of course, but we found time to make a few things in between working, trying to garden a little in this very cold weather, and trying to organize a few reviews of Helen's new recording (check out the super sexy new press release and a couple tunes here). To begin with, Helen made her first nanohana.

Nanohana is the flower of the rape plant. Despite its unfortunate English name, rape is a very tasty vegetable, and I understand its seeds are also useful! Nanohana is a kanzashi flower for March, and is usually portrayed in clusters. Helen just made one as a pendant from vintage kimono silk with a wonderfully crinkly texture...

 

Buy the necklace here. What else? A colorful little star-shaped flower from the remains of a beautiful silk blend jacquard that Helen's friend J9 gave her.....

 

 

....a red habotai flower with yellow jade.....

 

 

.....buy it here  . And finally, a flower that just had to be a brooch, made from an old silk scarf that J9 gave to Helen...

 

 

We just love the colors. It will probably end up in a gallery. We can see making some ume or plum flower pendants from this fabric.

 

OK, that's all for the moment. Soon, kanzashi bracelets.

Kanzashi Necklaces

 

Sorry for the delay, as usual, but there are so many new things to report! Helen has a new recording, a new publicist, a new iPad mini, a new Alexander Technique teacher, and a new kanzashi design......necklaces!

Here's what happened: Helen's friend Rebecca came over one day and said, "Make me a necklace, here's how you can do it". Rebecca is an art teacher, so she always has lots of Ideas. Well, not all of them work, as it turns out, but Helen liked the concept, and decided to try it.

Helen never cared much for fabic flower necklaces, because combining fabric with metal chains never seemed Quite Right to her. Rebecca's idea was for a long ribbon necklace with just one small flower. After doing some Experimenting, Helen arrived at her pendant design, and here's how to do it.

OK, make your flower.....probably something small with 4-7 petals. Now, cut a small piece of thin satin ribbon.....1 inch is probably sufficient. Fold the ribbon in half.....this is going to be your loop. Hand sew the ribbon to a small piece of fabric that won't fray....some knit or spandex sort of thing. Just tack it a few times. It will look roughly like this:

That's the underside. Glue this side to the flower. Here's the exposed side:

All right, it's hard to tell from the photo, but it looks relatively clean.....you mainly see the fabric, a few stitches, and a small ribbon loop. Now, glue it to the back of the flower, and slip a long ribbon through the loop, like this:

OK, so you've glued it. What about the back of the flower? You have to have something to protect it and hide the unmentionables, like glue and/or stitches. After trying a few things, Helen has decided on using the same fabric as the flower. Cut a small circle, treat the raw edge with fray prevention liquid or heat, and glue it to the flower back. All right, now for the fun part. Here are some completed necklaces. This one is silver fabric with a coin pearl....

 

 

That one's at the Morning Glory Gallery . Here are some that will be in Helen's Etsy shop soon...these are all silk of various sorts. This one's more about the leaves than the flower....

 

 

Fleur-de-lis.....

 

 

Dupioni silk with a coin pearl....

 

 

Another dupioni silk with a blue jade bead....

 

 

More to come.

 

Just a tip...pendants get bumped around more than brooches or hair accessories, so Helen is trying to stick mainly with silk for these flowers. We're impressed by the staying power of habutai, and the resilience of chirimen (neither of which are pictured here, lol). We all may stray to synthetics every now and again, but we can see the reason kanzashi were and are made from kimono silk....it's absolutely the right fabric.