I am visiting my folks in Falmouth, Maine where I grew up. My mom has just gotten a new knee and am around to keep the pieces together. All around the house are many of my old lampshades. It's fun to see the progress of my work. Yes, our work does get better the longer we stay with it. But some of my early work was also really beautiful. I'll post a few of them as well as a few of my early fiber art.
Okay, here's one of the first! Sort of sweet in a folky way. I did cut and pierced shades for about 10 years until my good friend Judy Pascal urged me to try making fabric shades with her vintage fabrics. Thank goodness for Judy! Most lampshade makers that continue making the cut shades end up with carpel tunnel, not to mention lower back pain. Ironically I studied textiles in college... sometimes it just takes longer to end where we are suppose to be.
Here's a sweet embroidery I did before my lampshades. Mom dated it on the back; I think it was 1975. Embroideries are still my favorite to work with in my lampshades.
This must be around 1976. I had a great weaving teacher, Rosalie Smith at North Yarmouth Academy. I hope Rosalie knows how much us crafty ones loved having her share her art with us. Not many high school kids had this level of teaching.
A little more tapestry weaving...
Detail of an early cut lampshade. I loved making up my own patterns from fabric designs or vintage prints.
Here is the full shot. My shade on a Flower Brook Pottery Lamp Base.
More cut and pierced. This one was very popular in it's day. Oh, how easy it was to screw up. Any little fleck of coffee or pen mark or slip of the #11 exacto blade and it was done for!!!
This one has seen better days!
detail of shade. These are all hand cut. Many cut and pierced shades these days are die cut, ie cut but machine. You can tell the difference if the cuts look flat they are die cut. If they are hand cut they are cut on an angle. Big difference!!! I ventured into it once, but just didn't want to sacrifice the look.
a variation on the paneled shade. These were pretty time consuming as I recall, but I liked the overall pattern.
This is the grand finale of my lampshade history tour! This is the crown jewel! I love loved this pattern. A HUGE challenge. I found the pattern in a victorian pattern book. It was the size of a postage stamp; I blew it up and reworked it to fit the shade. Tons of work. Only did a few of these!!! Of course Mom got one!
Today. Favorite fabric/embroidery/coronation work Lampshade. This is a shade I did last summer for Mom. Love this fabric!
detail of the beautiful vintage textile work.
I guess we never know paths our life will go or where it will continue. At least I don't and kind of like it that way. It's like antiquing or flea marketing--- you never know what treasure might be around the corner or WHO might walk into your shop! Speaking of shops, I am missing my dear shop while I'm here in Maine, but a little sabbatical will only spur the creativity for foliage. My hands are really happy to take a break from work.