Button Bag Sewing Kits

We have now been stocking Button Bag sewing and craft kits for over a year in our shop in Bristol and are now really pleased to have added them to our ever expanding online shop.
http://flo-joboutique.co.uk/#/shop/4574185016/Craft-kits
An obviously great way of selling the kits is by trying them out ourselves. Fortunately, I  have the perfect aged child who loves working his way through the cute range of animal and bird sewing kits and yes he is a BOY!
Easy to forget but boys love sewing too, perfect for developing hand eye co-ordination and making sure the future generation know how to sew a button on!
I know that I will be adding another in the range to his stocking this year!

The Making of Kitten Basket

As with all Button Bag kits all the materials are included; threads, stuffing, buttons and clear simple instructions, the only thing we needed was a small pair of scissors to cut threads. The pre-cut shapes mean that kids can get straight on with sewing which is a nice touch.

Django made the kittens over a number of weeks, enjoying the sense of completion that was achieved as each kitten was finished. By kitten number three he was sewing totally independently and was very proud of his creations which could then be added to the penguins that had been his first sewing project earlier this year.

A great finishing touch is that the box that the kit comes in transforms into a home for your creation, in this case a basket for the kittens, to join the penguins in their igloo home.

A proud and happy customer!

I was really pleased to see that Tilly of 'Tilly and the buttons' and The Sewing Bee fame, made a lovely pair of knickers using our knicker kit pattern. 
She took the creative stage a little further and opted to make them out of a scrap of fabric from a blouse she had made. We love hearing this as that's the point of the pattern! We hope that others use the pattern from the kit again and again. 
We do sell a Liberty print tana lawn fabric kit as well as the cotton kit. 
Do check out her blog!
http://www.tillyandthebuttons.com/2013/03/knickers.html

We hear that the Sewing Bee is due to return as our after Christmas treat, we're looking forward to it already!

Day of the dead!

We know it's not for another month but this celebration of our ancestors is dear to us so we really wanted to showcase our lovely fabrics in plenty of time for all our customers to get creative.
For anyone who's not familiar with the festival he's a bit of back knowledge...

Day of the Dead (Spanish: Día de Muertos) is a Mexican holiday celebrated throughout Mexico and around the world in other cultures. The holiday focuses on gatherings of family and friends to pray for and remember friends and family members who have died. It is particularly celebrated in Mexico, where it is a national holiday, and all banks are closed. The celebration takes place on November 1 and 2, in connection with the Catholic holidays of All Saints' Day and All Souls' Day. Traditions connected with the holiday include building private altars honoring the deceased using sugar skulls, marigolds, and the favorite foods and beverages of the departed and visiting graves with these as gifts. They also leave possessions of the deceased.
Scholars trace the origins of the modern Mexican holiday to indigenous observances dating back hundreds of years and to an Aztec festival dedicated to the goddess Mictecacihuatl. The holiday has spread throughout the world: In Brazil, Dia de Finados is a public holiday that many Brazilians celebrate by visiting cemeteries and churches. In Spain, there are festivals and parades, and, at the end of the day, people gather at cemeteries and pray for their dead loved ones. Similar observances occur elsewhere in Europe, and similarly themed celebrations appear in manyAsian and African cultures.

In some parts of the country (especially the cities, where in recent years other customs have been displaced), children in costumes roam the streets, knocking on people's doors for a calaverita, a small gift of candies or money; they also ask passersby for it. This relatively recent custom is similar to that of Halloween's trick-or-treating.

Some people believe possessing Day of the Dead items can bring good luck. Many people get tattoos or have dolls of the dead to carry with them. They also clean their houses and prepare the favorite dishes of their deceased loved ones to place upon their altar or ofrenda.

So we've decided to create a Day of the Dead window display and within this Erika and I have placed pictures of some of our deceased family members. There's something special about having their photos sat in our window here in our shop with us. 

New organic Cotton and Cotton Bamboo mix from India.

We've found a new supplier for ORGANIC cotton and cotton/bamboo mix prints. 

The fact that the prints are so pretty and inspired from a book of 1920's prints would have been enough for us but to find out that we bought them from a wonderful British company who's work in India is supporting some of the worlds poorest communities and really making a difference to their lives and their surrounding environment  is even better news!

They are copies of 1920's prints that they found in an old book.

Dress weight, or maybe for patchwork and craft, made from slub organic cotton warp and bamboo weft.

Hand printed, so the print will have some variations.

They are really special, and we can't wait to make ourselves a dress each for work. 

We think they will look great made into a classic tea dress.

Genesh is their partner in India. This is Genesh's Aunty and her grandchildren. She winds the warp thread here for her son to weave for us. The orders we give them enables them to avoid poverty.

These new 1920's design fabrics we have are a bamboo mix. Bamboo is a sustainable product fast growing and makes the cotton feel really soft and hang beautifully. 

Bamboo textiles are cloth, yarn, and clothing made out of bamboo fibres. While historically used only for structural elements, such as bustles and the ribs of corsets, in recent years a range of technologies have been developed allowing bamboo fibre to be used in a wide range of textile and fashion applications. Modern bamboo clothing is clothing made from either 100% bamboo yarn or a blend of bamboo and cotton yarn. The bamboo yarn can also be blended with other textile fibres such as hemp or even spandex.

A little bit about one of our ORGANIC cotton suppliers....

Organic Cotton

The organic  cotton comes from a non GM source and is supplied by Agrocel. One of their partners is Traidcraft, the largest UK fairtrade organisation.

The cotton is grown in northern India.

Our cotton is not sprayed with toxic chemicals. Instead, weeding is done by hand and pests are controlled biologically (by encouraging other insects to control the pests). Please see the excellent PAN site (Pesticide Action Network).

Fair Trade Cotton

This means that the people who grow cotton get a fair guaranteed wage and that their health and welfare is supported. They subscribe to the Fair Trade policy defined by IFAT (The International Fair Trade Association).

The hand loom cottons are woven and safely dyed using GOTS approved non azo dyes and are woven by a charity-run project involving about 250 workers using hand looms or small power looms.

Below; one of the weavers in K.V. Kuppam, a village in Tamil Nadu state, South India, 120 miles from Chennai (Madras). The area has long been a centre for cotton handloom weaving.

The middle picture is the cotton being dryed.

We have just bought 5 new designs of organic cotton. We're really excited by the work and hope you will like them too.

Mademoiselle - Inside CHANEL

Beautifully made informative little films about the wonderful beginnings of the fashion house that is CHANEL....enjoy ... we did!  xx

CHANEL N°5 - For the first time - Inside CHANEL

More wonderful mini films about the design house that is CHANEL.
Get up on your fashion facts!

INSIDE CHANEL

I found this collection of beautifully made films of the history of CHANEL
Worth a watch when you have a moment.

New organic cotton prints!

New Organic prints flew into the shop this week... we love them all, a little too much!

These are from Cloud 9 and Birch.  

There's more... we'll let you have a little peek very soon! 

Happy Friday afternoon,

x

All the lovely hues of the PANTONE colour chart that says FLO-JO BLUE!!!!
We've been busy on a print mission for our new haberdashery cards... it's not been easy!
Hopefully they'll be arriving soon. 

Make a Sun Top!
Kids summer workshops, 
 ~Wednesday 14th and Thursday the 15th of August
 ~10-12:30 PM
 ~ £40 inclusive of materials
 ~suitable for ages 8 and up.
The workshop is split over two sessions. Starting when they take measurements of their self's, then choosing fabric (provided) to make the Sun Top. 

Vintage circus girls.

A friend showed me these amazing photos of vintage circus performers. I just had to share.
They were shot at travelling camps in the ’40s and ’50s, they’re absolute eye candy for any fan of vintage glamour and girl power. A lovely aerialist flashes a daring smile from a curved headstand on the grass another showgirl's striding between the trailers in red feathered wings a cheerful brunette dressed down to jeans and a crop top, carrying buckets, all these girls sparkle with something so enviably fresh, free-spirited and charming.
The costumes have all the razzle dazzle of the showgirl with a mix of the Hollywood starlet. So different to the modern lycra heavy garments. Ooo we might just run off to the circus!

Lingerie Inspirations

Thinking about lingerie... well we have a very modern take on it at the shop this Saturday with our stretch knicker workshop,  making a pair of short type pants using stretch jersey and stretch elastic. We also sell the Colette lingerie pattern, little bias cut French knickers with a little bralette. Here's a link to the colette blog for some inspiration. By looking at other underwear you can build up ideas to customise your own pattern.

http://www.coletterie.com/inspiration/detail-inspiration-lingerie-details

Fifteen Months and smiling!

Hello folks, 
It's been a while and I've very much neglected this ere blog, we seem to find it easier to post things on facebook but in a much more slap dash kind of a way. So i'm going to try and pop here a bit more again!
Our shop's first birthday came and went and we seem to have been so busy we didn't even throw a party. So here's to us having been settled in our Gloucester Road shop for a year and a quarter now!
We've build up a lovely local customer base and people are coming from further a field to come and find us and our ever growing stock of cotton fabrics. 
We're finding new designs all the time and are so pleased to have added to our Liberty Tana Lawn range and our lovely organic cotton prints.
The workshops been going well and Laura's been kept busy running classes in all of the following, dressmaking, pattern cutting, corsetry, beginners sewing and dressmaking, kids clubs. We've had regular patchwork and quilting classes run by the very able Chris and of course we've been doing plenty of knicker making with lots of different groups. 
We're planing new workshops for the Autumn now with a few more 'make in a day' projects.
We've been trying to get more fabric onto our website too for those of you from further a field. More going up all the time so do keep checking... 
Many thanks for all your support over this last year it's been amazing,

Lots of love,

Delia and Erika xx

Geeky chic

We're loving the burst of colour and fun of this new fabric from Riley Blake.
100% cotton The glasses are approx 3 cm in length.
£14 per metre.
Come to the shop to buy or email us.
x