Dutch Design week 2013 / part 1

A week ago the whole city of Eindhoven was centered around design. All kinds of design and mostly dutch design ofcourse as from 19 till the 27th of October the Dutch Design week 2013 was held. From all around the world designers gather to see the newest design developments and during this one week Eindhoven is more alive than ever.
Being a designer myself, every year I visit many locations to find inspiration and enjoy the art of design.
So here a selection of the many photo's I took, which will hopefully inspire you as well.

Latte art

Recently I started working as a bartender at a big cafe/restaurant. It has an easygoing atmosphere and cool industrial look as the cafe is situated at the old light factory of Phillips in Eindhoven.

Being a bartender I have to 'make' all the drinks, which in most cases means grabbing the right bottle (which is not as easy as it sounds when 10 more orders are waiting..).

Making coffees however requires some serious skills. Especially frothing the milk for the cappucino's and latte machiato's to create the perfect thickness is essential for thier quality as well as for the creation of what is called 'latte art'. 

Latte art is created by pouring the frothed milk into the cup while moving in specific directions. This way beautiful hearts, flowers or even swans can be created. 

I must say the first time I saw my collegue make a heart it didn't seem that difficult. Yet after many attempts past weeks I rarely succeed in making a nice heart or flower. 

So respect to all the baristas out there who just like that draw onto your coffee!

I guess I still need a lot of practice but hopefully I will get there one day ;)

(even though this wasn't created by just pouring the milk, I couldn't not post it :p )

Wooden necklace

Hello dear reader, it's been a while!
Shame on me..
But here a brand new blogpost!

About a month ago one of my best friends sadly moved to Sweden to follow a master course on design for two years. She will be working with wood a lot, which she is very good at, so what better present to give to her than a wooden necklace which I made myself :)

From a project I previously did I still had left over pieces of mdf which were lasercut in the shape of a necklace, as I used the negative as a mold to create a prototype. I had saved the pieces with the plan of using them later, so using them to make a present was the perfect occasion.

I painted the mdf white and added tiny triangles to create an aztec-like pattern. The backside I left white so the necklace can be worn both sides. With some silver wire I attatched a silver necklace with a clasp.

I loved the result and so did my friend who was kind enough to send me some pictures of her wearing it, all the way in Sweden! :)

DIY paint swatch portrait

A long time ago I posted my favorite DIY projects and one of them was this modern wall art with paint swatches. When buying paint for my room a while ago I stocked up on quite a few paint swatches myself.
I really liked these since they were bigger (which made it a little less time consuming) and had cool names on them. I used an old frame which I had lying around and spray painted it white.

Then it was time to position the swatches which took quite a while as I wanted the perfect color combinations (ofcourse I did..). To make them fit I cut them a little. I used double sided tape to stick them on the piece of cardboard which came with the frame. Finally I put the frame around it and I was done!
I really like the result. It is a nice pop of color on my white wall.

Awesome finds // Bec Winnel

A while ago I finally got myself a smartphone and I got totally adicted to Instagram (my username is eeflubbers). I came across an amazing drawing of Bec Winnel, an artist based in Australia who draws (with color pencils) the most detailed and lifelike portraits I have ever seen. The use of color, details of texture, light that hits the face and depth in the drawings are mind-blowing and have totally won me over. I'm in love.


all images from http://becwinnel.com/

DIY simple necklace

A while ago when a was in Amsterdam I ran into an awesome beadshop and with all this creativeness around me I just HAD to buy something. I went for a simple silver beaded bar necklace. I loved the light green color of the beads and paired it with a thin silver chain. Further I used a bar to hold the beads and some rings and a clasp.

Chevron

I have really been loving the chevron trend lately. Such a simple pattern which makes everything look adorable.

1. pillow - 2. tape - 3. phone cover - 4. cake

As I was in a creative mood and recently bought a black nail striper I thought I might give this pattern a try on my nail. Even though the stripes are far from perfect it still looks pretty cool to me ;)

After rain comes sunshine

Summers in the Netherlands aren't the best. If we're lucky we have one or two weeks above 25 degrees and no rain but lately we're not that blessed...
Luckily after rain comes sunshine and look what my view was a couple of days ago!
A beautiful bright rainbow and an air balloon :)

Nail-o-holic

Hi I'm Eef and I'm a nail polish addict.
For people who know me this probably did not come as a surprise. Not often do you see me without a color on my nails and this color will probably not stay on much longer than 3 days. Painting my nails is a true guilty pleasure and it's my way of destressing.
The other day I started experimenting with gradient nails and this was the result!
Super easy, colorful and fun :)

Henna tattoo

A week ago a Moroccan friend of mine celebrated her birthday. Besides all the delicious dishes she offered to make henna tattoos so of course I had to get one.
See here the result!

Jewelry loves

I never used to wear much jewelry but I really start to appreciate the way it can upgrade a simple outfit.
Here my recent favorites.

1. bracelet - h&m
2. watch - LIV
3. necklace - h&m

Back to blogging!

Hello my dear readers, it's been a while!

The past weeks I discovered that blogging and graduating do not go together very well unfortunately...
I had to focus on my graduation project which I think paid off :) I will show you the result soon!
So now it's back to blogging as I finally handed in my last deliverable today!
Can't wait to start a great summer, if only the weather would agree with me..

 

Barbie got a new dress

Some months ago a friend told me about a design competition held by the Groninger Museum for which you had to design a dress for Barbie inspired by fashion designers Azzedine Alaia or Iris van Herpen, whos collections are exhibited at the museum at the moment. Being a fan of fashion design and loving detailed work, this competition was perfect for me and I decided to submit. As you could read in previous posts (here and here), I went to the museum to see the exhibition and to get inspired. I chose Iris van Herpen as my inspiration. Her designs combine traditional craftmanship and unconventional materials, resulting in beautiful pieces.

For my dress I decided to use a traditional craft that I recently learned, bobbin lace making!

My initial idea was to make lace with metal wire but after trying it, it didn't work out the way I wanted. The metal was too stiff so bending the wires was hard and made the structure too open.

I decided to use normal offwhite thread and combined it with metal wires. I drew an outline of the pattern of the dress and used it as the base of my bobbin lace. In order to create the lace structure that I wanted I had to use 60 bobbins! The most I ever used for one piece. You can imagine that winding and hanging the bobbins was a lot of work.

I used different patters creating closed and open structures and incorporated pieces of wire.

Next I sewed the piece together on the back and shaped the dress around the Barbie. Finally I used a lot of hairspray to fix the threads and hold the dress in place. 

Et voila! see here the final result :)

Bobbin lace making #2 // project

Finally, as promised, an update on my bobbin lace project!
As you could read in my previous project post, I started bobbin lace making.
Since then I have had more lessons and finished my first pieces!
So see here some of my results and the start of some new pieces.

 The snake!

Paper stories

Béatrice Coron is an artist who tells stories with the paper artworks she makes. I stumbled upon the TEDtalk in which she talks about her work and I felt completely inspired. By cutting one piece of paper she creates the elements of her stories, each still connected to another. The stories she tells are about situations, cities and worlds and invites us to think of our own. 
I guess my love for little details strikes again, can't wait to try this out myself! Although it probably isn't that easy to make paper cut-outs look this good...

Iris van Herpen @ Groninger Museum

Besides visiting Azzedin Alaia's exhibition at the Groninger Museum, the exhibiton of Iris van Herpen could of course not be missed. Since I already dedicated a blogpost to this amazing designer, it is no surprise that I love her work and this exhibition was no exception. I love how she uses unconventional materials and the perfection she creates in every little detail.
That I love looking at details was probably no surprise to the other museum visitors since the average distance between my face and the pieces was probably around 20 centimeter ;)

Awesome finds // Dalton Ghetti, sketching electronics

Every now and then I find random things that are just awesome and that I háve to share with someone, which is exactly what I will do in 'awesome finds'.

"What the h..." was all I could think when I saw these teeny tiny sculptures made by Dalton Ghetti. In the graphite of pencils Ghetti, who works as a carpenter, challenges himself to make his sculptures as small as possible and he has been doing it for almost 25 years now.
More of his work can be seen here: http://oddstuffmagazine.com/extraordinary-art-on-pencil-tips-by-dalton-ghetti.html

Even though technology isn't my favourite part of my study, things like this could make it a lot more fun. With conductive stickers and a pen with conductive ink you can just draw electric cirquits. By adding some intelligence of a microcontroller you can even transform your piece of paper into a piano! (see the end of the video)

Azzedine Alaïa

Last week I visited the exhibition of fashion designer Azzedine Alaia in the Groninger Museum. Alaia is a true couturier using the finest techniques and an eye for detail. I hadn't seen work from him before but I fell in love with his beautiful form fitting dresses, extraordinary use of materials, and craftmanship in every little detail. Here some of the pictures I took of this amazing exhibition.

TOMS shoes, Etsy designs

Have you heard about TOMS shoes yet? It is a great initiative which sells shoes and for each shoe sold, they give a pair of shoes to a child in developing countries. Beside the wonderful idea behind the shoes, I really like the way they look! Quite simple and casual and of good quality. Since the shoes are made of fabric, they are perfect to paint, and so do many Etsy designers. Here some of my favorite designs.

Etsy link 1
Etsy link 2
Etsy link 3
Etsy link 4
Etsy link 5

An eye for painting

When sorting out some boxes I stumbled upon this picture I printed out years ago because I wanted to make a painting of it. As with many ambitious plans, it never happened. This time I wouldn't let this happen again and I got up, gathered painting supplies and started painting. So here is the result on which I spend hours of painting in full concentration and precizion. The perfect way to clear your mind.