The Art Alchemist's Guild

You can also buy concrete fabric that's already full of the dry media, it's just a lot stiffer and harder ro cut.

You can mordant and eco-print on paper and wood as well. Basically any porous surface can take a dye.

I make foraged wreaths all year long and just give them away or toss them in the compost when I want to switch them up.

Local florists let me pick through their trimmings for interesting bits, and feathers give them a witchy vibe.

All my life I wanted a cool plague mask, so I had to make one. I sat on a pattern for nearly two months before commiting to using almost $100 worth of veg tan leather, and it turned out way too big. I'm working on sewing darts around the face hole to bring it in a bit. Hopefully it looks good when I'm done.

When I started needlefelting all I made were eyeballs and mushrooms. They're some of the easiest and most fun things to make.

I just finished harvesting all my dye things from my garden, here are some snippets.

The red is Elena's Rojo Amaranth, and old variety that was nearly lost during the civil war in Guatemala, but was brought back by maya communities. It's named after the indigenous farmer who was primarily responsible for its recovery.

Going clockwise from there is Japanese (or Chinese) Indigo. A historically important plant used for dyes, paints and inks in Asia going back to at least 2000BC.

Next is marigold, a source of reds, oranges and yellows depending on the ph of whatever it's mixed with. Most plant-based colours are sensitive to ph, for example you can slightly hange the colour of roses by altering the soil ph.

The purple wisps at the bottom are petunias, which aren't historically used for dye but they had such a rich colour I want to try.

Last are Cinnamon Dyers Coreopsis, a traditional dye plant native to North America, long used by indigenous peoples and settlers for yellows, oranges and reds.

It will be a while before I'm set up to start extracting pigment and making dyes again, but I'm looking forward to posting all about it.

I just harvested my amaranth but I won't get a chance to dye with it for another month. I'll post my results here!

Finally getting back into my sketchbook for some traditional art.

Intro to advanced drawing tips, including ones even I didn't know - like how to use a viewfinder.

I've been makiing these for years. They're needle felted and filled with catnip for my cat.

I love making these from old shirts, especially ones with holes so I can use sashiko mending to add some flare. Eventually all my bags will be Ship of Theseus bags.

I have some murasaki growing now that I won't get to harvest due to moving. Luckily I collected enough seeds to start a new batch at my next place.

One of the few guides on nuno felting, the art of integrating wool fibres in silk cloth, that I felt was truly informative. You can learn the entire process just by following this one write-up.

This is more of a brief starting point for further study, but outlines some key methods fairly well.

I started needlefelting during covid with no idea what I was doing, breaking every one of my needles along the way.

Here's a guide for anyone who wants to get into it. It's one of the most low-barrier crafts, in my opinion, with barely any cost ($10-$20) to get started.

This is my second beading project ever, courtesy of the local métis community who created and shared these kits with anyone who wanted to try.

I got the pattern from Dieselpunk.ro. This is pre-oiled, the finished product has a much nicer finish, but I forgot to take a picture before giving it away.