✴ start of the season

I think we can now most definitely say that wedding season is upon us. As someone who works with beautiful brides and spends most days looking lovingly at wedding inspirations I think there can be no better kick off with all things weddingy than with the recent nuptials of The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge.

Did you watch? I spent the day with two lovely hat wearing ladies and we supped bubbly and ate breakfast and supped bubbly and ate lunch and then just supped bubbly. 

We gasped and we oohed and we ahhed at the sublime beauty of Miss M in her beautiful gown. 

Imagine how hit-the-roof excited I then was to discover that my dear, and oh so talented friend, had been a special stitcher of that most famous frock. She was one of the embroiderers from The Royal School of Needlework. How gobsmacked was I?? The BEST KEPT SECRET bar none! 

You can read all about it here.

So, buzzing with this knowledge and therefore reckoning that if I spent the weekend congratulating and stroking the arm of said friend and royal stitcher {ok not the whole weekend, that would be weird} then indeed I could conclude that I am only one very petite person away from that most famous frock......that's how it works in my head anyway....

Not surprising then, that my space is of the bridal kind this week. 

With finishing of some pieces and the beginnings of others. Working on new brass pieces with vintage lace and quartz crystal, ideas brewing for these teeny tiny brass lockets, baby blue grosgrain ribbon, cinderella style tulle bows and finding inspiration in delicate forget-me-not flowers.

I feel compelled to doth my feathery fascinator style cap in awe to the brit style front cover of Grazia and the utterly brilliant headline "Arise McQueen Kate". Well done Grazia.

More Creative Spaces at Kootoyoo.

✴ speaking of weddings...

{ jasmine tiara }

Yesterday it was announced we are to have a Royal Wedding. How very exciting. I wonder if we'll all have a day off and celebrate with union jack bunting and street parties like we did when Charles and Diana got married. And yes it gives me palpitations that I can clearly remember that Royal Wedding even though it was 30 years ago.......{sharp intake of breath...}

I wonder what look our Royal Bride to be will go for...

{ rose adagio corsage comb }

A dear friend of mine is also getting hitched next year, and just when you think the levels of excitement that seem to exude from her every pore couldn't get any bigger.....yesterdays news of sharing a wedding year with the Royals....well...you can imagine!!!

{ cherry blossom corsages }

Here are a few images of the headdresses I designed and made this year for two lovely brides, each of them princesses in their own way.

I was quite busy with bridal, bridesmaid, mother of the bride headdresses, not to mention horseshoes and grooms cufflinks. All good fun and such a joy to do. I love the different styles the two brides went for.

{flower fern brooch and comb}

I'm still trying to sort through images for a new website to hopefully get some new commissions next year. I have one booking. With everything getting packed away for next years building extension it will be tricky working from home next year. I doubt I'll be able to take on too much creative making...

... But I'd make an exception for you, Kate.......!

{flora corsage combs}

✴ my creative space

Something Blue.......

I'm just popping in to play along with my creative space because it's been yonks! 

Yonks since I was even here......Here's a brief update.....

The little lady has been teething....of epic proportion! Nearly two months of nights screaming and griping. Tantrums and tears....and that's just me....

 I know now, more than ever, that unless you get a decent uninterrupted nights sleep, well, forget getting anything done the next day.... 

I'm running very behind and am constantly playing catch up. 

There's a tiredness and exhaustion that I remember well from the early weeks of motherhood.

Anyway, this time will pass, eventually I will get belated gifts in the post, I will finish new baby gifts - before new babies are teens....and  I will have a home that looks like it has leapt from a page of Homes and Gardens.....I will, oh yes I will......probably.......

In brief but welcome moments of calm creativity I've been busy with bridal commissions.

The wedding headdresses, and then subsequent bridesmaid headdresses were worn with style at the weekend! Hooray job done and huge success. Congratulations to the Bride and Groom.

I'm eagerly awaiting the photos.......so will post soon.....

I also worked on this commission from the Bride's mother (all top secret) to make the bride a wedding horseshoe with fabrics from the mother of the brides wedding dress....how sweet.

I added some blue stitching with the initials of the bride and groom and the date, and of course a dainty blue silk bow.

I loved working on this for many reasons. The obvious sentimental meaning of the gift, the up-cycling of the wedding dress fabric and just the general prettiness.... diamante, ribbons, beading, fabric rose making loveliness of it all.

Three out of four Somethings, ain't bad?!

✴ shh...

Yesterday I met with bride-to-be, the lovely Miss L and we talked all things weddings.

It's my first bridal commission in a while, having taken a little break when the baba came along.

I'm now in the process of drawing up sketches for her. 

It's so exciting and I really like her ideas and themes. But obviously it's classified, so better shh.....

It has been good to spend some time looking through my past work, some unfinished and some I had forgotten all about!

It was a bit like Christmas this weekend, sorting stones and beads and opening all the headdress and jewellery boxes and unwrapping sparkly pretty things from deep inside the layers of tissue paper.

I feel suddenly inspired and refreshed to get things looking lovely with the business with some new shots, new website and some new work!

♥

shh...

{All designs Sarah Hemsley Headdresses}

✴ a gift

Aunty Lulu has started her new course in London, so we get to see her a couple of days a week, hooray!

The first visit, she arrived with a gift for the new one year old. A beautiful origami Kusadama Ball. Just like this one she gave to me on the eve of my wedding. A good luck charm and so pretty to boot.

Pretty origami petals carefully folded and put together to form flowers which are then put together with other flowers to form a ball. Very clever. So delicate and intricate and such patience the paper folding expert has.

It's a gift, this paper floristry. The beautiful thing is that they last forever. With love and careful handling. And absolutely NO water required!

Paper Gifts {cut::folded::painted::loved}

                                  *

                                  * 

My wedding invitations.

{Snowberries & Winter Anemones}

Ella's 1st Birthday Card

Mexican style flowers

{ * Images and all work Lucy Bates}

✴ my place and yours :: shoes

Wedding shoes made by Emmy. White suede, soft, velvety...yum, now slightly grubby grey from so much dancing on a dusty oak dance floor. Silver leather trim with sparkly diamante  buckle. Handmade beaded decorative shoe clip, one later worn as a brooch but after too much wine at a party was lost on a drunken cab ride home....Sob!

I've been pondering for the last two years about whether to dye these shoes. But then I'll wear them all the time, they'll get battered and tatty. The heel will wear down to a metal point and that 1930's Hollywood style elegance will be lost, forever. But is it better to leave them hidden away, wrapped in tissue, inside a box, at the back of a wardrobe? Hhmmmm....

I'll never wear my Jenny Packham wedding dress again. I'll never wear any of the three headdresses I made and wore throughout the day and I'll definitely never wear the veil - it's all just a bit over the top for nipping out to m & s for a crusty baguette and a bag of satsumas.

But then I'll never get married again, so I guess the day was a bit of 'one time only' sort of day!

I'll never wear these things again, but I have a very strong feeling that in a few years time a little someone will love dressing up in these, marching around the house, playing here comes the bride....and that just won't be the same with black shoes, will it?

For more shoe stories, as chosen by The Craft Gypsy, head along to my place and yours at Punky & Me.

✴ wedding cupcakes

Yesterday we spent a lovely day at Pembroke Lodge in the middle of Richmond Park to celebrate a friends wedding. Such beautiful surroundings, passing grazing deer along the wintery tree lined drive through the park.

It was suitably chilly, still not quite used to the icy cold weather of Great Britain! 

Also not used to being woken up with a scream and a hair pull by a little person so early in the morning it's still dark, after a bit of a champagne day........Sigh.......

Congratulations Mr and Mrs Smith! x