Open Garden Squares Weekend 2012

Every year, London's secret (and not so secret) gardens throw open their gates to the public over the course of a weekend.  I've been meaning to go for the past couple of years, but always do that thing where one lives in London but entirely fails to do any of the amazing things routinely offered up by the city.

Anyway, my mum happened to ask when the Open Squares Weekend was this year and I actually got organised, looked it up and booked tickets, hurrah!

Given the somewhat biblical weather we've been having recently, I was expecting it to be rather a washout, but the clouds kept their little raindrops mainly contained for the weekend.

The London Parks and Gardens Trust helpfully sent me a book of all the gardens with our tickets,  so I sat down and made a plan of where to go on each day.  I figured we'd start on Saturday with Kings Cross, as there was a couple of interesting looking gardens around there.  We wandered from the station to Camley Street Natural Park, which was listed as being open on Saturday from 10:00am to 5:00pm, however when we turned up at around 11:45am the gates were firmly shut.  There were chains and a padlock and everything.  This was a bit disappointing, as it looked really nice when peering through the impeneterable gates. 

It wasn't an entirely wasted journey though, as I also wanted to see the Alara Permaculture Forest Garden.  It was a bit of a trek from the station, but well worth seeing.  Had a chat with the guy who runs it - you'd never know it was there, as it's built around commercial buildings on an industrial estate, but he was growing salads, artichokes, goosberry bushes, pear trees and all sorts of other amazingness, including beehives.  If you're a regular reader, you'll know how much I love bees!

I didn't take any pictures of the Alara garden, as I'm still rather a shy photographer and don't feel entirely comfortable brandishing my camera at people. I need to work on this.  People generally don't mind...

We then pottered back to Kings Cross and got on the tube to Portland Square and the Royal College of Physicians Gardens.  On an entirely unrelated note, I never realised how close Regents Park was to Tottenham Court Road.  Anyway, Royal College of Physicians gardens were lovely.  I want to work there and have my lunch in the gardens every day.  In fact I googled jobs there that very evening!  They are not currently looking for secretaries though.  Sadface.

I was playing with the Canon 500D close up filter that I'd got for super-cheap from Ebay, so I've got no sweeping shots of the gardens, just some close ups of the all the interesting medicinal plants they grow in the gardens.
 

 

Then, it was a potter down Tottenham Court Road, stopping briefly at DFS for Mum's opinion on the giant and ill-advised swivel chair I was coveting, continuing to Russell Square Gardens.  We had a slight detour via Bedford Square, as I have no sense of direction, but I discovered the awesomeness of the flashing blue Googlemaps dot on my newly acquired iPhone and we eventually arrived.  Russell Square was pretty and we had a bit of a sit down and looked at some super-cute dogs running about the place, but we soon pottered on to the last desination on my Saturday list, which was the Phoenix Garden.

I can't believe I never knew this place existed!  It's right round the corner from my work and is a beautiful and amazing place.  It's the antithesis of the perfectly planted and organised garden squares we'd just come from - the plants have been chosen to support as wide a range of wildlife as possible - and it was twittering with birds and buzzing with bees.  Have I mentioned how much I like bees..?  Apparently it's also home to the West End's only frogs, although we sadly didn't see any.  The Phoenix Garden is a registered charity and, having spent several lunch hours there since discovering it, I will certainly be becoming a member and donating to this amazing project (you can also do so here: http://www.thephoenixgarden.org/membership-signup/)

I took a couple of pictures there, playing with the 500D close up filter and my new and also bargainous second hand Canon 15-85 lens.

Here is a giant dragonfly:

And a shot of the garden - you'd never know it was right in the middle of London right?

And that was it for Saturday - some of the gardens were only open Sunday, and very specific hours.

Sunday we started at Inner Temple and Middle Temple Gardens just off the embankment.  There was some reliance on the blue dot again to work out where we were going... 

The gardens are gorgeous - it's where all the fancy barristers have their garden parties.

 

 

I got to play with my Canon 500D close up filter a bit more - it's designed for zoom lenses really, but I wanted to try it at the 15mm end of my 15-85mm.  I kind of like the way you get to have a foreground focus, but you still get the wider angle background. 

Inner Temple Gardens:

More playing with the 500D filter - this time with a ladybug.

A flower:

And some bees, which really don't like to keep still and have their picture taken.  Unhelpful little flying furballs!

After stalking bees around Temple gardens, we pottered across the bridge to the Southbank and this amazing wildflower, fruit and herb garden on top of Queen Elizabeth Hall.  It's another one that you'd never know was there as you walked along the river below it.

After this, we thought we'd have a nose about where the posh folk live, and got the tube to Hyde Park Corner and wandered to Belgrave Square gardens.  They're owned by the people that live in the gorgeous houses in the square and aren't usually open to us plebs.

They are gorgeous gardens, and enormous!

If you're posh, you get statues in your gardens and everything!  I'm not even allowed to put a plant outside my door and they get statues.  I'd quite like to be posh.  I'm sure I was supposed to be rich (I have very expensive tastes) and something just went awry along the way.   

There were lots of little gates and hidden spaces.  I bet the people who live in Belgrave Square (or their nannies/dog walkers anyway)get loads of peace and quiet in the gardens.

I liked this bit a lot:

The mini hedges and shapely shrubs are lovely.

The sundial was pretty cool as well. Apparently, this little bit of the gardens were created for the Millennium and donated by the 6th Duke of Westminster.  That's proper posh that is.

We figured we'd stick with bothering the posh folk and walked along the road to Eaton Square.  This was one of my favourite gardens - really nicely designed with water features and everything.

There's another sundial inside this bowl thingy:

Sadly, this being England in June, there was no actual sun.  Boooo.  It was a lovely garden though - I liked it more than Belgrave Square. 

Another sundial, which matched the one in Belgrave Square.

And there concludes our tour of London's Open Squares Weekend, as it was starting to rain and most of them were closing by this time.

There were so many more gardens, but you've only got two days, so you need a plan and an area or two to stick to.  Also, some of them were open at really stupid times, like from 8am - 10am on Sunday only, which kind of makes me think they don't really want you poking round their gardens at all!  The Chelsea Physic Garden was one of those - I'd have really liked to see that, but hadn't realised it was only open for such a short time. 

Anyway, I had a lovely time just pottering around with my mum - makes me realise that I really should try and drag myself away from my workbench and explore London a bit more.

For now though, it's back to the shiny things.  Some pictures of a custom mini-bee bracelet coming your way soon...

Queen of the Flatpack!

We recently decided that the last bits of our student furniture should probably be replaced.  Kind of sad, but also, shiny new furniture yay!  I love looking at furniture.  Especially the Dwell catalogue - I could buy EVERYTHING from there!

In the end, we went for a rather lovely computer desk that we'd been eyeing up for ages online.  Here it is:


Given that it was quite expensive, I was slightly put out when it arrived in a flat box and we had to put it together.  I sulked.  The boy mainly put it together by himself in a unprecedented display of practicality. 

Next, old studenty bookshelf had to go.  It was quite tall and got in the way of everything.  So, I replaced it with this:

Which looks terribly grown up (except for my awesome pineapple lamp sitting on it, obvs).  Redeemed my previous flatpack failings by building it ALL BY MYSELF whilst the boy had abandoned me for a weekend of poker.  He didn't even win me shoes.  Outrageous!

Anyway, I pottered about with a glass of wine and the TV on and it took me all of Friday evening to build, but it turned out really well I think.  And I had no screws left over!  Managed to redistribute all of the books, tetris style, and everything looks much tidier now.

I also built a little Ikea desk to bolt my polising motor to:

I think that's all the furniture we'll need for a good long while, although I'm currntly trying to persuade the boy into a giant swivel armchair.  Watch this space...

New Photography – Silver on White Background

The question of how to photograph silver on a white background has been troubling me for some time. It seems that a lot of websites, craft fairs etc ask for white background pictures, whereas I’ve always preferred dark.

So, now that I have my fancy new lens, I thought I’d have a go. It has been a rather headache-inducing experience, as if you just plonk the silver on a white background and take the shot, the background always comes out grey.

But, after much faffing about with lighting (and a few tweaks in Lightroom) I’ve managed to get them almost white.  Well, white ish.  Or cream.  Beige?

This was the whitest I could get it, but then it overbrightens the silver and I had to attempt some Photoshop faffery.  Bum.

Not really sure how to get it any closer to white without extensive photoshop faffery involving different layers, so these will have to do for now.

The jewellery is a new collection I've been working on for a while.  It's all baroque and fancy, with lovely little swirly bits everywhere.  I like swirly bits.  

Here's some more earrings:

Some especially swirly ones in large and small - I think these might be my favourites:



And some necklaces:

 

Everything is designed to co-ordinate with the other pieces, so it's going to be perfect for weddings - in fact I've been designing it for the boy's sister's wedding this summer! 

There's also a couple of larger (and rather fancy) bridal necklaces

Tada!

I was going to wear them for some pictures so you could see what they looked like on, but I never got round to putting any make up on yesterday and no-one needs to see that really!

Must move away from the computer and back to the workbench now - I have new versions of my shiny skate that need finishing and some shiny weather orders to complete!

Shiny Machines

 I have finally got round to building my little desk that my polishing motor will be bolted to.  Tada!

Now I just need to drill some big holes in it to bolt it down.  I wasn't going to bother, until I pushed a piece of metal too hard on one of the wheels, and the whole machine shifted 45 degrees whilst spinning very, very fast.  This is definitely not a good thing!

I also got an unexpected bonus from work, which made all the times they've made me cry this year almost worth it!

So I've also treated myself to this little beauty:

It's an ultrasonic cleaning machine, which means that I no longer have to spend hours (and create much mess in the bathroom) scrubbing polishing compound off of small shiny things with a toothbrush, yay!

New Lens!

So, it's been a while since I last posted.  Everything has been a tiny bit manic the past month.  I've been working super-hard on some wedding jewellery, which I finally finished yesterday, and an exciting new derby-related collaboration, which is also nearly done, hurrah!

In between all the madness, I took a couple of days off to go home and see my family.  Whilst I was there, I picked up the Canon macro lens that I've been coveting for the past year (they were offering £60 cashback on it - how could I refuse...?)

Suspect that the lens may currently be wasted on me, given that I've only recently learned what an f/stop is, but I'm hoping I'll grow into it!

Took a few shots just to play with it - all handheld, but you'd usually use a tripod with a macro lens.

Started off with mum's gorgeous little cat, Pudding.  She looks a bit startled here, as I forgot to switch off the flash.  I had this picture open in Lightroom filling the screen of our big monitor, which scared the boy as he walked past!  He was all like "why is there a giant evil-eyed cat head on the computer?"

I was also using auto-focus, so the camera picks the bit it wants to focus on, rather than what I would have chosen.  Look how it picks up all the tiny detail of her fur though - amazing!

The cat eventually grew tired of being my subject and hid her face in her paws, then also turned her back on me for good measure!

So I retreated outside to take pictures of Mum's plants.  It was a bit windy, which made it slightly difficult, especially without a tripod.

Some leaves:

An ugly fly.  Lens managed to capture the detail on it's wings though.

I liked this one - it's a closeup of a dandelion.

And my favourite subject - a bee!  Mum has this plant/bush thing at the end of the garden, which attracts these MASSIVE bumblebees. They were weighed down with so much pollen, they were struggling to fly and I had to duck several times as they accidentally divebombed me on their way out of the plant!

Again, this was handheld with no flash, so the focus is a bit iffy, but you can see all the detail on its stripy fur.  I did spend some time stalking the bees round the garden, but they were even less co-operative as subjects than the cat.

Also took some shots of my nanny's swarovski crystal ornaments.  I love how it throws all the background out of focus - can't wait to try it on some jewellery shots.

This is a super closeup of a glass ashtray on a patterned rug:

So far I am loving the lens, even just playing with it.  I'll post some more pictures once I've had time to shoot some jewellery with it.  Exciting!

Enterprise Nation - Fund 101

Last month an amazing project came to my attention.  It's called Fund 101 and is run by Enterprise Nation, an organisation dedicated to helping start up businesses.  I found out about Enterprise Nation through the founder, Emma Jones, and her book "Working 5-9: How to Start a Successful Business in Your Spare Time", which is, as you will know if you're a regular reader, what I've been doing with my jewellery for the past few years. 

Fund 101 was set up to help small businesses start up, or grow their business, by applying for a grant of up to £500.  This is kind of amazing, as it's so difficult for businesses, especially small ones, to get any kind of funding.

I was sadly too late to apply for last month's funding, as once their monthly total available has been reached, the application process and voting is temporarily closed.  But when it opened again today, I was ready with my application!  I'm applying for funding to buy proper sealed containers to store and heat my acids and chemicals, as they're pretty expensive and I've never been quite able to afford them.  This is what I'm after:

At the moment, I'm using ancient slow cookers to heat chemicals.  They're not sealed and all the lids are rusty, so they let all of the fumes out into my workshop and into my poor little lungs!  Also, the acid condensation gets all overy my hands when I need to use the chemicals, which definitely does my eczema no good at all!

Anyway, I've made my application and it's now live on the site.  Exciting!!!  I dithered for ages which picture to use between this one:

And this one:

...but went with my little winged skate in the end, as it's so "me"!

So, here is my application:  http://www.enterprisenation.com/funding-applications/lauren-grace-jewellery/

Please, please go and vote for me!  You do need to register on the Enterprise Nation site, but it only takes a minute and they promise not to spam you with loads of emails, it's just so they can make sure each person only votes once. 

To say thanks, if you leave a comment when you vote, you'll be entered into a prize draw (drawn by random number generator), the winner of which will get their choice of either a silver winged skate necklace or a silver bumblebee necklace.  That's got to be worth a couple of minutes of your time, right? 

Thank you so much for all your help!

Sunday Soup: Roasted Parsnip and Parmesan

This week I had a whole pack of parsnips left over (boy was Queen of the Fridge again), some parmesan and an onion.

I used this recipe here as it contained everything I had in the fridge. My finished product didn't look quite like theirs (okay, it looked NOTHING like theirs!) and I suspect I over-caramelised my parsnips.

Tasted good though.  If a little smokey...