People Are Amazing

I've been in handmade heaven these last few days. I took yesterday off and managed to make it out to the One of a Kind show before the crazy weekend crowds. The show was quite a marathon, especially since my strategy involved scoping out every booth before making any purchasing decisions and, thus, having to back track through the labyrinth. I managed to scratch a few key Christmas gifts of my list and, oh, how I wish I could post some pictures! Hand-printed fabric, embroidery... lovely.

Today, ventured out for some smaller-scale, but no less impressive arts shows in the city. I dropped by Winter Fling just in time to pick up one of their last loot bags (hooray!) and this stunning lino print card by Katie Muth. A perfect reminder that as frustrating and sometimes limiting lino appears to be, it has the potential to produce beautiful images.



Already starry-eyed with the beautiful crafts at Winter Fling, I then headed down to the OCAD Book Arts Fair. Consider my bookbinding passion officially rekindled. My affections for lino also increased x10 when I saw Marta Chudolinska's incredible novel Back + Forth composed completely out of lino prints. I've only just started to explore it, but already I'm amazed at the haunting narrative of the images she's created.




There were so many other amazing pieces. I wish I could have been able to buy something from everyone and help support such amazing work. Of course, now my own head is buzzing with new ideas, projects, experiments... So many things to add to my 365 list!