Yesterday's Textiles and Tea was a great presentation by a brilliant Thai researcher, academic and practicing weaver
She was speaking from Finland yesterday at a conference, but lives, teaches and exhibits now in Canada by way of Estonia and other countries.
She's written a book for general population and has an academic work coming out this year about material properties, very niche.
Look what she does with wire and spun paper. She works spontaneously, no drawing ahead nor computer mapping.
Behind her in this picture is a design of tangled loops, part of a work she created to honor and acknowledge the situation of her father who has dementia. It's very moving.
She's combined art weaving for exhibit with industrial designs for interiors, a many faceted working life. Look at her website for more.
Back to earth, and here's the latest offering to the Sock Ministry, going off today
And my contact, Sister M, has promised to restock my sock yarn supply.
I followed up on a comment I saw this morning, thank you, to share this amazing new fiber work, currently on exhibit at the London Chelsea Flower Show, a huge event in the horti world.
She grew wheatgrass over corals and other natural materials so it adopted the shape. This dress is totally biodegradable. She says the bride could literally throw it in the sea, and fish could safely eat it.
I like the idea of the First Swim instead of the First Dance! Bride emerges in cute underwear, dress having dissolved.
And LP in other less world shaking good news, the squashogram was normal, usual anomalies noted but now not a cause for alarm. And I retrieved my parking spot.
Slightly less welcome in the mail from the utility company, the annual balancing bill, where the equal payments of the year are compared to usage and you get either a bill or a credit.
One year they owed me and then went mad grossly undercharging me this year, so I was expecting a big reckoning
It's no use calling them to ask about doing better with the averaging, tried that, word salad, one admin contradicting another.
I just hope they're more accurate this year. And glad I planned and made sure the $$ is in the account for them to debit.
So that's The World According to Boud today. Off to the post office with the Knitting, now including Weaving.
Happy day everyone, enjoy whatever adventure you're up for, any size.
the electric company would much rather you owe them than them owe you. doing the math they undercharged you by $38 a month. That's a lot. the biodegradable dress reminds me of the paper dress that came out in the 60's. the scarf came out very nice.
ReplyDeleteI think the utility company is not calculating well. They could have had the use of all that money for their own purposes instead of failing to collect it. For years they deducted very accurately, then they overhauled their website and the numbers have never recovered.
DeleteI think there were also paper wedding dresses in the 60s. But mainly they were marketed as low end disposables.
Lovely new socks!
ReplyDeleteAnd oh my- that wedding dress idea is fantastic. "First Swim" would be great!
I think it's very cool. Even better if the whole wedding party dressed biodegradably!
DeleteI don't mind the averaging bill when it comes and I don't have to pay (much). Hate it the other way around!
ReplyDeleteIt's incompetence at their end. Somebody doesn't know how to compute gas average and electric average then add to get a monthly estimate. Before now the most I've had to balance is about $50. Oh well. So much for knowing your bill ahead of time!
DeleteI wish I could produce socks like you do. I’m so painfully slow.
ReplyDeleteThe weaving is as stunning as usual. I’m in awe. So many talented people in the world.
Speed isn't the issue with knitting. Enjoying is!
DeleteThat's a lot to owe. The dress idea is a good one. I still have the wedding dress from the first marriage, don't ask me why. I like those socks, the wide stripe. Hurrah fro reclaiming parking!
ReplyDeleteI noticed the socks suddenly looked like sandals, those wide stripes!
DeleteSorry the average is so far off. There is no good excuse for mistakes when computers know how to do math better and faster than humans.
ReplyDeleteA portable solar generator might help customers decrease their usage.
Those woven dresses are amazing.
My own usage is that of the most efficient houses in the area of this size. I've investigated solar possibility in the past, but doubt if even solar energy would push cost down enough to warrant the expense of the equipment, really.
DeleteAlso it's illegal to pierce the outer wall of jointly owned property without a waiver, which boards won't give, fear of opening the door to major reno! I don't know of any solar installation that doesn't involve piercing an outer wall in order to use the power collected.
I continue to wonder about using solar energy for more than a little oven on the deck!
Thai silk has a wonderful shimmer to it.
ReplyDeleteSo you don't get a utility reading every month? Here, someone comes and reads the gas meter and our electricity is read remotely (but accurately). They used to come and read the meter but, you know, technology and all that.
Yes, of course we get monthly accurate readings. That's separate from being billed for the usage though. I could be billed for actual usage rather than equal payments with an annual balancing month. But at the time I signed up for it I needed to be able to plan for the expected amount. They were also accurate in estimating. It's only since they overhauled the website that things have gone sideways.
DeleteThat paper dress is neat, but involves so much shaping of the various parts over rock formations. It seems a lot of man years involved in experimenting.
ReplyDeleteI wish your gas/electric bill had come out better. I bet the whole system came apart not at calculating the individual costs, but in consolidating them. Whatever, you are still the loser.
It's not paper, it's wheatgrass allowed to grow freely over coral and other objects. Just leave it alone to grow! I like the principles involved. And since the maker is an oceanographic researcher, it's a natural for her.
DeleteI think what happened was that the new people hired by the utility company as it upgraded its meters and online accounting completely lost track of the fact that some customers, like me, use both gas and electricity, some like my son, electricity only.
They clearly were only estimating for electric use. But my furnace is gas driven! Hence the discrepancy. I tried to get this through to them and they angrily refused to listen, so I gave up.
So much innovative weaving and art in your post today, thanks!
ReplyDeleteNithikul Nimkulrat makes astonishing art. She weaves air! Breathtaking! So nice to see such diverse presenters.
ReplyDeleteSpeaking of which, I livestreamed our Vietnamese neighbor's daughter's HS graduation tonight. My graduating class in upstate NY in the 1970s was about the same size, and we were all white middle-class students. Tonight it was so invigorating to hear so many different kinds of names from students from all over the world's troubled places (Boise has a strong refugee resettlement history, despite being in Deep Red Idaho). So many success stories there.
Glad the squashogram results were normal, ouch on the incompetent utilities balancing. Glad you planned ahead for that bill...
Owlet report: chicks are starting to peek out the nestbox entrance hole and practicing flapping their stubby wings. Their graduation won't be long now. https://youtu.be/uFfvnAVr1k0
Chris from Boise.
I'm glad Boise has welcomed many different people. It's good for the culture to be diverse, also much more interesting than the white bread version.
ReplyDeleteThe owls are exciting, such an adventure for them and their observers.
It seems that we've got the textile folks into seeking people who don't look like them, to share their art, good! Dr. Nimkulrat is a spectacular worker.
Socks - tremendous output. Weaving - had a Singaporean colleague who produced spontaneous embroidery, unplanned not drawn out. I guess the act of making is the drawing. Amazing to those of us who need to draw first. Wedding dress - dissolvable and biodegradable. In reality, silk, cotton, wool and linen are biodegradable and don't pose quite such a risk to a bride married on a rainy day.🙀🤔
ReplyDeleteThe production methods of other fibers are hard on the earth, though. Cotton demands massive amounts of water etc. Her approach, very niche, admittedly, is friendly start to finish.
DeleteI think it's a good practice to try stitching without drawing, just to develop the skill of visualizing. Likewise painting without drawing, drawing without blocking in. For some people this comes easier than others, but it's definitely worth a try.
I suppose that wedding dress wouldn't be a clever thing to wear if it rained...could give a whole new meaning to peek a boo.
ReplyDeleteIt's a great piece of ecological research.
Delete