A few have asked to see this… a glitter eyeshadow, yet some may think it’s neither here nor there. Pink glitter on the eyes which in a flash can sparkle (or not). Well it happily complimented my pale Irish skintone earlier, however the true fabbiness of it is only really made fabbier by model Marta Ortiz’s skintone at the Ashish Spring/Summer 2012 show (Oh and love that Sunflower print top).

Actually, that bit I just mentioned above about glitter “happily complimenting my skintone”, do real people talk like this? Is it not just make-up counter ladies who describe product in this secret language not unlike JRR Tolkien’s elves? All I know is that I’ve been hearing a lot of it about the past few days whilst shopping browsing so I’ll not inflict more upon you here. I took these shots last September at London Fashion Week and while I’m in deep confessional mood today I might as well tell you that I stepped as FAR back as the space would permit me to honestly consider these glitter eyes seriously. From back here, each little piece of carefully placed pigmented glitter twinkled and reflected the light beautifully. It was like looking at a good painting. Is that fair to say? At least it’s not Elvish speak right?

Here’s another shot, a real close up one. See, I was intrigued by this shadow because I don’t have a vast eye colour collection (by vast, I’m not referring to vast volume of product but amount of funds invested in colourful eye stuff…), to date I’ve only considered product in colours which I think actually suit me; never yellow eyeshadow because it’s too yuck! Pink of any kind makes me look ill. Black, brown, navy, grey, orange and blue are ticked as yeses but glitter?

I had to step back again and look at it on a girl with skin closer to my own complexion (Yeah, I wish!) So yes, you’ll probably roll your eyes at my wishful thinking and dedication to what could easily turn into a huge expensive mistake except…

….these painted eyelids are a result of a little art experiment. One part Vaseline (yes Vaseline) rubbed onto the lids and then pat some art glitter into it. The results are rather good no? If you’re concerned that the art glitter might scratch your eye out (oh yes it did) then a pigment pot glitter eyeshadow from MAC might me a safer bet. They come in several colours but aren’t as dramatic. MAC make-up artist Georgina Graham packed-on pink glitter from a MAC Pro glitter pot (they’re only available to professional MAC artists) hence the art shop artist’s glitter tip available to the rest of us went floating about backstage. I’m not entirely sure at which point this little nugget snuck into my notebook but someone also said that a clear or nude shadow base or cream shadow would work instead of Vaseline if you didn’t fancy your lids feeling slippy. SO use one and apply the glitter while it’s still wet. Oh and sparkles are messy; they scatter everywhere – including your clothes so some other lovely person suggested getting dressed after doing your eye make-up. Honestly bits of glitter have been falling onto my face and clothes trying this out all day but I’ve removed them with transparent scotch tape (wrap a small piece around your finger and life the specks off your skin).

So after a day spent in the company of Vaseline, glitter, scotch tape and my pens and pencils it’s a happy coincidence that the MAC team use these pads to sketch out and fill in the products used in each show (in keeping with my earlier art reference too). This slightly off-centre and haphazard vision of a ‘pretty’ eye (I’m so going to use this NON Elvish word forever now in beauty) is both feminine AND forward thinking. Considering these shots were taken backstage at Ashish’s London Fashion Week Spring/Summer 2012 show they are in fact next February’s Spring look. You’ll be very much ahead of the 2012-vers if you decide to join in my sparkly art experiment now.

A little while ago, I visited The Print Club London, where they allowed me to play !!Artist!! for a day and make 100 bespoke Goddess Guide screen prints – I write that word with exclamation marks and a capital “A” because well at the time, it felt a bit special (to me anyway). So let me tell you why the experience deserves just a few more quick exclamation marks. Honestly, I had a really lovely time even thought most of it was spent saying things like: “Stop filming!!! Emergency!!! More tea please!” I learnt a whole new language of colour while simultaneously trying to achieve the correct Pantone shade for my cups of milky tea.

Yes, this shade of tea is a tad dark for my liking right here but I had so much interest in mixing up the different paint colours that I even put them before finding the correct Pantone colour for my tea. I take my tea a very light shade a million miles away from builder and while the teabate continues to this day, I did manage to settle on four colours for this screen print.

Meanwhile during all of this chin-stroking and colour checking I was being filmed, but you’ll notice in the resulting film at the end of this post that you can’t hear me speak. Not a word. There’s a reason for this, it’s because the film is shot in stop motion – thousands of stills strung together so the only sound to be heard was the constant clicking of a camera shutter and not my *Irish excited and panicked voice* dribbling paint and words all over the place.

So I had a mixed media pen and ink drawing, hand painted in acrylic and oil which I wanted to screen print in four colours and ochre, a kind of a yellow was the first colour I chose. I was using this colour to get the correct shade of SHINY, GOLD, ANTIQUE for the chair and the Goddess’s vintage dress. It’s at this point in the film below that if there was indeed talking you would definitely hear me say…. “A bit more er, gold-ish wotsisname in there please? Thank You”

While choosing and creating four different colours I realised that there are quite a few steps to making a screen print. This was a first for me and whether it was the sheer concentration or too many cups of tea on the day but I started to get that first in your life feeling… like my first printed by-line; my little name in print above a piece I wrote about art in a newspaper which I brought home at Christmas to show my Mum. Or the first copy of my first book hot off the printing press. This print felt like that.

For the first screen pull, I had a go at placing the plastic sheet with the chair and Goddess’s dress drawn on it under the screen and taping it in place.

Then the screen was filled up with the ochre paint so that it could be pulled through the screen onto the paper (it’s easy to see all this in the film below).

And this is what the first ochre pull revealed. Only ninety-nine more chairs and dresses to do. Yikes!

Do any of you know how long this usually takes? Nope, me neither until it was explained to me by the printer Olivia Sautreuil that you have to wait for each colour to dry before you can add another. So after a few hours the ochre had dried and we applied the next colour…

…pink for the Goddess dress and head-dress. Mixing it made me wish I could find yoghurt this colour.

And this particular move right here was sure to get plenty of paint around the studio because it turned out to be one of my favourite shades in the world to work with (but not to wear).

So I got stuck in. No point in hiding the gleeeeeee, it’s quiet evident I’m a bit over-happy about this pink right here.

Olivia who was helping me print on the day also, (ahem!) handily gave me a few tips about getting my hands clean after working with inks and paint. Olivia buys Loctite in industrial size bottles and decants it into these tiny Muji bottles. She showed me how she just puts it on her hands, rubs it around a bit and it takes all paint away, NO water required. And she goes nowhere without her Ducray Laboratoire Dermatologiques Ictyane Créme mains réparatrice, a hand cream which helps repair and offers long-lasting protection to prevent dry and chapped skin (she has the most beautiful hands but I wouldn’t have expected anything less, she is after all French.)

Can you not spot her Frenchness even from behind. The way she carries her printing squigy in her satchel. So in her honour I named this print Les Liaisons Dangereuses. And by the way I’m not really this tiny, it’s just the way photo was taken (Swear).

I toyed with using a whole bunch of other colours when I saw them scattered on this. Seriously what sort of a blogger would I be if I didn’t toy with the idea of mixing !!Art!! !!Fashion!! and !!Colour!! (and loads more exclamation marks?)

I think I may have said something at this point along the lines of… “anyone who chooses to turn their hand to writing or sketching daily, I commend them.” This Goddess is in fact a sketch of Courtney Love which I did one day when doodling about with her over cookies and tea. It’s probably the most normal thing we have in common, the love of tea, cookies a good sketchpad and pen and pencil action. It’s important to keep making things if you’re any sort of artist. I really believe that. For me that means making things that make me smile….”

I was secretly hoping that it would turn out well when the red wallpaper background was applied. The background had taken me a good few months to create, each little thing in it is hand drawn (it’s from the cover of the first Goddess Guide book and is a pattern compiled of my favourite items).

I hoped with a little prayer that it would all come together once the final black layer when on.

I closed my eyes and squinted a bit as I opened them hoping that the final image would look good. Then I thought of something vaguely philosophical “It’s an homage to a Goddess who can quite effortlessly mix Topshop with a fantastical bespoke vintage headpiece and push her own style to the edge of existence. Her world is layered with luscious texture; the scent of Fracas perfume rolls over a satin and gilt edged chair, red flock wallpaper matches crumbling 40′s lipstick, kohl’d eyes look from beneath blonde Elnett curls. A landscape of longing.”

The significance for me of being able to hand make a print in England in a studio giving printers constant work cannot be underestimated. And if you’d like to try the process yourself The London Print Club lets you take a group along and you can get an introductory session for a fee. I hired The London Print Club for a full day and if the experience wasn’t a wonderful one, no amount of tea or smiles would make me pretend otherwise. I had the best fun and everyone there was so, so kind.

Also on this day, frustrated at not having anywhere to show step by step behind the scenes making of things (Jeeeeeez, shit, how am I supposed to show the littlest details of people that I visit?), I made the decision to start this blog. Just to be able to blog about things I like and hear what people like me really think in the world. To find and talk about things like this headdress in this print by this American designer here

So that’s all really! Oh yes, just to say that I’m not that small really, see it’s just that this print is really rather big! Also just to say that I did a print on the day with a blue background inspired by a blue mug in the studio, but I only did a few.

Some of these prints have already been bought by some pretty amazing people so if you fancy giving one a safe home, somewhere where Goddesses and milky tea are much appreciated, then have a look here. Meanwhile come behind the scenes in this little film below.

P.S. A special Thank you to @katieantoniou who helped organise everything for me and above all, thanks to you. X