Saturday 30 June 2012

The traveling dog



I'm ready to come back in my born town in Italy, as usual, for the summer holidays. This time, it is going to be more complicated because all low cost air companies do not allow animals on board and, for that, I was obliged to choose the train. Train, at least, is not so bad: indeed I prefer to enjoy the panorama of Alps while passing the burdens between France and Italy, and to admire the natural beauties outside of my window, to be submitted to impositions of low cost companies. I hate the hurry to be at the airport two hours before the flight take off, draconian check-ins, and the grey zone in which people is usually placed before coming on board, while wrestling for number-free seats in the plane.

And, in order to organize at the best my coming travel, I took decision to make a special bag for Fifi, She is going to stay a lot of hours in the train and rules impose me to have a bag in which to place her during the travel: not only for the train, but also to make easier the whole trip in stations while I will grab correspondences to get home. Moreover, this bag is going to be also very useful during the summer to bring Fifi at the seaside with me in my vespa!!!

 

I want to share with you this kind of bag, proposing here a pattern/sketch to produce it: you can download it here. The bag has a hole for your companion's head and sufficient space to take it in: I'm sure that Fifi is going to become, in spite of restrictions and absurd rules that are applied for dogs, the perfect travel companions... I wish you a good summer!





Sunday 24 June 2012

A new friend for summer time



Here's a new little felted friend for this summer! After the little crab, and the cute octopus, here's a little and white jellyfish, the advantage of which is that she does not prickle - differently to true jellyfish that are used to reside in seas! Check it out on my etsy...


And for whom that wants to have fun making their own sea these felt mascots, I have just written a new tutorial that contains instruction to do jellyfish, octopus, and crab felt brooches! You find also this tutorial on my etsy, I hope you like it!


Wednesday 13 June 2012

A diamond is (almost) forever



I discovered recently this funny alternative French song, Brigitte's Battez-vous, and I love it! Above all, I find very funny the sarcastic way adopted to deal with the typical womanly desire to be in any way in the middle of men's attentions. This song indeed talks about a girl who, believing in the power of her appeal, spurs her wooers to fight for her love, to adulate her with precious gifts, and to show her to be disposed to everything to win her love. Yet the video shows how this kind of desires can be deceptive sometimes... and we can say that this incitement to a love competition amongst beaus ends in a rather unexpected way....


In spite of this funny irony about women-men relations, I still believe that us, the women, deserve to be court and adulated with precious jewelry and, above all, with diamonds. But not the real ones, which are cause of destruction and dead in those countries where they are taken. For that, I've produced some creations inspired to a more ethic vision of the world of diamonds: a felt brooch and an hand carved rubber stamps set. Albeit these diamonds are not exactly the same precious stones to which many women think about, I'm sure that their cute face make them even more valuable than the real one! You can find them on my etsy!






Wednesday 6 June 2012

timeless vintage logo #9 Calimero


For this new issue of my posts dedicated to timeless vintage logos, I'm here glad to introduce Calimero. In this case, Calimero is not really a logo: this cute mascot was the principal character of tv commercial advertising of "Ava", an Italian vintage laundry soap. Between late 1950s and 1970s commercial advertisings in the Italian TV were concentrated in special space of 10 minuts per days (from 20h50 to 21h00) called "Carosello" and each advertising was in the form of a quick humorist sketch or cartoon.  That was the real appointment for little ones, which looked forward to see Carosello before going bed. Each firm had its own mascot as commercial testimonial. Calimero in this case survived and took autonomy from its original advertising nature, and became afterward a popular cartoon diffused in many country all over the world.

Calimero. Pubblicità degli anni '60.

Each episode of Calimero had more or less the same plot: Calimero, after having made countless troubles, ended up with complaining and grieving over his sorrow while claiming that nobody wants him because he was "little and black". As soon as these words were pronounced, a voice-over reassured the little chick saying "Calimero, you are not black, you are only dirty" and with AVA Calimero was cleaned up are restored in his original color. That's true, today this plot seems rather racist: the fact that to point out that to be dirty is better than to be black is offensive indeed. Yet this is  partially confuted by that fact that Calimero in white is too ugly; really much better in black!


Aside this little downside, Calimero became a real character of the modern pop culture, and personified a typical human behavior to feel sorry for ourselves. All of us, at least one time in the life, tried to blame external causes about life downturns, as Calimero, instead to adopt an auto-critical reply. The idea to be subject to an injustice independent of our mighty makes us feeling better than to admit our limits and to try to ameliorate them. This is why Calimero survived during times and became the symbol of an attitude. And I had also fun to make a rubber stamp with his shape and I hope you like it!



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