Amazing Animal Shoe Workshop!

Due to the mega popularity of the animal shoes, we've decided to show you how it's done at our Animal Shoe Workshop...

Join us on Sunday the 19th of May, at our Bournemouth shop/studio and customise your shoes, with creator behind the Love From Hetty & Dave brand, Zoe Larkins.

You will learn how to re-invent your shoes with leather details as well as stitching techniques that can be used to customise all the other shoes in your wardrobe!

Sunday the 19th of May from 11am - 3pm 

at

Love From Hetty & Dave

864 Christchurch Road

Bournemouth

BH7 6DQ

Suitable for beginners, £40 per person

Advance bookings only
8 places available

You will need to bring a pair of plain ballet pump style shoes or heels in your size to customise.

Examples of what you could do:
White shoes - Pandas, Mice or Bunnies
Brown shoes - Foxes or bears
Black shoes - Cats 

You get the idea... or contact us if you have any problems!

This workshop includes all materials except the shoes, sandwiches, tea and cake served vintage style, on delightful mismatched crockery.

Book your place here: 

http://lovefromhettyanddave.bigcartel.com/product/customised-animal-shoes-workshop-19th-may

Looking forward to helping you pimp your pumps!!

Tippy Toe Lovings

xx 

A Not Very Brief History of Love From Hetty & Dave: Part 1

Soooo, the other day I was perusing all my sales on Etsy from waaaaaaaay back, and was reminded how it all began, and as I re-count this story at least 3 times a day to customers in the shop, I thought I'd tell you lot about it too, so here goes....

In 2001, I just about scraped a third in my Silver and Goldsmithing degree at Rochester. In all honesty, I chose the wrong course- I should have done fashion or textiles, but was too lazy at the time to change it!  

Anyway, having collaborated with my best friend for her fashion collection, and making the handbags and accessories for her final show, I discovered how delicious it was, working with leather. I never worked with metal again, which was a massive relief as I was rubbish at soldering!

Shortly after graduating, we're talking a matter of hours, I disappeared out of Medway and back to my hometown of Bournemouth, where I spent the summer (and maybe a little bit longer) labelling video tapes. Pretty glamourous stuff. 

I did, in fact, get to the point where I could stick the spine label on one handed. I considered entering the Guinness Book of Records for my speedy labelling, but alas, I soon started to get the shakes from drinking copious amounts of instant coffee. 

I was soon promoted to printing vinyl CCTV signs, apparently labelling videos wasn't mentally stimulating enough for me, although I believe it was more to do with placing me in a work area far, far away from the coffee machine, thus saving the company a considerable amount of money on hot beverages.

Every evening, after my tape labelling day job, I'd go home and play around, experimenting with leather (NOT in the kinky sense), until I came up with a simple handbag design, with a folky, South American inspired design:

Front...

and back...

Then I did start experimenting in the kinky sense, and made these rude little ladies...

Here's a photo of me looking super young, demonstrating how to pass out on a friend's floor, and spill the contents of your handbag...







I called my brand 'Love From Hetty & Dave', after an old photo I got in a junk shop while I was living in Rochester. On the back, written in felt tip pen: 'To Mary and Bill, Love From Hetty & Dave'

No idea who this adorable couple is, but I presume they are Mary and Bill- Hetty & Dave probably took the photo, and sent it to them.

Aaaaaanyway, in 2005, I realised that the old folk of Bournemouth were never really going to appreciate my kinky handstitched works of art, and I made the move to London, where I worked as a customer services manager for an online fashion retailer. 

How I got this job, I will never know, as I could barely send an email, let alone do anything else that involved the internet. Luckily, I'm a fast learner, and managed to get by, despite phoning my dad, crying my eyes out, on the second day! 

I moved into a teeny, tiny bedsit off of Portobello Road, and worked my fingers to the bone every minute I wasn't at work, stitching my appliqued leather handbag creations to sell on Portobello Market every Saturday.

As it turned out, nobody was prepared to spend the money (which really wasn't very much) on a handmade leather bag, by a new, unknown designer. Looking around what people were selling on the market, I quickly sussed out that jewellery was what sold, and soon I had scaled my designs down into brooches and necklaces.

Bearing in mind, that craft seller websites like Etsy didn't exist at this point in time, or if they did, nobody really knew about them, the only way of selling my product was through markets, and after listening to the advice of the other stall holders, I moved over to Spitalfields Market, where things really started to take off. But that's a story for another day...

 

For now, I'll leave you with pictures of my Leather Tattoo Swallow handbag design:

And the Leather Tattoo Swallow Man-bag I made for Marc Almond of 'Soft Cell', in 2005...

 

 

Next time, whenever that will be, all about what happened when I started trading at Spitalfields...

Market trader lovings

xx

London Calling

Recently I came to the conclusion that I work waaaaay too hard, and actually, I do deserve a little break from time to time, so last weekend, I shut up shop, and headed off to London for a couple of days, to catch up with old chums, and have a bit of a mooch about.

Here's a picture of me mooching, and looking a bit cross:

 

This is what I did...

* Bumped into a customer on the bus, who was sporting a ladybird brooch on her bag

* Hung out in an old man's pub, and watched a pool competition, while simultaneously admiring the amazingly high gloss ceiling!

* Went to Soho to stock up on chains and findings, then popped over to Spitalfields to grab some blue leather for a Union Jack heart brooch order.

* Ate some delicious Turkish food.

* Popped into Lazy Oaf where I had a quick catch up with lovely Gemma, and tried on this AMAZING pineapple dress, then couldn't decide whether to buy it or not, so left it... for now!! I have a funny feeling that as soon as the sun shines, I'll be getting my purse out!

* But most exciting of all, finally made it to George Moore Menswear shop in Bowes Park, which I'd been wanting to go to for years...

No ordinary menswear shop, this place closed down about 13 years ago, but the owner who retired, and now lives above the shop never cleared out the window display. 

I love old, abandoned buildings, and when they still have all the  stuff in, even better! Just wish I could have had a peek inside the door, to see if all the stock was still on the shop floor.

Check out these delightfully mouldy underpants!

I'd like to think that the shop comes to life in the dead of night with ghosties and ghouls, shopping for faded ski gloves and mildewed undercrackers...

I hung about George's for a while, wondering how the local residents feel about this peculiar museum piece of a shop and gazing at the windows above, it's tattered grey nets fluttering in the breeze, I hoped to catch a glimpse of the gent that owns the shop. No such luck, so I headed off to my next eery destination...

Next stop was Postman's Park, a Memorial of Heroic Self Sacrifice, close to St Paul's.

The wall is lined with tiles, telling the heroic tales of all kinds of people...

Just lovely, and poignant.

If you are ever in the vicinity, you must, must, must go and have a look. 

Sooooooooo, that was my lovely, if somewhat weird and creepy weekend!

If you're fond of an eerie tale, check out this blog- one of my faves for peculiar stories: http://www.messynessychic.com/

That's all for today! Back in the shop this weekend!

Creepy Lovings

xx 

Easter Bunny Workshop

Oh lummy cripes! I've been meaning to blog for like, a million years or something, but life has been a little hectic/stressful/completely chaotic recently... Anyhoo, I'm currently addressing the slightly out of control chaos, and here I am, blogging innit.

Soooo, let me tell you all about the Easter Bunny workshop we held in March, which now seems a lifetime ago, and in all honesty, I was feeling a teensy bit run down around that time, so here are some delightful pictures to feast your eyeballs on...

Here's a picture of all the lovely ladies, concentrating on stitching their bunnies tails and ears on...

Here's an example of two velveteen wabbits with lace collars and pom pom tails...

This is Phoebe with her rather Scottish inspired bunny, Hamish McRabbit-Face. She managed to match her rabbit's pom pom nose to her green nail polish!

And spookily, Lydia unknowingly co-ordinated her yellow and pink polkadot nails to her bunny too!

Here's Lydia's Mum, Sue. We loved that she added a little purple beret to her bunny!

Judi brought along a lacy family heirloom, which she used to decorate her wabbit, Lady Verity!

Ali went for a bit of a tropical Carmen Miranda theme with her wabbit...

 

And here's the final line up of the Easter Bunnies with their creators/owners.

 

 Ladies, you did a great job!

If you fancy coming along to one of our workshops, the next one is on the 19th May, where I will be showing you how to create animal shoes out of plain ballet pumps.  

Have a look here for more information, and book online!

Off to beddy bo's now...

Bunny lovings

xx

Slug-o-rama!

So it's official. I may have said this before, but now it is REALLY official- I literally have the best customers in the whole world, EVER!

I always knew all the nicest, most brilliant people came to buy stuff from Love From Hetty & Dave, be it at markets, online or in the shop, but this week it was truly highlighted by this adorable Japanese lady, Mayu, who came back on Tuesday after discovering the shop on Saturday, to buy 2 slugs!

 

Me, Mayu and George the Slug

Mayu told me that after seeing the slugs on Saturday, she had slugs on the brain, and did a couple of doodles. 

And WOW! These doodles are just soooo brilliant! 

Check out SLUG RIDER here:

 

Doodle by Mayu Yokouchi

And this amazing doodle is all about a Japanese superstition: 

'You'll be dead by the morning if you fall asleep with your socks on and dream of monkeys'. 

Total bonks!

Doodle by Mayu Yokouchi

Just pure wonderful-ness! Makes me want to make a life size slug rider out of felt to hang out in my shop window, although I'm not sure what the Pokesdown community would make of a giant topless lady riding a massive slug along Christchurch Road!

Anyway, after Mayu made her purchase of George (giant slug) and Mary (baby slug), she took them for a cuppa in Boscombe, like every good slug owner should!

 

George and Mary sharing a cuppa and a slice of cheesecake.

She tells me that Baby Slug Mary is now living in Charminster with her Japanese friend, and George the Giant Slug has gone back to Japan with her. 

What a super dooper story!

I should mention, these aren't the first slugs to head out of the UK- We've sent slugs off to Japan before, as well as the Netherlands, Australia, New York, and one lovely customer tells us that the giant slug she bought before Christmas now resides with her sister in Berlin! International slugs- I love it!

If you fancy a slug in your life, you can buy one online here:

http://lovefromhettyanddave.bigcartel.com/category/slugs

Sluggish Lovings 

From the Queen of Slugs

(Yes, apparently I do carry that title!)

xx

A Delightfully Crafty Sunday

So, yesterday we hosted our first ever Love From Hetty & Dave workshop on the rainiest, most miserable Sunday ever! 

I'd been toying with the idea of teaching others how to make my leathery stuff over the last 2 years, and finally gave myself a little kick up the butt and got organising! Truth be told, I had been feeling a teeny weeny bit nervous about it, but with my wonderfully calm assistant Ali, by my side, deep down, I knew it would be just fine...

 

After purchasing many pairs of scissors, rather a lot of glue, and borrowing 6 vintage chairs from my darling friend Amber's 'Decades of Design' retro furniture shop down the road, by Saturday evening it was all set up, and ready for four lovely ladies to come and get stitching. 

So after an early night, and a mouse incident involving 2 cats at 4.30am, I picked up some delicious treats from lovely Lisa at 'Tricky Treats' in the morning- posh cucumber sandwiches, and the ol' classic egg and cress, all with the crusts cut off, along with an amazing Victoria sponge cake with fresh cream, and cranberry, pecan and white choco cookies. Unfortunately two cancelled at the last minute, which meant we had a lot more cake to eat between us, and each had cookies to take home in party bags... what a shame!

By 11am, everyone had arrived, from far and near. Amanda had driven all the way from Hereford, picking up Kate on the way, near Stonehenge. Suzie had come from Southampton and Alys just a stone's throw away in Poole. And WOW! What a super dooper lovely bunch of ladies they were!

After a leisurely cup of tea and chit-chat, we got on with the job in hand: Making leather heart brooches in a choice of pink or red, and with turquoise or black lettering. I must say, I was VERY impressed with everyone's cutting skills on those tiny letters!

Kate (second from the left) had never done any sewing, and did absolutely brilliantly, and was the only casualty with a prick to her finger!  Luckily, we had plasters to hand!

At 1pm we were half way through the brooch with everyone's letters stitching securely on, and it was time to tuck into some lunch, and decide on more workshop dates for the diary!

This was just the perfect excuse to get out all my mismatched vintage crockery, and it all looked so pretty against the cute table cloth... Amanda told me she hadn't expected a lunch like this, and it felt like such a real treat. To be honest, it hadn't really crossed my mind to do it any other way, so that was lovely to hear!

After lunch we finished the heart brooches in super speedy time, and everyone managed to make an additional brooch too!

Considering there were absolute beginners amongst us, it was really quite impressive!

Check out those looks of concentration, Kate and Alys!

Finishing the day with another cuppa and some delish cookies everyone had 2 finished heart brooches, and we all agreed it had been such a lovely, relaxing day.

Sadly the glamourous Suzie (in the beautiful red fur collar, here) rushed off, and missed having her pic taken with the girls and their finished brooches.

So here are the ladies wearing their hearts- left to right: Amanda, Kate, Alys and Ali. 

Good work ladies, and a huge thank you for making the first ever workshop go like a dream!

And if you are reading this, feeling a wee bit gutted that you missed out, don't despair!

On Sunday the 24th February, we are holding another heart brooch workshop. You can book your place right here, right now!

I am also in the process of finalising other workshops at the moment, making other crafty delights which I know this lovely bunch of ladies are desperate to get signed up too, so until next time...

Cake-y, stitch-y lovings

xx