Tag Archives: gilding

All Quiet…..

Sshhhhhh….. all the bloggers are sleeping, except for dear Jon – who is entertaining me with Blue Peter presenters and Postmodern Jukebox vibes, and lovely Mr Swings – who likes to share his dinners. It is quiet out there.

And what do I have to offer? Insightful views on Brexit? Non. My opinion on bralets? Oui, trés bon. Gilding antics? Yes!

gold-lettered-love-gilding-on-its-way-to-savannah-uk

Finally…something on its way to Savannah.

Tiny bears? Yes, I have tiny bears!!

framed-gilded-letter-g-with-genuine-gold-leaf-on-calligraphy-uk

Here’s one I made earlier….

And, I have a big blue autumnal sky over Devon….

Devon-sky-2018

Big sky….

I will finish with a random comment left on a vintage Scarlet Blue post back in 2011.

So glad the knickers will be clean.
I remember being quite taken by the Borg, especially at Wimbledon in the late 70s.

Lucky You…..

….or not so lucky.

I did used to enjoy writing those old advert posts, but over the past few years I have been consumed by calligraphy, and, to be fair, I haven’t seen many adverts that I’ve felt inspired by. Is it my jaded old brain or the new swathe of boring adverts that are to blame? Bit of both I reckon. Also I have a tendency to be scrolling through my iPad whilst the adverts are on so maybe I should pay more attention?

Anyhow, here is an old advert post from 2011.

Due to the sluggish financial market the Halifax staff have little to do. They are under strict instruction to only authorise two mortgages this year and can only lend to people who don’t need loans. The financial advisers have all been made redundant and now the entire business is propped up by the canteen staff who have diversified by setting up a radio station in the basement of an NCP car park in Buttocks Booth just off Lumbertubs Lane. They broadcast daily, via telegraphic transfer, to five mountain goats on a farm in Southwold, Suffolk.
Scottish widow Sandy and Co-operative Carol provide the morning entertainment with a breakfast show. They are a tight team; they have a mutual interest in investing extra digits in their hedge funds and have bonded over unit banking. Alas, they are so enamoured by one another that they have failed to notice the potential threat of a hostile takeover bid from tea boy, Derek. He has coveted their breakfast slots from afar and, in an effort to remove the women from the helm he has sabotaged Sandy’s liquid assets. He completes the arm’s length transaction by passing Sandy her mug. The mug handle breaks causing hot tea to spill across the mixing desk. Carol and Sandy are unfazed by life’s little dramas. They have each other and therefore the accelerated depreciation is negligible. They smile sweetly and, still laughing, still singing from the same spreadsheet, they tell Derek that life is better with a beaver.

And to finish on a topical note a little gilded insult from Lulu’s suggestion on a previous post,

gilded-insult-gold-leaf-calligraphy-uk

Trump?

NEXT TIME: Under the weight of all the books, the chair breaks, leading Ms Scarlet to enrol on a chair restoration course where she meets a man in a bobble hat who offers her a hobnob and a cup of tea from his tartan themed thermos flask….

Another Book on a Chair

I thought I would share the view from my bathroom. I was fully dressed when I took this photograph – it is a bit fuzzy because I was trying to zoom in on the flax fields. Yes, I sometimes sit in my bath and pretend these are fields of lavender and that I’m in France.

north-devon-flax-fields-may-2016

A Bathroom with a view….

And here is another picture of a book on a chair seeing as the book on the chair in my previous post proved so popular. I have decided that ‘A book on a chair’ is my new thing. This is The Illusionists by Rosie Thomas – a jolly romp through Victorian London theatre land. As I’m reading I am envisioning Clark Gable in the lead role alongside Warwick Davis and Jenna Coleman, plus my envisioning is in black and white and was made in 1939. I am on page 284 (of 513) and the obligatory reference to Jack the Ripper has just turned up.

rosie-thomas-the-illusionists-review-2016

Book on chair…

Meanwhile, I have finished this. I am not happy with it. It is suffering from Kolner Miniatum pucker…. meaning the surface of the gold is wrinkly; this is probably because I applied the miniatum too thickly – or because I didn’t breathe on it correctly and therefore introduced unnecessary moisture to the surface before applying the leaf. Ack. This is a fuzzy photo to deliberately disguise my shortcomings.

gilded-word-graffiti-miniatum-epic-fail-2016-calligraphy

Finished….

I am happy with this though….

calligraphy-addressed-envelope-to-London-uk

Addressed….

Until next time when I will have another book on a chair.

Duckpool-may-2016

Catching Up…..

As it was sunny Charmaine brought the Rolls round to the front of the house in preparation for a trip to the seaside; after a buff and polish with Mr Sheen the old girl was ready for her first outing of the season. The sun shone, birds pooped on the windscreen, whilst Charmaine crunched gears, narrowly missed hitting small children and got her flip-flop caught on the accelerator. Finally we arrived at our destination in time for our first lesson in stone balancing…..

stone-balancing-at-Duckpool

Well balanced…

Sadly, after believing I had a natural talent for this sort of thing I was expelled from the workshop. Apparently the use of superglue was not considered to be a viable option.

I returned to the Rolls to read my book, leaving Charmaine to frolic in the surf and hopefully dislodge the pebble that had balanced itself on her forehead.
After 5 hours of solid reading in variable light with no interruptions for ice cream, fish’n’chips, or anything cheerful, I finished the damn book. And it was a damn book. This one…

the-visitors-by-sally-beauman

The Visitors

The Visitors by Sally Beauman. 540 words of misery; death; more misery; a bit of tragedy chucked in just to make it even more miserable; only one miserly paragraph alluding to sex; grumpy men looking for treasure; posh people stealing from Egyptian tombs; death; more death; typhoid; TB; DEATH. I think the book might have been about death. Set in the valley of the kings it was hardly going to be about the life and soul of the party [she was murdered early on]. Good grief. On the plus side it was extremely well written.

SO…. after finishing the book Charmaine drove me home, sans pebble but with an unsightly weeping wound on her forehead, where I decided that I should photograph this piece of work that has been gathering dust in my studio for the past two weeks begging to be finished….

gilded-calligraphy-gold-graffiti-uk

Gold witterings…

I am slapping this picture in this post with the promise that I will finish this piece for next week’s blog post. AND THERE WILL BE A BLOG POST NEXT WEEK.

I thank you.

Happy Birthday…..

…..to me…..

Yep, it’s that time of the year again when I am allowed to sit on the sofa all day and eat cake. I did have a fabulous post planned… but I seem to have lost it.

Meanwhile, isn’t this photograph peculiar?

gilded-letters-calligraphy-uk

Old Benson and Hedges Advert?

This one is not so peculiar… further gilding experiments with silver leaf…

gilding-with-silver-leaf-letter-g-uk

Silver Leaf

Apologies for this rubbish post. But it is my birthday.

Coming soon:- Charmaine finds out what it means to be British; Aunt Scarlet makes an International faux pas; and we finally find out what was in the picnic basket that Charmaine left in the hallway several posts ago…