Wednesday 17 October 2012

magical colour at the Morgan [and some pix for Ma]


i have been staying in a wee treehouse here in Cleveland
and have made a friend just up the street
i asked my new friend if i could take some happy snaps for my Ma
and my new friend [who seems to be of the strong, silent type]
did not object
 
 

Fall is a splendid time of year to be making marks on paper
and what better place to be making those marks
than the renowned Morgan Conservatory?

they have the biggest dyepot i've ever seen
- it took two of us to lift it up onto the gas hob


the pot even has it's own wheelie thingummy to go underneath
in a shape i am most partial to.
[i had to restrain myself from attempting carparksurfing on it]


looking out the back we are surrounded by gorgeous industrial buildings
there is truly splendid brickwork here
all sorts of different brick bonds to be seen
i've spotted English Garden Wall bond and also Scottish Bond [similar to EGWB but with two extra rows of stretchers] which is [on this side of the puddle] called American Bond
 

and so we made colour
using bio-regional dye materials, most of them gathered outside the backdoor of the Morgan
with the inclusion of a gift from the Dogs Above
who had kindly arranged for a branch from a dark coloured Prunus
to be deposited on my doorstep






we had a small and nervous visitor
Tom Balbo kindly put him outside


more images can be found on Christine's pages and over at Lotta's

11 comments:

  1. Wonderful colours of my favourite season, thank you! Wish you could bring the open air, claw footed bathtub home as well as the dye pot + stand. Such a pity about luggage restrictions.

    Really exciting leaf prints on paper, I just adored the patterning and colours.

    PS the last batch of tulips are just starting to flower - fringed deep pink and very tall and pretty.

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  2. after all these years of remotely seeing you in action and meeting new cities, it was such a pleasure to meet you and see the class energy. i am so delighted that you and the morgan have finally met!

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  3. more to swoon over (I've already spied aimee's blog pics and tale) and eco print paper (now I'm positively fainting away)

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  4. love the colors of your new friend...............

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  5. so glad you love the morgan, too. and lovely papers, indeed.

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  6. I'm partial to the wheelie thingummy myself.... not to mention the eco prints in amazing colours.

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  7. While collecting walnuts on my family's home property of 10 acres I found a growth on the walnut trees that reminded me of oak gall. Is there a walnut gall that you use for the dyeing pot. I don't know whether to use it in the dye pot or to distroy it. this is the link to a photo http://www.apsnet.org/edcenter/intropp/lessons/prokaryotes/Article%20Images/CrownGall01.jpg

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  8. galls are generally caused by insects. I'd be doing some further research on what might be living in there before I picked it...

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  9. Beautiful, gorgeous paper. Thanks for sharing.

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