Linnea: Found this wooden chair on he street in our village. My father helped me to restore it and to put it back together again. In the back of my head , I had a vision of a beautiful pom pom chair that I found on the internet : Of course my chair got the colour of lemon yellow and the pom pom´s, I sewed on to a felted fabric and then glued it to the seat. Here is the result, you can click on the pictures to enlarge.
0 Comments
Linnea:
So, first of all I have a confession to make: I have a "thing" for ostriches, trees, leafs and peacocks. Maybe I forgot something now, but I guess that this mix is weird enough as it is. And on top of that, I love strong colors. One of my latest projects are two cabinet doors that my land lord had laying around on the road to our house. In the beginning, I really wanted to make them into tables but after I had painted them, they seemed more suitable on the wall. I used acrylic paint for glass and made the ostrich sketchy like. The trees took longer time, cause there was a lot of precise painting to do. But what took me the longest time, were the frames. They were covered in thick layers of lack and it took me forever to get it out. When I finally got rid of it, I didn't feel like covering it all again. So I used linen oil to protect the wood andto bring out the beautiful tree color! Linnea:
Today is the last day of my fathers 2 week visit here in Israel. It has really been a wonderful time and I have learned a lot. My father is 73 years old and has worked as a carpenter for most of his life. He actually built our summerhouse in Sweden and all its interiors alone and it´s still standing strong, looking the same after nearly 40 years! I really admire his way through life and his way of looking at things. Despite illness, he fights on and wants to get as much out of life as he can! One of the things that I have in common with him, is that we both like the challenge of making something out of nothing. Using the tools and materials that we have and try to come up with solutions to what´s missing! So this is what we have been doing a lot of these 2 weeks, especially since this is a typical Israeli house:-). There was no gate between the outside wall and the fence, but now we have one thanks to my dad! And now, we can also close the doors to all the rooms properly, hang the towels on the bathroom wall etc. But I am most happy for the new working table that he put together for me outside, made by blocks and a pallet on top! Finally I can work without hurting my back. Why didn't I come up with that before??? Another thing that he helped me with was a turned wooden chair that I found on the road. We needed to pick it all apart and glue it back on again. But since the chair was so delicate, you couldn't use screw clamps. Instead we had to press it together, using thin ropes and tension rods of smooth wood. I took some pictures of it to remember how to do it the next time and maybe someone else can have use for the information too! Anyway, my dad is going tomorrow morning and my heart is aching. But I am so thankful for this time. We don´t see each other so often now when I live in Israel. But when we do, it is for a longer period and we both appreciate the time more than before. Linnea:
Long time a ago when we lived in Rishon, I painted an old telephone chair red. The seat was made of woven ropes and in a bad shape, but back then it still hung together. After 2 years in Sweden, we returned to Israel and I took back the chair but the seat was now completely damaged. It took me some time to get the inspiration to fix it - 2 years actually. Then I got some really beautiful designed fabrics from my sister in Miami, and started to work! First I got rid of all the ropes of course, then I sawed a wooden board( found on the street) into equal pieces and placed them as the base seat and on that I glued foam from an old chair. Then I riveted a stretchable fabric to keep all in place. Finally, I riveted a beautiful Satara-patterned fabric and now my heart is at peace, I really don´t enjoy having unfinished projects in my living-room!!! Linnea:
My husband brought an ugly mirror home and it was a big one. A bit broken in the corners and I didn't like it at all but I put it on the side as always and waited for a good idea to pop up! Later I had a conversation with my mother about the interior in our summer house in Sweden. It has a quite small living-room and my sister (the interior designer) thought it would be a good thing to put up a big mirror above the sofa, to make the room look larger. I said of course - this is what I am going to do too!!! I cut out the outer plastic coat on the ends of the mirror and cleaned it from all grease. Then I spray painted the frame, first with matte - white and then with sun-yellow twice. I hung it up by the dining table and the room really feels bigger now! Linnea: So I decided that the biscuit- tin- watches was a cool project and made some more: But there is another project that I really want to do with these tins, that actually was the original idea. But for that, I will need at least 5 and right now I have none!!!! Just need to be patient and wait until I have collected enough. And that is really not one of my strong sides......
Linnea:
It has been a long time since I´ve done something new from leather and I had some jackets from before that I had already cut into pieces. So I started to play around and finally one jacket collar became a belt, with pockets from an old pair of leather pants. The other belt was created from the arms of the jacket and I just added some cut out triangular pieces that was laying around. Linnea:
It has been terrible weather in Israel, cold, raining and in many places also snowing. Now it´s kind of windy but really ok, if you compare it to what has been! So, during this time I have stayed inside the house and worked with what I can. I have been thinking about what I can do with used glass, instead of throwing it away. I had some old facial cream boxes that I cleaned completely. I primed them first with a sponge in white, 3 times. After that, I used small brushes to paint them in different patterns. You need to air dry them for 3 weeks or as I prefer; to dry them inside the oven for 1 hour in 100 c. I can honestly say that it is not worth the time if you want to make money from it, but it is definitely a fun thing to give away as a gift or to keep for yourself! Linnea:
So, I've got a hang up on biscuit tins.......It will probably get very bad. I can feel the craving building up in my body just by writing "biscuit tin".... I think that one of the reasons is that I can take some of the metal waste that they just trow away and do something with it. Here in Israel they are quite good at recycling plastic bottles but cans, glass and other metals, they just throw away with all the rest of the garbage. Which of course is totally CRAZY!!!! I tried another method today on the biscuit tin clock. I spray painted an ugly tin completely white and when it had dried, I put a crocheted small tablecloth (also called doily) over it and sprayed it again Ultra-pink. It was just for fun and now I can't actually decide if it´s still ugly or kind of cool? What do you think? Linnea:
Both me and Caroline have a fetish for old biscuit tins.You can find them everywhere in our houses, in all different sizes and colours. For me they are not as holy as they are for C, and I have been thinking for a while what you can use them for - more than just a tin. One day, I found a clock face in a store, came home and put it inside one of my favorite tins and it´s now hanging on my wall. Maybe Caroline will forgive me one day for making a hole in the tin but probably she won't... |
Linnea & Caroline2 foreigners in Israel trying to find their space. Up-cycling furniture and clothes for a better environment and future. Check us out on Instagram:
|