My studio is full of reused and repurposed things. I could be a packrat because I sometimes look at things and think I should save it because it may come in handy later, and many times it does!
My workspace employs large reused items from the family households. My studio work desk is an old table that belonged to my husband's great-grandparents. It's a heavy, solid wood table that I will never refinish because I love all the history in the marks, scratches, dents, and now, paint splatters. I also use my daughter's old dollhouse as a studio bookshelf. I have my great-grandmother’s sewing machine, my grandmother’s tea cart (still thinking about what to do with that), and an old end table from our first furniture set. In this way I keep connections to my own history right where I create.
Smaller reused items are employed for organization and painting tools. I use my grandmother's tea cups and saucers, jam jars and chipped mugs for organization and storage. I use old silverware and ceramic tiles for stamping and mark-making. I save the offcuts and scraps from fabrics for fiber arts. I collect old wooden spools to wind scraps of yarn and threads. I buy handmade paints in repurposed bottle-caps and tins. I even repurpose my garden by using sticks, dried leaves, and flowers.
repurposed studio table
fabric offcuts for new art
jars and spools for notions
repurposed watercolor supplies
Most of my bookmaking papers and fiber art supplies are repurposed. I even reuse my own discarded paintings for collages and artist books. I try not to even let my own discards go to waste. We have a local shop, Scrap Creative Reuse, where I get almost all of my threads, yarns, fabric pieces and papers. It is always exciting to go in there and see what I can create from someone else's scraps and discards.
I think about my great grandmother a lot. She was a farmer's wife, lived through the great depression, and made do, mended, stored, and reused. I have always loved old things and how they adapted to new circumstances and created new stories, and I remember with much sadness that my family shunned anything handmade, mended, second-hand, or reused.
To me, mended and reused things have stories embedded in them, and this isn't just a modern sentimental notion. I work as a docent at the Kelsey Museum of Archaeology, and there are so many examples of reuse that show up in the archaeological record. For example, some of the textiles in their collection contain "patches" of reused embroidery or tapestry work depicting mythical or religious iconography that were carefully woven into new textiles. The idea of reusing and repurposing things is as old as humanity and working with them adds to their stories.
(To celebrate National Reuse Day, the Artisan’s Cooperative interviewed me for an article about artistic reuse. Quotes from this post first appeared there.)
Make a Vintage Magnetic Pin Dish
Pin cushions are cute and all, but I prefer to have a catch-place for all the things that try to escape when I am sewing. I also like the magnetic needle-minders that nab the needles and pins that are the true escape artists.
I had already been collecting sewing notions in one of the many teacups and saucers I inherited from my grandmother when I realized that by sticking a strong magnet on the underside of a saucer I would get a magnetic pin dish with all the cozy feels and the satisfaction of repurposing a vintage item I already loved.
Not all saucers will work for this idea because the inner depth of the saucer foot must accommodate the magnet without creating a wobble. I used a Tombow Adhesive Dot to stick the magnet to the underside of this saucer so there would be no damage if I ever decide to remove it.
