Studying the Old to Learn the New

Thought I would share my latest attempt at learning something new. Above is an early Victorian Pin-keep I purchased of off Ebay last year. I fell in love with it as soon as I saw it and thought that I could justify this purchase by using this Pin-keep as a study tool.

I have displayed this piece here and there and I have looked at it many times wishing I could create something similar. Now I know a lot of you have created examples similar to this...but I have never in my life created anything so delicate and I humbly declare that my style of stitching is rather clumsy at best.

So I decided to create a piece that was more my style...a little rough and tumble looking and more on the folk art side of things.

This is what I came up with...an old style advertising pin-keep. I love animal themed advertising from days gone by and could just imagine them giving out these pin-keeps to the women of the day as a way to promote their products.
"Colburn's Philadelphia Mustard Company"
In reality though they were just trade cards and not pin-keeps like I made...but heck...its fun to use your imagination to create one of kind objects for your own use and enjoyment...in that respect we women haven't changed all that much.

I made my pin-keep in layers
 Front
1. fabric photocopy of advertisement
2. a layer of felt
3. stiff cardboard

Back

1. wool fabric

2. cardboard

You can pretty much guess how it is put together by looking at the photos. It a fun project...takes some patience but isn't difficult to do. 

If you want to make your own Bulldog pin-keep but aren't sure where to get the graphics just head on over to Catnip Studio...she has a huge variety of clip to choose from including the graphics for this Bulldog.

I liked this bulldog image because he reminded 

me of my little Jasper.

Back to mouse making.

Susan