Scarlett Hart aka Rowan Redd

Once upon a time there was a girl in a blue dress that went on an adventure down a rabbit hole. The girl in the blue dress slayed a dragon, killed a Queen, and nearly destroyed a kingdom. This is not her story, but it is the story of a princess who became a girl lost in Wonderland. The girl did not have a name though she sometimes called herself Rowan and sometimes Scarlett. Some say she is a blue blood but she will tell you that her blood is red the same as any. She is said to be the bastard daughter of the Queen of Hearts and an unknown lover of questionable mentality. Upon her birth she was placed in the Wonderland Asylum for Lunatics and the Criminally Insane, some say that madness burns behind her mismatched eyes worse than the blood rage that burned within the Queen herself.

The Princess Scarlett Hart was put away and forgotten by Wonderland, but she did not forget. She is beautiful, serene, a genius, a thief, a sociopath and quite utterly mad. A brilliantly broken and addled porcelain doll. Though no more mad then anyone left living in a broken Wonderland. She is obsessed with locks, and keys, and bright shiny blades. No locks can keep her out or in. She wanders the halls of the Asylum and the City humming, and singing slightly off key in a voice sweet as cyanide laced tarty tarts.

She laughed at the Queen of Heart’s fate and cried for the dragon as she bathed in the pool of tears. She wanders the forest in the day and sometimes takes tea with Hatter muttering about skinning white rabbits to make coats. A mad grin of too sharp teeth flickers across her tear streaked face while playing with her shining knives. On odd days she tells only lies, on even days she tells the truth. In Wonderland all the days are odd.

In your tour of Wonderland you may visit the Wonderland Asylum for Lunatics and the Criminally Insane for a very modest fee. You may even bribe a guard with a nice tarty tart to walk within the garden there. Whatever you do promise me you will be careful to never take tea with a flame haired fury with mismatched eyes, and bleeding hearts upon her gown. The forgotten princess of Hearts may tell you truths or sweeten your tea with honey and gentle lies or serve you sweet cakes laced with laudanum and spite. Or she may follow you home with her shiny blades as she serenades you with sugary sweet songs.

Better pictures soon but the light had already gone when I finished making Scarlett so I wrote down the Wonderland-ish story that was swirling about my head. This is the first doll I have made of the new year and the first doll I have made in two months, I think I may have found a little piece of my crafting mojo. *crosses fingers* I have more writing to do but hopefully I can start on another doll or craft project in the morning while the Boy does whatever he likes, mainly ignoring me until he wants feeding or I want to bribe him to escape the house for a few hours.

A Clockwork tale of Red Riding Hood (Part the first)

I know I'm a little bit behind on blogging (read as 'hugely immensely behind on blogging, writing and crafting') but I'm working on it...honestly.... I offer you the beginning of the fairy tale I am writing for the Red Riding Hood doll I finished making the other day with the addition of a few well placed cogs I managed to dig up in a antiques shop Wirksworth. I'm hoping that if I share the first few paragraphs of the story it will encourage me to finish writing Red's fairy tale and list the doll and figure out how I will print out her story in zine form. So here goes...

A Clockwork Tale of Red Riding Hood (Part the First)

by Apryl Lowe

My name is Rowan but most people call me Red. I live in a village in the heart of the forest. There is no silence here, the forest is filled with clanking and ticking of steam driven machinery cutting down trees. Vibrations shake the earth beneath my feet as the miners drill deeper and deeper under the ground, searching out new veins of precious metal. The sound of metal against metal fills the air near the blacksmith’s forge, ribbons of black smoke curl as they rise from the rooftops.

Today is my eighteenth birthday. Mother says I shall leave now to visit Grandmother in the Cottage. Mother has been up all night sewing me a hooded cloak, the colour of ripe red berries, the colour of my left eye. The one the villagers say is cursed and evil. Mother says it’s nonsense, that it means I will always see the truth of things. I have always been the finder of things, keys, coins, cogs and jewellery. Mother says I could find a diamond in a snow storm or weed out all the lies the peddlers spout and find the truth hidden in pretty words.

Today I leave the forest forever. I leave Mother, our small house and head to the city like my father did before I was born. I have been chosen to go to Grandmother as Father was before me, as so many were. Mother refuses to talk about it, she will only say that those chosen go to serve Grandmother in the Cottage and never return. She fears the truth I will see no matter how honeyed the lies she might speak.

Mother refused to walk with me to the platform. I stand with three other villagers, two girls and a boy, each of us carrying a basket filled with gifts for Grandmother, shiny copper and brass springs and cogs with decorative scrollwork, some with tiny chips of precious gems, and golden threads. I grip my cloak tightly around me the basket heavy over my arms. Leaning against my boots is a worn leather satchel, filled with what few belongings I own. The train whistles before pulling to a stop at the platform, plums of steam bubble around the black engine as the breaks sigh.

A man leaps out from the train a book and pen in his hands. Brass goggles obscure his eyes, he is smartly dressed in a navy uniform with highly polished scrollwork and gears decorating his chest. His left hand is mechanical, a clockwork construction of brass. I tilt my head to catch the faint sound of gears turning as the man examines the clockwork pendants each of us wear. The pendants are the sign of the chosen grandchildren. I am forbidden to tinker with mine though it lies warm against my skin and makes my teeth itch.

to be continued....

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Ok that's the first half, I have another paragraph written and extensive notes for the rest of the story I just need a harpy on my back to get me writing again.

Little Miss Melancholia

Melancholia is wistful and some might say wise. She is an expert on morose and obscure poets. She can often be found wandering aimlessly on cliff tops and moonlit moors. Rainclouds follow her every step. Every time she turns the radio on a song of hollow hearts, acoustic guitars and melancholy lyrics fills the room.

She tried to grow a garden once but only with weeping willow and love-lies-bleeding grew. The roses and forget-me-nots all withered and died. Poor little Melancholia never had any friends for long the all seemed to move away, or suddenly died in a quietly tragic way.

Miss Melancholia is made with cotton, vintage buttons, acrylic wool and scraps of fabric and vintage doilies upcycled into something new and magical. She was grunged up with a lovely smelling mixture of coffee, tea, vanilla and cinnamon. Melancholia will come with her own hand stained and typed story card for you to keep. She is an art doll and not meant for small children to play with due to small buttons. I have listed her in my little etsy shop.

Malice in Valentine City

Malice posing with camera and skeleton key

Malice lives on the edge of Valentine City in a crumbling castle with whispering ghosts. She cries in the rain and laughs in the snow. Malice carries the tarnished key to her heart pinned to her dress. Her heart lies buried in a wooden box beneath the castle.

Once she fell in love and her heart was broken, dashed to pieces and she no longer lives in the bubbling metropolis of Valentine City filled with lovers, cherubs, flower garlands, frothy lace, heart shaped chocolate boxes, and Valentine’s cards. She roams the edge of the city in search of heartbreakers to destroy. To toy with their hearts as her heart was shattered into sharp edged pieces. She paints sorrow on candy hearts, and embroiders broken hearts onto rose petals.

Sally moleskin and the top of the key and button necklace

I made Malice and an assortment of other goodies for Jessica my partner in the Nightmare Before Valentine's Day Tim Burton-esq Swap. I dithered over what to make Jessica for days

weeks, I doodled in my note book ,read and re-read her likes and dislikes for the swap and finally decided to make a doll that would fit into Burton's Holiday World as her favourite film was Nightmare Before Christmas and Sally is Jessica's favourite Burton character.

Malice and her story card leaning against my inspiration board

I drew Sally on a sheet of book paper and decoupaged it to the cover of a little moleskin notebook. Then I made a heart pincushion in a vaguely primitive style with ribbon, lace, stripped ticking and a vintage button. Then I procrastinated for quite a bit gathering together some vintage haberdashery, a little clock stamp and ephemera items to go with the swap (better than candy and chocolate I think...a little bit better any way.) I made the necklace with a vintage key and red button (I slightly cheated here as I had made myself the same necklace with matching key and button the week before).

Sally notebook, pendant, pin badge, pincushion and pocket watch stamp

When I had procrastinated long enough I gathered together my fabrics, doilies and buttons and made Malice. I don't have much of a technique when it comes to doll making I tend to go with what scraps of fabric I have and begin sewing in a bit of a haphazard way. I do draw ideas for dolls and as I make them and draw them bits of story float through my mind and then everything seems to fall together.

Malice

I like that Malice carries a little key and though she is one of my simpler dolls I think she has a lot of heart even if it is locked up in a box safe and sound. I think she would live happily in Halloween Town don't you?

book page doodle illustration (one of my favourites)

all wrapped up, the pin badge is a typed quote

from Nightmare before Christmas

'What's wrong? I thought you liked Frog's breath.'

Miss Gertrude the Gatekeeper

Miss Gertrude the Gatekeeper

Miss Gertrude Grey is the Gatekeeper of Greymere Cemetery. Her father the venerable Professor Gideon Grey died leaving poor Gertrude with only the crumbling house filled with books and the skeleton key to the cemetery gates.

Each night she listens to the gears of her father’s collection of clocks waiting for them to toll the hours of the night. After midnight when the fog is thick in the empty streets she ventures out to the Greymere. She stalks the night voluminous skirts whispering against gravestones. From her pocket she withdraws a map of the cemetery each mausoleum and crypt carefully drawn. She follows a winding path, skirts brushing against headstones and crypts until she stood before the stature of a long forgotten lady.

Gertrude removed the skeleton key from around her neck and slipped the key into the intricately carved base of the stature. The key turned and Gertrude listened to gears grinding and turning before a small door slid back. She stepped through into the darkness and down a creaking spiralling stairs deep below the cemetery grounds. At the bottom of the stairs gas lamps flicker to life and Gertrude enters what was once her father’s laboratory. It is filled with rusting hulks of machinery, broken gears and levers, books, and dusty glass bottles filled with strange items and coloured liquids.

Everywhere are scattered notes and drawings in her father’s precise handwriting, piled high on the work bench, pinned up on the wall. Gertrude reaches out to brush her fingers against her father’s notes and the tools gathering dust upon his desk. A ghostly smile crosses her face as she picks up a small heart shaped machine from his desk turning it over and over in her hands looking at it through a golden filigree magnifying glass. She picks up a pair of delicate tweezers and sets to work adjusting the tiny cogs and springs within the apparatus.

Miss Gertrude locks the gates at night of ancient Greymere Cemetery, but when the hours dwindle she spends her nights in her father's secret lab building the machines he never finished and creating new clockwork curiosities.

Gertrude will be listed in my little etsy shop in a few moments.

the Ghost Boy

Merle the Ghost Boy

The ghost boy lives in a boarded up shop at the end of a dark twisting ally. Behind a rusty chain, a lock with no key and a door that might once have been green but now is black with age. The shop is filled with books, paper, ink, typewriters, wooden letterpress blocks and archaic machinery. He thinks his name might once have been Merle, or Mervin or maybe Fox. It’s been so long since anyone has ever asked.

The night is filled with the moans, shrieks, and groans of the printing press as the Ghost Boy plays with ink and letterpress blocks. He reads his books, prints stories and posters of fantastical imaginary things. He pins up posters on telephone poles and plasters them on walls. He makes up typography jokes that nobody ever hears. Nobody ever laughs but him.

He walks though the town when the lights are dim and laughs at signs in papyrus, comic sans and arial black. He painstakingly prints graffiti letter by letter onto white painted walls to share the beauty of typography and words. He painstakingly types letters and notes, and slips them into newspapers and books in the library and the bookshops in town. He waits and waits for the books to be opened and his secret notes to be found.

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the Ghost Boy was made with love using scraps of fabric, vintage thread and buttons, he is filled with toy filler. Merle comes with his very own story card. I have listed Merle on etsy, click here or click on the link on the sidebar.

suitcases, zombies and tweets

I haven't done nearly as much crafting as I need to get done. I had planned to use the last of my badge machine components to make some badges up, some to sell and some to give out to a few great crafty friends that I am meeting up with tomorrow morning at Starbucks by Ikea Nottingham. We are having a tweet -up of crafters, some I know who are fantastic and inspire me in my blogging and crafting and a few new people that I haven't met before but crafting and blogging are a great way to meet new friends. Also there is coffee and that is always a fantastic thing.

I haven't done nearly as much crafting as I need to get done. I had planned to use the last of my badge machine components to make some badges up, some to sell and some to give out to a few great crafty friends that I am meeting up with tomorrow morning at Starbucks by Ikea Nottingham. We are having a tweet -up of crafters, some I know who are fantastic and inspire me in my blogging and crafting and a few new people that I haven't met before but crafting and blogging are a great way to meet new friends. Also there is coffee and that is always a fantastic thing.

The only crafting I have done is finish a tiny little zombie doll who I may bring along tomorrow to the tweet up for er moral support? Or I may get myself together and sew together the fabric I have for a new doll. The fabric is hidden in a neat pile inside one of the vintage suitcases I use as craft storage. I Shall then have something to sit and nervously work on while I wait for everyone to show up. (then I will probably hide it because there will be some fantastic crafters at the tweet-up and I will go all self conscious at having such a stellar array of crafty peeps before me.

I planned to have a number of witty blog posts written this week but this cold H gave us has wiped me out. I thought I was getting better on Sunday when I got some crafting and tidying done but today I have felt pants and my brain has run away. So I'm going to make the box of Annie's Mac and Cheese for tea that my friend Jaci sent to me in October. I have hidden it in the cupboard till a time when comfort food is needed. I cannot for the life of me remember telling her that it was a favourite American food stuff. So thank you Jaci for dinner tonight.