Who is Edie? Edie was a cat I
had the pleasure of having in my life for 18 years and the inspiration behind
the business name 'Beadie Eyed Edie'.
Back in 2010 my business Beadie Eyed Edie was born as a platform to sell
my art and crafts. Having moved down to Essex from the North East of England to
live with my now husband, I started looking for a creative past time I could do
in the restricted space of our then one bedroom apartment. With no room to get
out the sewing machine or my existing large stash of textile and craft goodies
(which were away in storage), I returned to my love of beading and jewellery
making. Beadie Eyed Edie was purely
jewellery in the very beginning but as soon as we moved into a house I started
to add my passion of textiles to the business, it is after all what I trained
in and where my true passion lies. I
must admit I am a total craft addict and I want to try EVERYTHING! I may have
been to art college to study textile design specializing in embroidered
textiles, but a lot of what I have learned
happened long after leaving college. I continue to nurture the skills I
have gained as well as constantly wanting to learn more. I believe it is a
priority in business to always look for ways to progress.
Although Felting is
something I touched upon at art college I never gave too much time to it since,
focusing mainly on machine embroidery. I decided to practice and experiment
with needle felting and discovered it is really just a tactile version of
painting. I love being able to blend and layer colours, there is really no
image you can not create with felt that you could with paint. My natural tool
for drawing for a long time has been the sewing machine, with most of my work
done freehand (no fully drawn out image)
I move at a crazy speed when I get started! So combining felting and machine
embroidery happened, at times embroidering on needle felting is a nightmare and
I break a lot of needles! I think the results are worth it though.
If I am needle felting, embroidering on fabric or indulging in one
of my other many crafts I am inspired by everything around me. Nature is a big
inspiration for me and you can see from my work I love flowers. I wish I could
say I was a gardener but really the weeds in my little garden are as much of a
love as the plants we have added ourselves! I also love to felt and paint
seascapes, the northeast where I am from has an amazing coastline and I use
photo references I have collected over the years for ideas.
My work does not stop when I switch off the sewing machine or put
down the felting, my brain never switches off from it all. I am always taking photos of things I see,
sketching, making notes, browsing photos online and I even wake up in the
middle of the night thinking of new ideas. If I decide to take a little time
out I just find myself doing something creative, like an up-cycling project or
a bit of soap making. If I have ever thought I might call it a day on the
textile art, I realize I could not if I wanted to as it is a total addiction
and passion.
I think the hardest part of running a creative business is all the
non creative necessities. As well as being able to come up with ideas and
follow them through you need to be good at promoting yourself, managing the
financial side of things, navigating your way around social media, creating a
website or finding the right person to do it.....and so much more! I currently
sell my work via Folksy, Facebook and direct to customers. I have sold work via
shops in London, Norfolk & Newcastle and love the face to face contact with
customers at craft fairs. I still get a buzz from thinking someone has my work
hanging on their wall at home or are walking round wearing my jewellery!
