Scroll Saw Village

We’ve looked at a couple of scherenschnitte galleries in the last couple of posts. Karin’s work has a folk art feel that’s obviously inspired by folk and fairy tales. Cindy’s work tends to have a graphic art/illustration feel to it. Now lets take a look at artist Steven Gu.

Steven was born in Shanghai, China, but now resides on Vancouver Island. Much of his work has an Asian influence. But he also pays homage to the Victorian and Pennsylvania Dutch style in several of his pieces. His designs are very intricately detailed and rather delicate. This attention to detail reminds me of the work of scroll saw artist/designer Jeff Zaffino. Check out Steven’s gallery. You’ll be quite amazed at his craftsmanship and the beauty of his designs.

Cindy Mindy Pindy has a great blog that shows off her latest papercuttings. She has a assortment of scherenschnitte with a wide variety of styles ranging from abstract to traditional illustration. Take some time and look through her archives and check out her work. Its a great source of inspiration and may spawn a few ideas for your own scroll saw designs.

Scherenschnitte. Excuse me! Actually, scherenschnitte (shear-n-SNIT-a) is the German art of paper cutting that dates back to the 1500’s. Many of the principles of scherenschnitte are shared with scenic fretwork. You have to design the pattern in such a way that the finished cutting is one piece, but still retains the detail of a drawing. However, scherenschnitte tends to be more silhouette oriented and the cut design usually represent the shadows.

I have found a great gallery of scherenschnitte designs by Karin Dickel-Jonasch. Her main website is in German, and since the website is flash based, translation tools won’t help. But her gallery is fantastic. Here’s a direct link to her gallery. Its really neat to look at these type of designs, as they’re much more unusual than the patterns we typically create. It definitely has its own aesthetic and her designs obviously have reference to folk and fairy tales. Take a look. I think they’ll really be a great inspiration to some of your own designs.

I love whiling away my summer afternoons, sitting on my patio and watching the birds do their thing. Unfortunately, summer’s not here quite yet. Until then, I’ve got a great fretwork pattern of a blue bird from Accent Woodcraft Designs. The patten is free to download. The detailed cutting instructions make it perfect for beginners, but pretty enough for the seasoned scrollers. When you frame it, try using a navy blue felt backing instead of black. It looks great! While you’re there, check out their other patterns. They have a lot of great stuff.

I love looking at galleries of other people’s work. I often go seek them out specifically. Unfortunately, the search engines I use only offer English speaking websites. Its a shame, because there is a big ol’ world out there. I stumbled across Bouyerchrist’s scroll saw gallery/blog awhile back. Bouyerchrist is located in Chambéry in France. The website is mostly a gallery of photos, so the language barrier won’t be much of a problem. You can use Babel Fish to translate the web page for you and you should get a good idea of what is being said. Check it out. Bouyerchrist has some wonderful scroll sawn artwork. I’m sure it will be a great inspiration to some of your own designs!

by: Natalie Goyette

Think of an ideal craft show for a moment… thousands of people coming through the turnstiles at the fairgrounds or the exhibition areas with money in their hands and an intense desire to spend it. What about having a million people with access to your crafts at a craft show – at any time they wanted. That would really be IDEAL!

At a typical craft show, you are going to see hundreds, and maybe a couple thousand people visiting over any given weekend. Some shows are bigger than others, but even with 2,000 people coming through the gates, how many of them are stopping and looking at your booth with the intention of buying? It can vary. If you could somehow increase the number of people that stop by your booth, it makes sense that you could increase your sales, right?

Have you thought of a website for your crafts? This is the ultimate craft show – millions of people can access your information and your products, and you have limited set up fees – and orders can be placed while you are sleeping snug in your bed at night.

Putting together a good website for your crafts takes a little bit of effort to get off the ground, but it might be well worth the work. Here’s what you have to do:

” Design a site – You can probably find someone to give you a hand with this, and it doesn’t have to be very elaborate looking – just enough to show pictures of your crafts, their prices, a little bit about you… etc. It is important to make sure that you set the site up with a secure credit card payment system, as this will aid in a greater number of sales, just like in a regular craft show.

” Find a host – All sites need a web host in order to post them on the Internet. There are hundreds of providers out there, and you just need to find the one that is right for you. Chances are you have a friend or acquaintance that has a website, and they may be able to help you with on for your crafts.

” Drive traffic to the website – This can be done any number of ways: articles like this one, having others link to your site, update your pages regularly so your pages are indexed by search engines like Google and Yahoo! Coming up with the right keywords for your crafts is important for when people are searching the Internet for the type of craft you make.

” Maintain the site – I would suggest updating your crafting website at least once every two weeks, and maybe even once a week if you have time. This provides a certain amount of confidence for web buyers that your craft site up alive and well!

While having a website can certainly boost your sales, the other side of the coin is that you might be inundated with orders! That’s not necessarily a bad thing, except you could be working night and day to meet the orders! One way to avoid this is to post on your website how many of a certain item is available.

Remember imagining a craft show where millions of people came in and they had money to spend on crafts? Now you have it… albeit a virtual craft show. The sky is the limit when you are talking about selling your crafts on the Internet. With the right presentation, the right price and with the right traffic driven to your site, you can open the doors to your crafts for millions of people.

About The Author
Natalie Goyette is the author of the best selling e-book “Craft Show Success” which finally shows crafters how they can make money selling their crafts! www.craftshowsuccess.com.

A while back, I wrote about wooden gear clocks and listed several sources for patterns. Well, now that you have your first clock done, check out Brian Law’s clock plans. He has 4 clocks to choose from. Best of all, they’re free! Yup, you heard right! I’m not sure if I’d call them patterns, however. They’re more along the lines of blueprints. They are rather technical and probably best suited to a more advanced clockmaker. So if you have a head for math and engineering, these are right up your alley. The plans are downloadable in PDF format for easy printing. His website also includes construction info, exploded drawings, and other information related to clock making.

Well, I thought I’d jump into the Easter spirit too and design a new pattern. This time, we’ve got two bunny puzzles and three Easter egg puzzles. They’re pretty quick project. For a more festive look, dye the wood with watered down acrylics or leather dye. I’ve provided the pattern as a PDF. For those of you out there using Inkscape, I’ve also provided the source file! Enjoy the pattern!

Rick (aka Scrollzlilla) from Spitting Image WoodWoodworking is running a charity drive on behalf of Make A Wish Foundation. His daughter’s Senior class is raising money for Make A Wish Foundation by giving Hugs for Hope. In the spirit of giving, Rick is donating all proceeds from pattern sales between March 12-18 will be donated to this worthy cause.

Make A Wish Foundation is a very special charity that has made wishes come true for thousands of children with a life threatening illness. They help make a wish come true for a child in need every 41 minutes! My neighbor’s daughter had a wish come true by this fantastic group of people. Its amazing how a little thing like this makes such a big difference.

You can read more about this charity drive from his website. While you’re there, buy a few of those patterns you’ve had your eye on. The proceeds will help make a wish come true for a very deserving child.

Wow, the bunnies are certainly multiplying this week. I’ve given you a lot of great Easter projects to decorate the inside of your house. What about the outside? I’ve got a great yard art project for you from Accents Woodcraft Designs. Although not a scroll saw project, I’m sure it will satisfy the scroller in us.

This cute bunny and chick pattern is a 15 page pattern. Print them out, tape them together, cut and paint. Couldn’t be more easy. The instructions are clear and has easy painting guides to help layout our pattern. Check it out. While you are there, check out their other patterns. They have a lot of great stuff to keep you busy for the next few Easters!