Enchanted Textile Design - Kirsteen Lyons BA (Hons)

I am Kirsteen Lyons BA (Hons) and my textile design company is called Enchanted Textile Design.

I am a freelance textile designer for a design studio in Europe. I create original furnishing fabric and wallpaper design which my design house then sells to prestigious clients throughout Europe and further afield.

I have been creating art and design my whole life as a designer, writer, photographer and fine artist. I studied textile design at Heriot-Watt University and have worked both in-house and freelance as a designer for studios in Kent, London, New York and now Europe.

More textile design and design related content can be seen here:
enchantedtextiledesign.blogspot.com

enchantedtextiledesign.blogspot.com

Living in Spain: Unknown heroes.

Living in Spain: Unknown heroes.

I was told an amazing story today by our friends who live on the beach in a vintage VW van. Our friends are a woman and her daughter who is a bit older than my daughter.

We hadn't seen them in a while and when we spotted the van it was repainted. She told me why: A couple of weeks ago she was using her gas stove to boil water, it was one of those ones with a small sideways disposable canister. I'd heard they are not safe, now I'm convinced! Don't buy one!!! She had the stove on a unit outside her van and was just inside the door when it went on fire. Two passing men noticed it and came and knocked on the door to show her. She now knows that she should have instantly grabbed her daughter and run away! But she didn't, she reached into the van for a large glass jar of water to throw over the stove! If she had succeeded in doing so she would have been killed as the super heated gas canister would have gone into metal shock and exploded in her face while she was holding a large glass jar. Luckily for her our two unknown heroes knew better and seeing that the woman and her daughter were not running they grabbed the whole unit with burning stove and supper heated gas bottle on top and dragged it between them some feet from the van. A few seconds later it did explode! Everyone was knocked down and the side of the van and surrounding ground was showered with twisted metal shards and globs of melted plastic the size of golf balls. In what I feel was literally a miracle the larger chunks missed all four humans and the each only had small plastic burns! My friends top was on fire and she had to pull it off and sit there in shock in her bra!

Without the courage of two unknown Spanish men my friend and her daughter would have been standing NEXT TO that explosion! 

I am in complete awe of someone who could look at a gas canister unknown seconds from becoming a bomb and decide to run TOWARDS it for the sake of two strangers! My life has never tested my courage that far, I hope it never will, if it did I hope I have half as much selfless bravery. I guess firemen and lifeboat crews make similar choices frequently, I'm in awe of them too.

It's been my experience in life that most people are nice, and will help you if they can. This story really impressed me with how true that is.

So here is to all the unknown heroes everywhere, ordinary men and women who do incredible things for others - real people are amazing! 

Finally some advice on gas stoves:

1. Get one with a bottle separated from the stove by a tube.

2. Keep a fire blanket or appropriate extinguisher within reach.

3. If you fit it in a van or home have it checked by a professional.

4. Never leave them unattended - even to pop in the door of your van!

Living in Spain: Sun buttered sycamore seeds.

Living in Spain: Sun buttered sycamore seeds.

To those in England now abed...or watching TV and winding down. I wish I could send you a few moments from my evening. Some sleepy harbour cats, the warm air, the red of the broken earth, and a slice of sun buttered sycamore seeds to view!

I really love it here. So do my kids. In some ways it's better than when we first arrived as we have solved our immediate problems: Where can we shop? What can we buy the kids will eat? That sort of thing. I mentioned to my husband that there must be an ideal balance between new and known. He tells me there is an equation for it, lots of science and research done. Scientists have worked out how much we should explore new things for our optimum survival! Well I'm no scientist but I can tell you that no new things is too little! I'm glad I shoehorned my family out of our rut!

I've decided that life's activity can be put into three categories; Making a fool of yourself, not making a fool of yourself, and doing the things you are brilliant at. The fun is all in the first and the last catagories.

For example I made a fool of myself when I told everyone I was going to have 25 facepainters working for me in Sussex, Kent and Surrey and had it all worked out to turn over £100,000 a year in facepainting! The most I ever had work for me was four, part time, and it was still only a marginally profitable business - but I don't regret all the hours of planning, organising and working! I had a blast making a fool of myself.

I think I made a fool of myself starting a craft fair in a downturn, when a farmers market a week was closing in the UK! I did start it, and it ran for several successful years but I was never able to expand it enough (get more fairs in different places) to make a living. I think I helped a lot of artists, I know I had a lot of fun, but honestly - didn't make too much money for the effort!

I didn't make a fool of myself when I took a job that was well paid doing technical textiles, not creative textiles, it was a good job, sensible choice, and I learned what it's like to drag yourself from your bed to face a hated 9:00 to 5:00 for six months, then I made a fool of myself and quit without a plan or a job to go to!

The other good category is "doing what you are brilliant at" joy is also to be found here. My four years doing a BA in textile design, messing about with fabric, dyes, paints, printing machines and looms panned out as fun, fun and happiness. Likewise my morning a week of designing for my current studio is a looked forward to treat. I get to work (instead of cook and change nappies) I get to excel, be me, be a designer, someone with a future, independence, and great competence born of study, observation and lots of practice, but, and here is my point, once upon a time I made a fool of myself trying to start a textiles degree while still unclear the difference between textiles and fashion! And long before that I made a fool of myself learning to draw. All the good stuff follows after making a fool of yourself!

And if you lack the confidence to walk into new places and new situations, I give you this brilliant tip from my big brother, pretend! Acted confidence, to the people around you is in no practical l way different from real confidence! And the beauty of this tip, we have both found that real confidence naturally follows pretended confidence, you start like you know what your up to and shortly after you do! 

So now I'm thinking what shall we do to make fools of ourselves in June when our time in Spain is over?

Buy a minibus and convert it, I don't really have the know how or funds so I'm bound to make a fool of myself trying! Try to get a house sit in some exotic location to give us more time to save for a built camper? Set off in a trailer tent with no plan! I'm not really planning to not make a fool of myself and rent a little flat and resume normal!

What do you think?