VatWhat?

A lot of artists, designers, musicians and enterprising kitchen table creatives are just waking up to the breathtaking legislation set to sweep through the internet on January 1st. Our finance ministers, HMRC and as Mr Andrus Ansip so testily put it, have had full knowledge since devising the 'single digital market' strategy for the EU for six years. Yet for thousands this news is only just seeping out.

In case you're not yet aware, the EU is making on line retailers of anything digital (music, e-books, knitting patterns, craft templates, beadwork patterns, downloadable pdf's) responsible for collecting VAT from the customer, at the rate of VAT in the customer's country if they live in the EU. It's a complicated mess, succinctly described by Clare Josa,  here.
It is currently not viable for genuinely small businesses to comply. HMRC's big hope is that we will all register for VAT under an umbrella scheme called VATmoss, but only for anything digital, saving us the hassle of having to register in 27 different countries with, collectively, 75 different rates of VAT. They hope to apply this law to all products sold on line as soon as they can.

Just in case you thought this was too easy, the scheme applies to anyone, anywhere, selling into the EU. HMRC have also threatened anyone not complying with state of the art technology in the form of a new tech savvy team (22 jobs currently advertised) and 'web bots' to track the errant down.

It appears, however, that they think that what applied to the internet in 2008 is still current today, and assume that anyone with something to sell on line is selling it through Amazon type third party platforms. Unfortunately, to date most of these were late to the party too, and have taken a swift step back, landed the problem right back with us.

What caused this scheme to be thought up back in the day? .. a means to stop said corporate giants settling in tax havens like Luxembourg. Another stock comment is that it is designed to 'create a level playing field'.

You can read more about it, sign the petition, storm up twitter and support a growing international band of tiny people taking on a leviathan.

Here's why I think you should.
The internet has grown exponentially and is the most magnificent form of education, exchange of expertise and communication this planet has ever experienced.
In my small world of beading there has been an explosion of creativity, new techniques, new beads, new designers. Artists are no longer distant beings who's work we admire in books, they are blogging and sharing, facebooking and friending. At the click of a button I can browse museum collections, research history, find the inspiration for my next design or class.
I may be a micro business but I help fuel an international trade of big manufacturers products, I sell a pattern to you, next you go buy what you need, they sell and go make more beads, thread. tools, bead mats, craft lamps reading glasses. I'm only one tiny part, and that's the point, micro businesses may not make a lot of moola individually, but together we create an industry, we really do.

In my little bead studio in the heart of the English countryside, I can connect to everyone who loves beads as much as I do. I love this craft so much, relish each new innovation, congratulate excellence and put my share of discoveries out there too. I can ask for advice, talk to my students, and share news about my patterns and kits.

All I needed was a simple website and a paypal account. I am grateful for every purchase from my website, each one validates my creativity, I'm happy to talk with my customers many of whom are now firm friends. Having an online presence has given me amazing opportunities, to travel and teach, to meet my peers and mentors. this is how crafts stay alive, renew and grow.

For every form of creativity you can imagine, from model airplane builders to geeks coding awesome games and apps, making interactivity so readily available to anyone with a phone. Trending crochet? bloggers made it cool to love a Granny Square.
It all starts with just one person having a brilliant idea and the guts to put it out there. We mostly make a modest living, not everything in life is about money and that's how we work.

 This terrifies legislators. In my beading world I have friends in every country, politics is not an issue, we just love beads and each other. But this is why they will chip away, taking a freedom here, levying a tax there, because they can't see a community, only a community chest to be plundered. Far from levelling the playing field, what they are about to achieve is the most  invasive restriction of intellectual and creative freedom ever, EVER.

If you still and think, 'this doesn't apply to me', yes it does, it really does, whether you are a kitchen table entrepreneur, an educator with useful knowledge to share or a customer out browsing for a treat.  Your online world is about to gat a whole lot smaller and meaner. Already there is much talk of boycotting the EU. So easy to think 'OK I'll just take my beading pocket money to artists and designers outside the EU'. It's already happening.

I can't compete with that, but it isn't a level playing field any more is it?

I hope the legislators can be made to see common sense, if this was just about tax, I think they could be persuaded, all it needs is a simple agreement to exempt businesses beneath a certain size. Common sense because the costs of trying to recoup half a euro here, a couple of francs there between 28 countries will be way more than they will earn from the micro businesses. Targeting us might feel big and it might feel clever, but we are the shoulders on which those bigger businesses stand.

So on January 1st, I'll still have a website, you can still buy my kits and patterns, you just won't be able to download them, I'll have to post them to you... for now...
because in a back bedroom somewhere, someone is working out the next generation of technology which will make it possible for us to keep our amazing creativity flowing around the world, and yes, pay the tax too, but in a simple, click here and it's sorted kind of way.

It's curtains in the kitchen

raw materials

Thank you for the gentle nudges from my lovely band of blog followers to get posting!
How does she find the time, I hear you muse when I reveal a sudden bout of domesticity and the making of new kitchen curtains. While anyone who has ever had a big deadline will recognise immediately the displacement activity tactics I've fallen in to, as one or two rather big projects near deadline date.
We took ownership of the kitchen curtains too, when we bought our house fourteen years ago. They have been perfectly serviceable and regularly laundered, but it did strike me eventually that it was time to take ownership of my kitchen windows and hang my own curtains. I am not good at interiors, I can pretty up a window sill and re-arrange cushion covers. The bigger scheme of step ladders, pots of paint and whole room makeovers is something I never seem to get a chunk of time to deal with. I know what to do in principle, but put it off to avoid the chaos and upheaval not to mention the extra work an old house inevitably reveals once you get started.

The view from here

So, I am easing myself in with baby steps, which begin with renewing those 'not chosen by' me curtains at long last.
Tada! here are my acid lime, button embellished, home made curtains which took a whole afternoon of hand sewing and a smattering of cutting and
hemming.
They are made from a bargain bundle of pure cotton tea towels, some cotton ticking braid and a pile of mismatched buttons. In, of course, all my favourite shades of turquoise and green, mustard and lime. They create a really cheerful mood with the light streaming through them.
Now, where did I put that Farrow and Ball paint catalogue!

tabs tackled

Love my vintage button collection!

Toho'd again

Toho 2014 Design Challenge

Last year was my first entry into the Toho Challenge and I ended my post about it with high hopes for the next challenge.
Here are the challenge beads that arrived...  
I found myself staring lovingly at the delicious array of bead shapes, tempered with anxiety, as they were in my, probably, least favourite colour mix ever. So I did a terrible thing... I ignored the box of beads,  telling myself the muse would strike...

Toho's photo of my Prom Queen Corsage

As the weeks ticked by, it was time for the bracing talk to self about being professional, stepping up, rolling up the sleeves... I love colour, I revel in it, I play subtle games with colour. Even so, my fingers twitched to separate the colours into two groups, the pink and purple with maybe the orange: The iris blue and browns with maybe the orange, but all together? still not 'me'! The challenge is to use as many of the beads as possible so culling fifty percent wasn't an option.

I looked at many pink and purple things with hints of orange and cold dark blue... drew out designs... started and stopped... and if anybody is hoping for a magical recipe for how to overcome personal challenges, be warned, this so isn't it... buckle up for a bumpy ride!

With the deadline fast approaching and an agreement to hand the finished bead work over to Team Toho at the Bead and Button show, my hugely elaborate collar of imagined loveliness seemed less and less achievable. Windows of beading opportunity got filled up with pre-show preparations and as I boarded the flight to the USA I snuck on crochet hook and thread with the hopes of beading a rope while I hurtled through the sky.
Which as it grew, I liked less and less.

One side of the corsage has a flower

So in the end, I was beading in my room, after classes, through most of the last possible night, to finish what became a corsage for a prom queen.

Toho beads are truly great to work with and I managed to include some of each size and shape, promising myself to purchase some of the gorgeous colour lined and metallic finishes to add to my stash. I'm already a fan of the CzechMates beads that make up the shaped beads in the challenge pack; love the two hole triangles, possibly my favourite among the many new beads that have appeared recently; tried petal beads for the first time and added them to the shopping list too. When beading under extreme pressure, sometimes the ideas flowed thick and fast.
I wished I'd started sooner, but truthfully, some of those seat of the pants ideas are morphing into new designs which never would have existed without the stress.

The other side has leaves

On deadline morning, there was just enough time for a quick photo session in my room. Who knew a toothbrush glass and hotel duvet would be such nice props...
As I handed over the finished piece, with the creative doubt and insecurity record of 'What were you thinking! this is not great! what have you done!' running in my head... a very well known designer who's work I admire greatly was passing by, grabbed my piece, tried it on, gave a twirl and whispered... 'ooh I LOVE it!'...
and suddenly... it wasn't so bad.

Treat yourself to some gorgeous eye candy and see how the other designers interpreted the challenge, completely inspiring. In each piece the colour mix looks truly lovely.
Thank you Toho for the gorgeous beads, the challenge, the opportunity... and the personal bead lessons learned.
I'm deeply honoured that my prom corsage is now on display in Japan, and profoundly hopeful that I'll be included again in next year's challenge. What ever the colour mix, bring it on and I'll definitely be starting as soon as the beads arrive!

Curtain call on the wrist corsage

Bright Stars with beads

Printed cotton from 1860
 from PastCrafts Etsy

It is no secret that I do like a bit of vintage, and the afore mentioned film Bright Star has some wonderful costumes... which led me to revisit 19th century printed textiles in all their dainty detail.
Then came the arrival of a new bead to play with, this time the Dragon Scale bead, next in the series of beads developed by my lovely friend and bead artist Sabine Lippert. There is no end to her inventiveness and I am enchanted by the Dragon Scale, a tiny flat diamond of sparkly glass with a hole at one end. With the textiles as inspiration I was soon playing, and I confess that more urgent tasks were completely ignored while I had a play with my new favourite bead.

BrightStar
Dragon Scale bead single strand bracelet

The beads slot neatly together to make little constellations and flowers, of course flowers. The first design is BrightStar, and can be worked as single strands of flowers, or garlands, or for a longer project, as wider cuffs.

BrightStar
ZigZag Garland bracelet

The downloadable pattern is available here. Or choose the printed and wait for the post version here.

Bright Stars

Have you ever watched Jane Campions beautiful film Bright Star? all about the last few years of poet John Keats and named for his quietly passionate poem thought to describe his relationship with Fanny Brawne. It's no secret that Keats died of tuberculosis, in Rome, at only 25. But I was so caught up in the colours and imagery of the film that I forgot, and so wept at the ending!  What I love most about the film is the artistry of the film maker. Go watch it, if only for the colours, the interiors and the fluttering butterfly metaphors.
John Keats featured large in my school life as the one who penned the interminable poem 'To Autumn', which we had to memorise and recite. We had ancient poetry books printed with f's instead of s's, sadly this poem always began, 'feasonf of mifts and mellow fruitfulneff'... Perfect recall of the lunch hour spent writing lines as punishment for pronouncing it just as it was written. So thank you Jane Campion, for Bright Star and the prompt to go back and revisit Keats poems with an adult eye and open mind.

To celebrate the onset of this year's season of mists; and despite the loss of summer, I love autumn for the fruitfulness and the rich harvest of inspirational colours; I went to the local farmers market to stock up on provisions and found a new trader selling gorgeous bunches of flowers from her garden. I fell in love with these darkly bronzed sunflowers and she wrapped an armful up for me in brown paper tied with raffia. They glow fiery bright with the sun shining through them and sit darkly sinister in the evenings. I'm not sure of the variety name, but she told me they flower plentifully through the summer and autumn and are a good cutting garden plant to have.

I've travelled a lot this year and have more journeys scheduled for next, so my garden is best described as an overgrown wilderness.  I love gardening in the autumn, and building bonfires, so if you see woodsmoke trailing up from our valley it will be me having fun and making good a year of neglect.