The time I felt a lot

Hell-o everybody!

This time my dears, want to talk about jewelry and accessories. As a maker, I really enjoy making complementing pieces for my/your/our/their wardrobe.

Few years ago, while in fashion school, I was lucky enough to meet two beautiful ladies to whom I could share this passion with. The crazy bead hunting, the guilty pleasure and rush (almost like on drugs) on spending money we didn’t have!… After a whole afternoon walking around the city getting all kinds of interesting findings, we would have ice cream just to get a little energy to get home.

As I was the only of us living alone we would get together in my apartment with our materials and start making shit. I loved to share hours sitting on the floor mixing threads, yarn, wire, beads and long chats!  And at the end of the day realize that we had made beautiful intricate neckpieces, that later we’d sell at this fancy boutique for almost nothing.

A tiny representation of the style we developed, I regret not taking pictures before selling the other ones

(…sigh…) Good (not that) old times.

My friends are very creative, and I so loved that their aesthetics were different than mine. I would think all rock’n’roll, black, metal, anger! And they’d be so delicate and feminine! I must admit I learned a lot from them and also helped me loosen up a little, design wise.

I also have to say that besides my friends, I had these two really awesome professors at the school (well, most of my then teachers that now I consider friends were and still are amazing on different levels), textile experts and sweet hearts, that inspired me to experiment. These ladies were working on felt pieces and at that moment that was a mysterious eye candy for me, I was mesmerized with the colors, textures and the pieces themselves were really, really, really cute.

I will never forget them, Ivonne gave me this wonderful necklace when she learned I was getting married, how sweet of her, and guess what: I wore it for my wedding! And Montse taught me how to felt at her house studio.

My Wedding’s Felt necklace made by Ivonne Charlin (Chile) 

Montserrat Lira’a Felt Necklace

Now, not only I was starting to make felt beads but it got into me so deeply that I spent a couple months rolling, and squeezing huge amounts of wool, I got in trouble very badly with the landlady cause I would work at her terrace, oops! And when my girls came out and see the process, they flipped out when saw me irresponsibly iron my felt on a wet floor, Oh my! That was fun!!!!!.

All the hard work paid off, I made maybe a 4×2 meters piece of felt that I then cut and sewed into a dress…that’s the spirit of makers…

Felt dress made by me