The First 100 Melted Lenses

Ssh! Don't tell anyone but the real reason I joined Squidoo was to promote my textiles website: MeltedFabrics.com.

I know, I know, how Machevellian but all that Internet promotion lark isn't my strong point and I was hoping using Squidoo would be a easy way to break myself in to making my name known. Like anything is ever easy!

Little did I know that just a few days later I would be obsessed with making lenses about anything and everything, not just trying to push wall hangings and fancy bags. I mean, you can make lenses about anything: books you've read, films you've seen, stuff that doesn't even exist, places you've never been, books you've never read... did I say books already?

Here's the collection of lenses based around my Melted Fabrics business. Some of them need a little sprucing up soon but don't worry I will be going round them with a duster and a hoover at regular intervals.

In this section you will find:

Rachel's Melted Fabrics
This is the first lens I ever made with some basic information about who I am, how I started my textiles business, where I can be found on the web and some eye candy textiles images.
Melted Doodles
I adore doodles and I have a large collection of pieces of paper with my doodles on them. In this lens you will find doodles that were the initial drawings for a lot of my textiles, bags and art dolls. Basically you'll see what awful scrappy drawings I start with and what they finish as.
Melted Fabrics Calendar
This was an idea I had earlier this year that I'm still working on and hoping to have finished by early December 2009.
I want to make a calendar using my textiles pieces for imagery but the idea is to make each month a different tutorial and show people how they can make their own textiles, bags, dolls etc.
Textiles Art Kits
One of the things I sell on my website is the textiles art kit. These include everything you need to make your own textiles art.
I made videos for these kits too so you can see me awkwardly showing you how you can use them in my first collection of videos.
Rachel's Live Journal
I've been using Live Journal for a long time now and made this little lens about it.
Online Craft Business Tips
This is a mammoth lens I made about having a craft business.
It was meant as a quick guide for a friend who's thinking about having her own craft business. It also got awarded a purple star. Yay!
Rachel's Craft Stall
Rachel's Craft Stall is just a bit of fun I had one day.
I've never sold my work in a craft fair before and thought I'd have a little fun seeing what it might be like!

These are my lenses that are predominantly concerned with textiles eye candy.

Mother and Child Art
This is a collection of the textiles pieces I produced that have mothers and children in them as their main subject. I also included some beautiful imagery that I found elsewhere.
Recycling Fabric
I mainly use recycled fabric in my textiles pieces. I have a huge collection of fabrics that people have given to me instead of throwing them away. I often use a lot of old curtains, sheets and clothing. Find out more in this lens.
Cell Structure Textiles
In this lens you will find out more about what I first started sewing when I left university and decided I wanted to be a full time textiles artist.
These pieces are all based on microscopic imagery of cells.
Historical Women
This is a collection of textiles pieces I recently made, all based on women's clothing at different points in history. I wanted these pieces to look antique so not only were they melted but they were also grated with a cheesegrater too!
Summer Quilt
This is a large quilt I started producing. I'm still working on it so I will add more pictures and information as I go along.

These are two sketchbooks I made out of different textiles pieces. I used to love working in sketchbooks whilst I was a student but once I was working for myself I dropped the habit. These two books were my attempt to start making creative notebooks again.

Felt Sketchbook
This book features in a textiles instructional book I wrote about mixing textiles and felting. It includes all sorts of different felting techniques, including felted beads and I also used it to help brainstorm ideas for a novel I was writing at the time.
The Garden of the Empress
The Garden of the Empress is the first textiles sketchbook that I produced. This book was based on the Empress card of the Tarot deck.

If there's one thing I enjoy more than textiles and sewing then it's books and writing. With that in mind I started to write my own books about my textiles work.

Melted Fabrics
Melted Fabrics is the first book I wrote. I decided to write this file because I kept getting e-mails asking me to tell people how I produced my work and what techniques I used. Now I just smugly point people towards my book. Of course the people who expect you to tell them your secrets for free through an e-mail aren't often the ones who are going to buy a book, but never mind. Slight rant over.
Foundling
Foundling is a "sketchbook" I produced for a project based on Foundling babies. It's not all dark and serious though - mainly it was just an excuse to explore textiles pieces with sweet little babies and bluebirds. There is also quite a bit of work on gardens and nature.
Melting and Felting
I wrote melting and felting after I learnt to felt again. It was pretty convenient because my sewing machine decided to just die so I needed to do something textiley that didn't involve a lot of sewing.
How to Make a Textiles Wrap
This is a mini booklet about how you can make your own thick textiles wrap. I knit a lot and I love the freeform wraps I've seen but I couldn't afford to buy enormous quantities of gorgeous wool. I do however have wardrobes full of fabrics so I decided I would treat myself to a textiles wrap.

These are the textiles instrutional books that I'm still working on.

Recycling For Textiles
Recycling for Textiles is basically going to go through what you can do with textiles to recycle fabrics and other items. The projects even include a chair that I reupholstered with my own textiles pieces.
I mainly use recycled fabrics in my projects because a) it's cheaper... well free and b) there's so much of it out there. What a waste to just throw away clothes or curtains or whatever. Sure you can send stuff to the charity shops but some things are stained or have holes worn through and would be rejected by shops anyway. I wonder how much fabric charity shops throw out every year? I bet it's a terrifying amount.
There used to be this rag and bone type shop near where I went to college. They got a lot of the clothes that charity shops threw out and let me tell you, this place was amazing! I got some really impressive dressses from this place - stuff that you wouldn't be seen dead in now but the fabrics were stunning. I had a white dress with purple polka dots and a dress with fabric covered in butterflies in all those icky 70s colours. Of course most of the stuff that was in this shop (often selling for just one of your British pounds) is probably now about £50 in a Vintage store!
The Melted Fabrics Creative Journal
Oh dear. I kind of forgot about this journal. It was supposed to be kept every day to encourage me to do something creative every day. Unfortunately it fell by the wayside but I've decided that I've added far too much to it to just forget about it. I'm going to use it as a way of looking back at what I've achieved in the year, piecing it all together and discussing what I can do next whilst trying to keep it entertaining!

As well as making textiles pieces, I also use my textiles to make bags. It's a bit odd really because I'm not really a cutesy girly bag person myself. I'd prefer a large sack that I could just stuff full of all the junk I like to lug around with me as I wear my frumpy baggy t-shirt and jeans!

However I do adore making pretty little girly pink fluffy frilly things! They're like little fabric sculptures to me.

This lens is dedicated to the handbags and purses I've created.

I found this really cool book in Borders once all about art dolls. I'd never even considered the idea that dolls could be art. I mean, I kind of liked action figures at the time but dolls were for little girls, weren't they?
I was studying my costume degree at the time and I had this book on costume design and illustration. Inside the book I found an image of some plasticine models with costumes - how cool! My first doll was made from a costume design I produced at university.

Melted Dolls
This is a collection of all the dolls I've made or half-made or am working on including felted dolls, mix media dolls and altered art dolls.

Remember the Melted Calendar I mentioned above? Well these are the different months that I've started working on so far.

Melted January
For January I'm making a little textiles wall hanging for Resolutions. I'm, a big Resolutions fan and I think it's important to look back and see what you've achieved the previous year. I don't often look at my Resolutions during the year so it's always a big surprize the next New Year when I look back at the previous years Resolutions. I thought this would be a cute way to display my Resolutions where I can see them - where they can loom over me and taunt me!
Melted February
I decided I wanted February to be all about learning to love yourself so it's all about making a textiles self-portrait to embrace everything about you. For instance I'm embracing my extra pounds and silver hairs!
Melted April
Get your old umbrellas out to be recycled into something funky! This month on my Melted Calendar is dedicated to making an altered art umbrella. A warning to the superstitious however - this may mean opening your umbrellas indoors! My umbrella is going to be dripping with green - leaves, seeds and beads.

I'm still not convinced textiles make the best images for mugs and t-shirts and so on but I was pleased to find somewhere that I could make prints and postcards for my textiles pieces.

The Melted Fabrics Zazzle Store
In this lens you'll find out more about the images I use in my Zazzle store and some of the products too, like these Autumn Lady shoes (opposite).
The Melted Fabrics Cafepress Store
I started this Cafepress store years ago. This is set up in a pretty similar way to my Zazzle lens.

What does a seamstress do when she's not sewing? Why she knits of course!
These are my woolly lenses.

Sweater of Love
The Sweater of Love is a sweater I made for my partner for Christmas 2008. I handspun the wool and knitted it all myself so I was pretty proud of myself.
Unfortunately it was just slightly too small and he doesn't like the orange bits much. I'm not sure I can take it all apart and reknit it without screaming though. I think I might just need to put him on a water and stale bread diet instead.
Four Fleeces
Four fleeces is about the free wool I got given, how the sheep were sheared and how I processed the wool. Yay!

I studied costume at degree level and here are my lenses based on the project work I produced.

At the end of my degree I never wanted to hear the word "costume" again so these lenses are part of my "healing process"!

Costume Degree Year One
This is a quick rundown of the work I produced in the first year. I'm sure I've forgotten things so I'll probably be adding more details in the future to each of my costume years.
The first year including way too much period costume, a trip to Venice and designs for a Russian folktale.
Costume Degree Year Two
This lens includes my second year project work including my 2 month stay in Ohio, fun silicone and stretchy fabric samples and costume design work for Shakespeare's play "The Tempest".
Costume Degree Year Three
My third year included designs for Salome and the Book of Revelation and a quick look at my dissertation.
The Tempest
These are my designs for William Shakespeare's play "The Tempest".
Costume For Ceres
This is the costume I produced from my Tempest designs it involved a huge wig, massive hip buckets and stilts!
Salome Costume Design
This is a lens of my design work for Oscar Wilde's play "Salome". I was inspired by orignmi and experimented with ways to fold fabric as you would paper.
L'enfant et les Sortileges
This is one of the projects I produced whilst I was staying in the US. L'enfant et les Sortileges is an opera for small people (children that is). My design work was inspired by scribbles, jelly beans and lolly pops.
Revelation Costume Design
This is the last project of my third year. I decided that it would be a great idea to design costumes for the Book of Revelation (yes, the one in the Bible).
The Importance of Being Earnest
Here is some of my design work for Oscar Wilde's play "The Importance of Being Earnest". A handbag!
Sadko
This was one of my first year projects - designs and textiles pieces for a cute Russian folktale.

I adore writing, especially fiction.

Find out more in these lenses.


Rachel Writing
This is the first lens I wrote about writing, how I do it and what I write about. I've recently given it quite a big overhaul and talk about my newest story - each chapter is based on a new prompt image.

Holly Lisle's Create a Culture Clinic
This is more of a book review but I put it in the Writing category on this lens because I'm using it to help me write my own novels.

Holly Lisle has some amazing advice for fiction writers.

Seasonings - An Imaginary Restaurant
and
Octavia's Birthday Bash at Seasonings

The first Seasonings lens came about when one of the Giant Squid Summer school projects was to make a restaurant review lens.

I'm not really a fan of restaurants, really.

I was worried this lens would be really boring both to read and write and also quite pointless as I live in England and I'm not sure that people are really going to come all the way over here to have a look around my local pub.

Darn! I thought, I'm not going to be able to do this lens but then I had an idea.

What would my favourite restaurant be like? I enjoyed making things up so why not invent a restaurant.

I sat down and began to plan.

I threw a party at Seasonings for lensmaster OctaviasOfferings after she told me she tried to book a table but apparently their waiting lists were a couple of years long. Find out below how I managed to get her in!

The Narwhal
The Narwhal is the best whale because it has a horn! These horns used to be sold by Vikings as "unicorn horns".
The National Lobster Hatchery
This is a place I visited in Padstow, in Cornwall. At the hatchery they are trying to preserve the lobster industry and to make sure this interesting creature isn't overfished.

The Adventures of Mark Twain
This is one of the weirdest little films I've ever seen. It's based around the idea that Mark Twain was born when Halley's comet was seen in the skies and that he wanted to die when the comet returned again.
Twain has a strange intergallactic balloon that he wants to use to crash into the comet. Tom Sawyer, Huck Finn and Becky Thatcher jump on board and Twain spends the journey telling the kids different stories.

Lady in the Water
M. Night. Shymalan's Lady in the Water stars Bryce Dallas Howard as "Story", a water nymph who has come from the Blue World to inspire a man to write a book.

The Turn of the Screw
The Turn of the Screw is a Victorian ghost story featuring a governess who's trying to protect her charges from wicked spirits.

Magic Bites
This is a book a friend leant me. It features Kate Daniels who has to deal with vampires, were-creatures and necromancers on a daily basis.
The Wood Wife
Terry Windling's book The Wood Wife is about the magic fey spirits of the Sonoran dessert and how their existence is tied up with an artist.
Like Water for Chocolate
This is the tale of Tita who is an amazing cook. Here cooking is literally magical. Will she ever get to be with Pedro?
The Museum at Purgatory
This is a great little book by Nick Bantock which includes great images of funny little objects Bantock has made and stories he's written about them.
The Orphan's Tales: In the Night Garden
This is a beautiful novel by Catherynne M Valente that's made up by lots of interweaving magical stories. It's like Arabian Nights but 100 times better!
The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland
This is another story by Catherynne M Valente but this one is a free/donation-supported novel available online.

The River Dart
This is a lens about the River Dart in Dartmouth, South West England. This is one of my favourite places in Devon. Now I've learnt I can make silly doodles about places I think I'll be going back and changing this lens quite a bit!
The Palace of Versailles
This is another of my purple star lenses. It's an exploration of the Palace of Versailles and Marie Antoinette etc. I visited Versailles when I went to Paris for the weekend and it's one of the most beautiful, opulent places I've ever seen.

These lenses were all made after I came home from my trip to South-East England.
Tate Modern Visit
Tate Modern was a fairly bleak and at times horriffic event. Find out more about my observations in this lens.
Hampton Court Palace
My partner and I have a bit of a Tudors obsession so we had to visit Hampton Court Palace. Find out way more information about this place than you'll ever need in this lens!
The Tower of London
This is one of my purple star lenses and includes one of the first daft doodles that I ever made for my lenses.
London Trip
This is a mini-lensography of all of my London trip lenses.
Imagining Pleshey
Pleashey is an interesting site of Motte and Bailey Castle ruins. Unfortunately it's all blocked up so I could merely imagine what it looked like inside.
Troilus and Cressida
Whilst we were in London we got to go to the Globe Theatre and watch Shakespeare's play "Troilus and Cressida".

I had two holidays in the Summer of 2009 (lucky me). My second holiday was in Cornwall.
Waiting for Cornwall
Before I left for my holiday I made this lens about the things I could do in Cornwall and what I imagined they would be like.
Tintagel
In this lens I show you around Tintagel and the castle - where King Arthur was born!
Cornish Holiday
This is a round up of everything I did on my holiday.

Klimt Inspired Textiles
People tell me my textiles work is a lot like the work of artist Gustav Klimt so I decided to make a lens about him and compare his work with mine.
Edmund Dulac
Edmund Dulac was a fairytale illustrator. I made this lens to showcase some of his beautiful work.
Hundertwasser
Ever since studying my costume degree I've loved the paintings of Hundertwasser. I was inspired by his work whilst I was designing costumes for the opera L'enfant et les Sortileges. Hundertwasser was a fairly weird and interesting guy!
John Bauer
John Bauer was a Swedish fairytale illustrator who tragically died at a young age. I discovered his work after one of his paintings was set as a prompt for a short story competition.
Desperate Romantics
Desperate Romantics was an entertaining TV programme dramatising the lives of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood.
Barbara Cartland's Book of Love and Lovers
This one's just a bit of fun. It's about a book I picked up in a charity shop and thought it was so hysterical that I just wanted to share it.

All About Melted Rachel
This is a lens I started fairly early on in my Squidoo "career" and probably needs a lot of updating! Anyway, you can find out all about me here.
Rachel's Treasure
This is a lens about the mental way I always carry a bag around of my favourite things!
I Killed a Sewing Machine
Don't trust me with expensive machinery!
Be Good to Your Muse
This is a lens about ways I try to inspire myself if I'vm feeling all "bleh" and uncreative.

This Small Furry lens is all about all the cute little animals I used to own. Unfortunately I'm petless at the moment but I'd love animals again one day. My pets included rabbits, guinea pigs and rats.
One day I intend to add or change this lens somehow and make it a tad more personal. I've got some great little stories to share about these cute little critters.

These are all the Squidoo-specific lenses I've made.
Rachel's Squidoo Thanks
In this lens I thank all the awesome people who've befriended me here on Squidoo and shown me how to be the Squid I am today.
Exploring Picture Modules
This lens was produced for the Wiwon School of Wonders. It features the modules you can add pictures to on your Squidoo lenses.
Searching For Images
Can't find an image for your lens? In this lens I give you some options of places to look for free images and how to properly attribute Creative Commons images.

These are the lenses that I wasn't sure where else to fit in.
Silence vs Sound: Which is better for drowning out Noisy Neighbours?
This lens is a discussion about whether its best to use earplugs or sound machines to drown out your noisy neighbours. And it got a purple star!

Microwave Magic
Microwave Magic is basically about the evils of microwaves and how they can make Jeff Goldblum appear in your kitchen.