Le petit chaperon rouge

Absolutely no reason why the title is in French. Just sounded better than a post all about little red riding hood.

I had originally planned this post as being about images from all fairy tales. I have always loved the illustrations from the books I grew up reading. People like Kay Nielsen and Maurice Sendak. They are probably a huge part of the reason I have ended up trying my hand at earning a living from the arts.

I remember my Mum telling me once that she often bought books to read to my brother and I because she wanted to use the illustrations to work from for her textile designs.

After starting my search with Little Red Riding Hood, I found precious little imagery that caught my attention about many of the other fairy tales. Mostly it was Disney that came up. And, for anyone that knows me well, I am a staunch opponent to Disney. Although in my usual style, being contrary and all, two of my favourite films are Disney's Robin Hood and Sword in the Stone. I never liked the Disney princesses all that much even as a kid.

I wonder why Little Red Riding Hood has captured the imagination so much. I'm not fool enough to think that this hasn't had a little something to do with it:

Red Riding Hood (2011) has helped to push this particular story back in to the wider public conciousness. (I imagine Snow White will be making more non-Disney appearances in google searches now.) I haven't seen the film so I can't comment on it, but I do wonder why the fairy tale is being fixed upon lately.

This post is honestly just idle meanderings of my conciousness. I had a whim to look at fairy tale art work and photography, it's not meant to be an essay on the up and coming popularity of fairy tales!

I love the above costume. I want the outfit myself.

I couldn't resist these astoundingly clever Russian dolls.

I find it interesting that while searching for German images of little red riding hood the 'riding hood' part is kept to (As in the image below), whereas the red cape look seems to be the one that has become so utterly iconic that even a suggestion of it is recognizable (as in the image above!)

I think the below picture is brilliant. Everything the artist, Noma Bar, does is brilliant actually (picture links to an interview with him, and more art works), but this one is particularly is perfect, the red cape doubling up as the wolf's red and presumably bloody mouth? Genius.

This picture just made me laugh! It's the tongue hanging out that does it.

For even more Red Riding Hood illustrations check out this post here, also look at this for the true and terrified face of Red Riding Hood (wouldn't let me link to a picture!)

As I said I had started out searching for all fairy tales. I found bearly (hohoho) any imagery on goldilocks. But the above picture was too good not to share. I find the bears surprisingly creepy. It uses few contrasts of colour, and simple shapes and yet manages to portray the two groups and their emotions perfectly. Scary scary bears.




Illustrations All images are © Chloe Cooter 2012 unless image links to another website. All images that are not © Chloe Cooter will be linked to the source (if possible) and credited in that way.

Illustrated recipe

This is perhaps a bit of a silly post, but I was experimenting with my new toy whilst thinking about some of the things I want to blog about. This blog was never meant to just be an interiors blog, or gardens or fashion/style. It was always meant to be a more rounded life style type of blog, covering the above subjects but also food and drink, DIY projects, places to go, things to see. Etc etc. So I thought seeing as I'm on a diet I'd torture my self illustrating the most simple recipe I know for a giggle.

What do you think? Can you understand my silliness? I know the actual illustrations need a lot of work, but it did only take me 10 mins!

Nom

I have just submitted a design in my 'Birds' series style to Threadless.com for a competition they're running. This one is for their regular 'Threadless loves...' series, this one being 'Theadless loves Simple'.

I chose to view Simple as a 2 colour design, with one style of line art drawn by hand.

This is my submission!

You can vote for it via the link below! Please please do!

Score this design: "Nom," to help it get printed on Threadless!

 
 
This is continuing the theme of real birds, and is an Asian Koel, which is a type of cuckoo, obviously not a British variety of bird, but for the design to look right in my eyes, I wanted an ominous looking black bird with red eyes, and Mr. Koel fitted bill!

Illustrated bird series

Important news from Chloe and the Chimera HQ! My first new new style item is up for grabs on both my website and on Etsy!

Still haven't decided on a good name for the style so I've opted for just 'hand illustrated' for the moment.

Please be kind, but feed back would be very welcome!

Etsy listing
Chloe and the Chimera listing

Fashionspiration

Right now, I am loving these shorts (click on the picture for a link to the original blog.) I am getting really excited about the prospect of doing something similar, but with my own illustrations.

But would you wear something like this little fella across your bum?

Obviously there are other options such as t-shirts and dresses etc!

That's gonna be the next project me thinks!

What's in a name?

Well, I have a bit of a conundrum. I cant decide what to call my style of work.

This is important because it'll help me when it comes to making sales. I want people to be able to find my work on the internet, and if I term it as something too obscure, or unique, or unwanted (even if what I do is lovely within that genre), then no one will stumble across it, fall in love and buy it!

I originally wanted to term it something to do with decoupage. Thinking that this is mostly because that's what it is. But, after a conversation with my lovely friend over at Laura After Midnight, I realised that decoupage was probably not a particularly regularly searched term! After a long time spent searching Etsy for similar kind of things, I realised that although what I'm doing is unique, due to its decoupaged method, its style isn't. There is a lot of hand illustrated designed items out there. Does this mean that I should just call my item 'illustrated' or is it illustrated decoupage. Or collage? Or is it hand drawn. Or is it something entirely different? What?!!

This must absolutely be sorted out before I put it up on Etsy and Chloe and the Chimera for sale!

Above you can see the sort of start of my 'decoupage-y' look. I like things that are simple, clean, but still beautiful. I'm not a fan of the over-crowded decoupage you see in a lot of places.

Above here you can see my first attempt at a real bird with the block pattern effect of the top image developed. This is a Pied Flycatcher, and is black and white.

This is my 2nd attempt in the real bird series. I decided to develop the look if more than two colours were needed. This is a Bullfinch, and is black (where the pattern is), white, grey and peachy-red. I'm really happy with the result. Obviously not stuck to this surface yet though!

And this is my Pied Flycatcher in situ. Not totally finished, still needs varnish etc, but it helps to show how it'll look as a whole.

I am really happy with my product and illustration development. I feel this style of drawing can be applied to everything I want to do: Home, Garden and Clothing.

Yet, what do I call it that screams buy me! Or more to the point, that people are going to be searching for in the first place? I need a hook, or a massive signpost of a describing name: [Chloe and the Chimera That Way >> type of thing.

I do hope I'm making sense! All ideas gratefully received!

Stanley knife blades and sleep deprivation

Just a little snippet of what I'm trying to work on at the moment. I'm trying to develop a more cohesive style here at Chloe and the Chimera. This is just a mini preview. Not even sure how it'll turn out!

So that's that. Keeping it cryptic for now! I'm a bit worried it won't turn out well to be honest.

I'm finding getting Chloe and the Chimera off the ground hard going at the moment. I can't be he only one who struggles around a long tiring job to be creative. How does everyone else do it?! I'm so tired this morning and my to-do list is miles long. I'm motivated enough, I just don't have the energy!

Enough of that for now! I'll post another picture or two when there is more progress!

My first fashion post

For someone who can quite openly say that I love clothing, styling, putting outfits together and designing clothes, I can also quite openly say that I am awful at shopping, especially charity style shopping, and impressively uninterested in fashion.

There I've said it. I feel like I've just announced something to the fashion equivalent of Alcoholics Anonymous.

Or that it's a dirty little secret that is going to generate a lot of scorn.

The fact of the matter is that I live in my own bubble far too much to worry about what fashion designers are doing, and then what all the over monied and under fed can pull on over their heads. I'm not saying that fashion doesn't effect me. Of course it effects me. It's just that it tends to effect me about 6 months later than everyone else. I normally turn my nose up at the latest thing in H&M only to turn around down the line and suddenly think that instead of putting that with leggings like everyone else I could put it with my 15 year old baggy jeans, my Cat boots, and my straw trilby style hat and I'd look AWESOME!

I have a different issue when it comes to shopping in charity or TK Maxx style shops. I find that I can't see the wood for the trees. There is so much stuff, laid out with no order. I find the same in book shops. I find it overwhelming. And any charity shop that can afford to be minimal isn't going to be affordable.

So how does someone who fully intends get their own collection designed then made up to sell create something that people will want if the inspiration is not drawn for the fashion world?

Well, I hope I'm not alone in saying that fashion isn't everything. Style is.

Why can't I draw inspiration from anywhere I feel like? from art installations, to comics, from any period in history I feel like, to street style photo blogs. Anything!

These are some designs I did from quite a while ago now. I took some inspiration from Russian Constructivism and some from Steam Punk.

 I'm quite happy that I designed a small selection of wearable clothes which only concious concession to fashions (nearly 2 years ago) was body-con. My favourite is the white mini-dress with the rust colour aeroplane print.