Crafts

Make 16 beautiful crocheted animals with Liberty fabric additions in calming pastel colours.

Enter into the whimsical, crocheted world of Aleksandra, from the site Eleonore & Maurice. She is a talented designer who blends pastel yarns with Liberty fabric to make truly adorable creations: plush animals with little accessories, as well as sweet cushions. The combination of the calming pastel cotton yarn and the delicate Liberty designs give very pleasing results. These crisp creations include a cat cushion, a bird family, a hedgehog, a rabbit and a reindeer.

The crochet patterns are clear and easy to follow and the sewing element is minimal, including items such as fabric bows, belts, ears, tails and collars. Make them for yourself or as gifts for family and friends. Everyone is sure to love these beautiful crocheted creatures. The soft colours and splashes of Liberty fabric make them perfect companions that children will love.

From tennis shoes to framed canvas, get your gouache on!

Although gouache goes back about 600 years, it is enjoying a renaissance with modern artists. Falling between watercolor and acrylic, gouache is generally diluted before being applied, but it's opaque and contains a high amount of pigment. The texture isn't delicate, so it's a good medium for canvas or coated surfaces. New and experienced painters alike will enjoy lessons on color theory, mixing, and the innovative techniques offered in this book--there are thirty guided projects so you can practice what you learn.

Beginner-friendly guide to making 18 lovely soaps using only natural ingredients that are kind to the environment.

Beautifully photographed, this beginner-friendly guide has everything you need to make 18 lovely soaps. Inspirational for seasoned soap-makers as well, the recipes use only natural ingredients that are kind to the skin and our environment. From olive oil to juniper and cucumber to honey, there are lots of gorgeous fragrances and colours to satisfy everyone.

With comprehensive information on where to start and what you need, the book includes essential tips on utensils, safety issues to consider, and by a step-by-step guide to making soap. There are also useful sections on fragrances and natural colourings and additives such as coffee and cinnamon. This book tells you everything you need to know about making your own hand-crafted soap, using tools most people already own

An addictive hobby, you will find yourself making lovely, personalised soap ideas for gifting.

At last, a book that tells you everything you need to know about needle felting!

This is the book authors Roz Dace and Judy Balchin wish they had been given when they started out on their felting journey. A complete course for the absolute beginner, it is packed full of useful tips and techniques to help you on your own felting adventures.

Learn how to sculpt miniature teacup worlds, animals and birds, and even your friends and family. There are 12 varied projects, starting with the easiest and progressing in difficulty. Master the basics, then learn how to use wire, embellishments and armatures in your work, and even how to capture expression in faces. You can use the techniques you have been shown to create your own variations.

Pick up that felting needle and you are guaranteed to have fun with this much-needed book.

A stylish yet practical guide to creating unique scented candles at home for the modern reader.

In this beautiful book, Paul and Niko of Earl of East London share the secrets behind the gorgeously scented candles they create at their studio. As well as the basic steps to preparing and pouring candles at home, the book includes a fascinating exploration of the art of building scent, so that the reader can create their own signature fragrances. Paul and Niko are devoted to capturing memories and feelings in scent, and in this book you can learn how to combine different essential oils to trigger different emotions and memories, whether that is the recollection of a childhood holiday conjured up by a hint of mandarin and seaweed, or an imagined walk in your grandparents' garden scented with basil and parsley.

Not only is candle making and scent development a wonderfully relaxing craft, it is also a unique way to create personalized gifts or to create a signature scent for your own home or special event.

Recipes, DIY projects, and inspiration for a beautiful and low-waste life, from the creator of @simply.living.well on Instagram

In this timely and motivational guide, author Julia Watkins shares rituals, recipes, and projects for living simply and sustainably at home. For every area of your household--kitchen, cleaning, wellness, bath, and garden--Julia shows you how to eliminate wasteful packaging, harmful ingredients, and disposable items. Practical checklists outline easy swaps (instead of disposable sponges, opt for biodegradable sponges or Swedish dishcloths; choose a bamboo toothbrush over a plastic one) and sustainable upgrades for common household tools and products. Projects include scrap apple cider vinegar, wool dryer balls, kitchen bowl covers and cloth produce bags, non-toxic dryer sheets, all-purpose citrus cleaner, herbal tinctures and balms, and more, plus recipes for package-free essentials like homemade nut milk, hummus, ketchup, salad dressings, and veggie stock.

Over 40 adaptable sweaters to knit for your littles ones, based on the classic, minimal and quietly stunning jumpers of Dutch fishermen.

Based on the original designs shared by families and discovered in archives, Stella has created recreations of these historically important garments for our contemporary life that ooze classic style with modern minimalism. With these designs, you are offered not only a chance to pay homage to the women who lovingly knitted the jumpers and to share in a beautiful Dutch tradition, but also give something for your child to treasure for years to come.

The sizes of the ganseys run from 2- to 14-years old, but can easily be adjusted to any child's size by following Stella's straightforward measuring instructions in her chapter on knitting know-how. With a wealth of fascinating background information and historical photos of the original designs alongside every design, this is a unique and inspiring book for the ambitious knitter looking for unique, classic knitwear, and a brilliant read for anyone interested in craft, culture and heritage.

Between approximately 1875 and 1950, Dutch fishermen wore sweaters with characteristic knit and purl stitch patterns, sometimes cable. These jerseys, known as ganseys, became an intrinsic part of the identity of the Dutchmen who wore them. Many of the children in these fishing families wore ganseys too, and numerous photos have been discovered in recent years of schoolchildren dressed in the knitwear seen on their fishermen fathers.

Now, based on her popular Dutch Traditional Ganseys (2013) and More Traditional Dutch Ganseys (2017), Stella Ruhe returns with over 40 sweaters to knit from 30 different Dutch villages - this time, for your little ones to wear and ramble in.

A fast-paced account of the year Clara Parkes spent transforming a 676-pound bale of fleece into saleable yarn, and the people and vanishing industry she discovered along the way

Join Clara Parkes on a cross-country adventure and meet a cast of characters that includes the shepherds, dyers, and countless workers without whom our knitting needles would be empty, our mills idle, and our feet woefully cold. Travel the country with her as she meets a flock of Saxon Merino sheep in upstate New York, tours a scouring plant in Texas, visits a steamy Maine dyehouse, helps sort freshly shorn wool on a working farm, and learns how wool fleece is measured, baled, shipped, and turned into skeins.

In pursuit of the perfect yarn, Parkes describes a brush with the dangers of opening a bale (they can explode), and her adventures from Maine to Wisconsin ("the most knitterly state") and back again; along the way, she presents a behind-the-scenes look at the spinners, scourers, genius inventors, and crazy-complex mill machines that populate the yarn-making industry. By the end of the book, you'll be ready to set aside the backyard chickens and add a flock of sheep instead. Simply put, no other book exists that explores American culture through the lens of wool.