It has been SO HOT here in sunny Australia for the last month or so. Ridiculously hot. I know, I know - it's Summer. It's supposed to be hot. But this has been nasty, sticky, sweating-through-your-clothing-at-7am-in-the-morning kind of hot. So to finally see some rain has been a wonderful relief. It kind of came at a bad time in terms of festivities though, as it's Australia Day here today. We spent the day inside watching kids movies and eating cupcakes while listening to the rain on the roof. So not too bad really :)
But what I really wanted to show you guys was our latest work for the last fortnight or so. We decided to use one of our finer/stretchier faux fur pieces (Fluffy Duckling) in a larger bear design to see how it would turn out. I had a very specific idea in mind for this bear - and I must say (for once) the end result was pretty close!
Meet Samson - all 21" of him! He's a big chunky boy with a head on him as large as my 2yr olds! And HUGE ooak hand painted glass eyes that just set him off.
(Because it's hard to tell size comparisons in photos, I thought I'd take a few photos of Samson with some of our other bears. Above he is holding 'Jonas' - one of our old style 13" bears, and below he's holding onto 'Grace' who is 10" tall).
We also had a custom request for a black and red bear... and this little sweetheart was the result! This is 'Scarlet'. She is made from our 'Licorish' black kid mohair, and our 'Queen of Hearts' red/black tipped mohair.
We also thought we'd try a choc/blue mix bear in the same pattern (Osias), and Angus was the result. He is a mix of 'Pudding' kid mohair and 'Bermuda' two-tone mohair. I wasn't completely sure how they'd work in this match due to the length differences between the kid and regular lines (25mm versus 20mm) - but it is actually pretty cool. I love how full and fluffy Angus's limbs and ears look, and his sweet little face has such a wind-swept look, it makes you want to push his hair out of his eyes and give him a cuddle.
Angus is actually available at the moment in completed form, and as a kit if you'd like to have a go at making your own version.
And lastly, we were asked to make a custom bear in our Arctic Wolf faux fur with some roses by her neck - very much like our original 'Alivea' bear, but without the hand shaving/shading, and a different face. I just love the softness in this bears expression - and her gorgeous lilac eyes tie in perfectly with the colouring of this fur. I would say that Arctic Wolf has to be my favourite of our current lot of faux fur for bear making. It's dense, and soft and lends itself to facial scissor sculpting perfectly. I'm yet to try it in a bear under 18" tall though... so would be curious to see any of your creations out there if you've purchased this fabric for us for a smaller project?!
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