Music cufflinks created by Simone Walsh

This post is to shamelessly plug the wonderful handmade jewellery designed and created by Simone Walsh.

A few weeks ago, we hired a suit for the eldest Teen's school formal and seeing as his shirt had french cuffs, we needed a pair of cufflinks. The easy option would have been to hire a pair, or to simply buy a suitably neutral pair from the nearest department store. As the Teen loves music, I thought buying a pair of music themed cufflink would be a good idea, the trouble was, no department or jewellery store had such a pair - that I could find... What to do? Well, turn to twitter of course. There in my feed was @simonewalsh tweeting about being in her studio creating her current pieces. Bingo! I would contact Simone and ask if she could create the cufflinks. Of course she could! So, a few short emails later and all I had to do was sit back and wait for the cufflinks to arrive in the post. The whole process took less than a week - I still think this is an amazing feat! It really was very easy, payment was organised through PayPal, the cufflinks were express posted and arrived in plenty of time. Simone enclosed the important care instructions and the cufflinks were beautifully wrapped. What more could I ask for? Well, how about a special discount offer for my next purchase - yes, special voucher enclosed - excellent!

Here's an image of the cufflinks, the music is from one of the Teen's own compositions.

What did the Teen think of his cufflinks? He loved them!

Need some inspiration for gift giving ideas for that special person? Then look no further than Simone's website. Happy shopping!

 

 

Book Review - "Presenting: Miss Bertie Page by Mel Brackstone"

I am absolutely delighted to share with you the arrival of an online purchase I made several weeks ago. I don’t know if you know or not – but recently RedBubble partnered with blurb, the creative online book publishers to offer a new service to all RedBubble members: publish your own photography/art books and sell them online! It was also at about that time that Mel Brackstone was capturing the dreamiest of images of Miss Bertie Page – doing what she does best - using a handmade loupy lens thanks to Matt Penfold. “Hmmm...”, me thought, “...wouldn’t it be great if I had a book where every page was a loupy lens photograph of Miss Bertie Page as photographed by Mel?” Luckily with the magic of perfect timing and the internet I’m now the proud owner of a “Presenting Miss Bertie Page by Mel Brackstone” Let me say the ordering process is straight forward, with emails sent to confirm your purchase as well as a confirmation email sent when the book is actually shipped.

I could not find fault with the sturdy packaging, and the book arrived in perfect condition.

The pages have a beautiful satin feel to them and are a good weight while the colour rendition is comparable to the images on Mel’s site.
With Christmas only a few short weeks away, why don’t you consider making your very own blurb photographic art book? Or you might like to purchase one created by another artist, like I did. They’re a wonderful gift idea, and really, you can’t beat online shopping! If you’ve created a blurb book, add your link here for all of us to view and admire.