Thursday 2 September 2010

The reel thing...

When my Dad visited recently he bought a rather large box full of interesting things, amongst which were several pieces of driftwood.

We have been collecting driftwood in one way or another for as long as I can remember, so now there is quite a stash in my Dad's workroom.  We have been trying to think of a good project to use it on but hadn't had many viable ideas.

Then, recently, whilst trying to tidy (!) my own crafty stash I started thinking about all of my thread spools and whether there would be a way to store them more accessibly and visibly - to see them all at once for colour inspiration.  I started thinking about some sort of wall-hanging-spool-tidy, and drew a few sketches which I sent to my dad for suggestions (thanks Dad!).  The idea gradually developed, and then we realised we would finally be able to use some of the driftwood!  Hurrah!

Here's what we came up with:

(it was my Dad's idea to call it 'the reel thing', honest)


I really like the mishmash of different types of spools and it's great to see all the colours together.  I'm hoping it will inspire me to develop my machine embroidery skills!

19 comments:

Cate Rose said...

How cool is this!

Rosi said...

I love the idea!

Zoe @ Playing by the book said...

Wow, that is amazing! It's a piece of art in its own right hanging there on your wall. What a cool Dad we have :-)

Country Rhodes said...

Love it. Even better than the reel thing

Spiral Dyed Downunder said...

Fantastic idea! Handy Dad.

Moogie said...

off to search for driftwood...

Kate said...

Thanks so much everyone - and yes, definitely a handy Dad! Now the idea is in my head I'm seeing visions of a massive-scale version that covers my whole wall... :D

Kate x

and Rhodes - can't believe you beat me to that one!!

jojoebi-designs said...

I LOVE this idea, I might have to adapt it to my own spool collection, I have been looking at spool holders but non of them really 'do' it for me :o)

Maybe you could send your dad round to my place?

ginny said...

inspired! ~ i love this : )

Our Hands For Hope said...

This falls into the category as brilliant!

Anonymous said...

This is such a cool idea and can be adapted to any wood, or even some other materials. Such a crafty person....thanks
vyphuisdesigns.etsy.com

Kim Taylor Kruse said...

I saw this on Craftzine.com and think it's the most beautiful thread organizer I've ever seen. Nice work!

ishly said...

This is FAB!!!! I want one :-)

Anonymous said...

This is wonderful! I just linked this post on my blog. =) http://christinebyhand.blogspot.com/2010/09/does-this-form-follow-function.html

Kate said...

Hello everyone,
thanks so much!

Kim - thanks for the heads up about the Craftzine feature - I had no idea about the mention!

Christine - thank you so much for the blog link - and I'm with you on 'form follows function'!

Kate x

Unknown said...

what is holding the spools onto the driftwood? nails?

Kate said...

Hi!
The spools are on small lengths of wooden dowelling, which sit in drilled holes in the pieces of driftwood :)
Kate x

Unknown said...

Wow! It's amazingly beautiful!

Unknown said...

absolutely brilliant!