The Elevator Music Box

From traditional crafts to modern crafts, we’re covering news and interesting projects to educate you and keep you inspired. Design trends and pop culture related projects are here to inspire.

Reuse your old glass bottles and make a neat etched vase out of them. With vinyl stick-on letters and etching cream, you can create just about any kind of message on a bottle. A quick personalized gift idea for the holidays! Link.
Calling herself the “fashion nerd”, Designer Diana Eng brings her technology sense to the fashion world on the TV show “Project Runway” which can be seen every Wednesday nights at 10pm on Bravo. From the site, “She hopes to make the fashion-minded more interested in the research process and the scientific-minded more interested in fashion as a form of self-expression. Diana is currently co-creating an online show called iheartswitch.com, a do-it-yourself fashion website designed to switch girls onto technology by teaching them how to make accessories and apparel with embedded electronics from everyday supplies.” Not only do Diana’s creations incorporate technology in a useful and ingenious manner, they look amazing too! We can’t wait to watch tonight to see what she makes next. Thanks Kevin and Eliot! Project Runway and Link.
Here’s a great use of your old light bulbs. Make pal Ianiv writes,”When your light bulbs die, don’t throw them out. Make them into really cute ornaments. My fiance Arieanna made some really cute snowmen for our Christmas tree.” The complete instructions are on the site. Thanks Ianiv! Link.
Zoe Ashton-Worsnop crafts old school style by spinning her own yarn. The UK based crafter loves the relaxing and addictive nature of this art. How did she get into this you ask? Zoe explains, “I learnt to crochet about 2 years ago and from there I discovered people like Heidi Kenney from mypapercrane.com and Lexi from Pluckyfluff. I fell in love with their yarns and I wanted to be able to crochet with yarns like theirs but as I was at home with not much money I couldn’t afford to buy any for myself. I met a lovely old lady at a local craft fair who spun and she kindly taught me how to spin on a drop spindle and also gave me two spindles and some roving. ” Zoe has been spinning ever since and her beautiful multi-colored yarn can be found on her site along with pictures of her antique spinning wheel, “Lilian the Louet” (Click on Mango Yarns/Tools). Link.

Lizette Greco’s craft work is inspired by the drawings of her two children. Her 4 year old son loves robots, and hence the plethora of robot material in her work, like these robot ornaments. With her children’s drawings as her pattern, she creates some amazing plush toys, dolls, bags and more. Lizette shared with us one of her cool crafting tips, “When I embroider a drawing, I trace the original drawing (a face for example) on tissue paper and then pin it to the head of the doll. I embroider on top of the paper and when I’m done, I rip it off gently. That way, I don’t make pencil marks on my pieces and don’t have to clean up after them (I’ve tried this before).” Flickr Photos and Link.