Trash to Industrial Treasure

Hello all!  I hope you had a good time wandering around Central Park with me - the blossom and leaves are even better now, so I'll have to get some more photos at some point.  But now on to a new project...  I'm excited and very honoured to be a guest over at Stamps and Stencils today.  I'm a huge fan of the challenge and the brilliant Design Team there, and I was thrilled when they picked my Flourishing Florals as their Splatter, Spritz and Smoosh winner.

That piece was about as "girly" as I get - full of flowers and flourishes.  It wasn't a conscious decision, but my guest creation for Autumn's wonderful Trash to Treasure theme ended up going in almost completely the opposite direction, with a masculine industrial look.

There are some basic making-of details over at Stamps and Stencils, so I won't bore you with those all over again.  Let me just take you on a quick tour of the Philbric Electric Company.  Oh, and I will let you in on the secrets of the trash which I've turned to (I hope) treasure.




It started with me grabbing some things from my "bound-to-come-in-useful-bits-and-bobs" basket, where I stash old containers and packaging and other bits and bobs which I haven't been able to bring myself to throw out.

On this occasion, I pulled out the lid of a wooden Camembert box and some used lightbulbs.  I laid them onto a 6x6 canvas and let my imagination go wandering.

I figured the cheese lid would make a good frame for a photo, and I quite quickly decided that it would be more fun with the lid the other way up. Plus it gave me lots of fun surfaces to play on.

With the lightbulbs to guide me, I selected one of the Found Relatives who seemed to have good industrial magnate credentials.











He's Jeremiah Philbric, the founder of the Philbric Electric Company - one of those canny individuals who spotted the immense potential of this new source of power, and invested early.













In the early days he was a hands-on industrialist, driving the company forward and working hard to persuade the public that there was no danger in electrification, showing them how their lives would change if they allowed electric light into their houses.  He became an expert in the art of persuasion and advertisement.












Once electricity had become an accepted part of people's lives, the company diversified... the advertisement puffs off the all the gadgets and contraptions you didn't even know you needed!












But the invention which remains at the heart of the transformation wrought by the development of electricity is the lightbulb... casting light and casting out the shadows.














Jeremiah still remembers his first time watching an electric bulb lighting up - and that excitement means he wants to keep up with all the latest developments.  These days he still keeps an eye on activities in his factories and warehouses...

... but most of the work is now left to his loyal and capable staff.  The whole operation works like clockwork.














That's an electrically powered clock, though, obviously, not an old-fashioned key-wound one!

Jeremiah turned his own life around from humble beginnings to become a respected captain of industry... a sort of turning of "trash to treasure", an echo of the challenge theme which kicked the whole thing off.













I had an absolute ball creating this recycled canvas - and my thanks go to Sue and the team at Stamps and Stencils for inviting me along to play this month.

I hope this has added to the inspiration the DT offered up earlier this month.  If you didn't see them, do check out their amazing projects here.  And don't forget if you want to know more about how I made this, you can find that out over at Stamps and Stencils too.

For now, I'll leave you to rummage in your own bits-and-bobs baskets and maybe you'll be turning some trash to treasure soon.  Happy Crafting all!


Electricity is really just organised lightning.
George Carlin

Soon now, the faint tinkling of a broken filament will become another sound of another century.
From Brilliant: The Evolution of Artificial Light by Jane Brox



I'd like to enter this at Mixed Media Mojo, where they're looking for Recycling with a Twist of Metal
And at Mixed Media World the theme is Get in Gear - plenty of gears here!
And for a mixed media hatrick - the Mixed Media Monthly challenge is Dimension, so I'd like to play along there too
Over at Frilly and Funkie they are celebrating Earth Day with a recycling challenge - It's Not Easy Being Green