The Evolution of Midwinter Hollow: My Happy Place

Well I was on such good form writing a blog post a month for three months and here I am three months later and still no new blog post written. I was on such a good track - what happened?? 

Too many fun activities to catch up on post Covid and then the school holidays. As soon as my usual schedule stops, everything goes out the window.

A New Direction

Well I guess I've been busy finishing off some old projects and starting some new ones, as well as thinking about new ideas and new directions. Actually not so much new directions more like merging all the different directions into one single path. 

For some reason I thought Midwinter Hollow should solely be a jewellery brand. I stifled my creativity when I didn’t allow myself to make the things I want or express myself in the ways I would like. I feel confined by rules and boxes and I work best when ideas can flow and there are no time constraints. There is an ever present flow of ideas in the back of my mind, constantly flowing and changing. I never really allowed them to flow together, thinking I should keep things compartmentalised. Well now the doors will be thrown open at Midwinter Hollow and the ideas shall henceforth flow.

What Makes Me Happy

So moving forward I will be creating what I want to and  not what I think I should. I don’t know if it makes sense to you but it’s a change in perspective for me and I’m just going make whatever the fuck I want to make. Basically, I’m going to do what makes me happy. Maybe that is what Midwinter hollow is to me  - my happy place. 

How this will look moving forward, we will find out together. “We” being my brain and I, because it’s unlikely anyone is reading my blog posts haha.

 So that's what it will be - maybe lots of short runs of different ideas merging different media and ideas together - jewellery, art, jewellery as art, lino print, clothing, linoprint on clothing, maybe a bit of tie-dye.  I'll use up all my old crafts and create some crossovers of all the different crafts I spent loads of fucking money on.

So what I'm really saying is that Midwinter Hollow will be how I purge my workshop of all the arts & crafts that I have hoarded over the years and hardly use. Hey times are tough! I could probably open my own craft shop here (maybe now is the time to open a PO Box or have a registered business address that isn't our home address)

I had unconsciously started this evolution with my collection of wearable art “The Organica Collection” and solidified it when I decided to launch the affordable art initiative that had been living rent free in my mind for a few years. With the cost of living crisis happening I felt this was the time to launch Pay What You Want Prints. I launched this in July and was overwhelmed with the response! I released 5 linocut prints where the buyer could choose the price point they want to pay from free (just pay postage) up to something ridiculous like £1000 (well you never know, someone might enjoy helping a struggling artist haha).

These prints included my botanical hare and badger prints which I am so proud of. There was also a UFO print which represents my love for UFOs - you know they are real right?? An optical illusion print which will be the start of a series as I really love optical illusions. The final print was a tiny “fuck off” which represented my feelings towards Boris Johnson at that time. Hmm maybe it’s time for a Fuck Off Lizz Truss print?

Moving forward I will have prints in the Pay What You Want Prints category for about a month before moving them over to the general print section which will also contain some limited edition prints in the future. I will try to keep at least one print always available in the Pay What You Want Prints collection. 

So there we have it. Watch this space for the continued evolution of Midwinter Hollow! I look forward to seeing where this goes!