Art: February 2018 Round up and ice dye round four

With February coming to a close, we'll wrap with another batch of tie-dye rinsing photos to try to take us out on an upbeat colourful note. It's been a busy month despite being a brief 28 days! We set up our first pop-up retail tie-dye spot at the Bubblegum Gallery here in Las Vegas's own Art's District, we've processed several photoshoots and posted lots of new items on the Etsy shop, so very much tie-dye was made, had a commitment ceremony performed by Batman, lost our little buddy Zinni to natural causes, discovered our new favourite neighbourhood pizza joint (they have anchovies! Not every place has anchovies, and one of our first big relationship realisations was when Antho and I both confessed to liking anchovies on our pizza), my hours at my day-job were cut tremendously, threatening our financial stability some and causing me to have to refocus my energies elsewhere after being dedicated to the job for the nearly a year... Overall, it's been a bit of a rollercoaster of a month! In a lot of ways I have to say I'm not terribly worried about having the hours of my day-job cut, as I was able to spend a lot of time with Zinni while he was struggling in his final days and that means a lot to me. We've had most of our pet rats for their entire lives, from their very first squeak to their very last, and while it still hurts so badly to lose any of them I have to say that I'm grateful to have been able to be there for them from start to finish like that. Having a pet is a large responsibility, and whenever I take in an animal I truly hope to be there for them throughout our lives together. Humans typically outlive our animal friends, after all, and I don't think it's fair to shuffle them around from home to home where they might not lead such happy lives...and with rats, there's always that chance someone's going to use them as food for a predatory animal, a fate I'd hate to consider being possible for any of the docile little goofs we've raised. And to think, it all started when we spontaneously agreed to adopt an old rat boy named Pendleton. Anyhow, this post isn't about rats or day-jobs or any of that nonsense, we're here for the PRETTIES!

For the colour!

FOR THE TIE-DYE!

Hoo-RAH!

💖

Until next time, catch you next month!

💕

XOXO,

NAU

Vegas: Batman Commitment Ceremony at Viva Las Vegas wedding chapel

A couple days prior to Valentine's day proper, our good friend Blaze contacted us asking if we'd like to participate in a commitment ceremony at the Viva Las Vegas Wedding Chapel. There would be photographers / paparazzi there for Buzzfeed, commemorating the experience and giving us a few moments of potential internet fame under our belts, and to top it all of the event was going to be hosted by Batman! How could we possibly say no to such a proposition? Antho has gone above and beyond for Valentine's days in the past, like the time he signed off on a townhome for us and got the keys so he could surprise me with our new home on Valentine's a few years back, so it'd be hard to top that but this was definitely up there! The whole experience was really cheesy and fun, and we'd discussed in the past how we'd like to have the ceremony officiated/hosted by Batman when we got married, so it's pretty outrageously cool that the varying coincidences and circumstances just so happened to make that occur. 

And on Valentine's day, no less. It was pretty romantic, there was even Michael Keaton's Batman theme playing to enhance the Gotham-noir mood. There was a dense fog and a mysterious reveal, and then the Dark Knight was there, guiding us through the process. 

You might be wondering what the difference between a commitment ceremony and an actual wedding is... basically it boils down to paperwork. A commitment ceremony is a way for couples to publicly celebrate their love and make vows to eachother, like in a wedding, but there's no marriage certificate involved so no legally binding contracts. Traditionally commitment ceremonies were a way for couples who might not have legal access to marriage to have the same affirmation of their love and dedication among friends and family. Our good friends Mae and Stefano joined us, as did Blaze though he was technically working still for a large portion of the evening so he couldn't socialise as much. It's all good, though, as we were able to spend some time together after everything was said and done! Also, his hard work is what led to us getting most of these photos and the video, so we're extremely grateful for him! The girls from Buzzfeed were sweethearts too, and while we didn't get to talk to them much because they were busy working we wish them both well and look forward to seeing what they create with all the footage they captured of not just us but many other happy couples they witnessed that day.

Overall it was a wonderful experience. We got the brighter lit of all these photos and a video of the entire ceremony for ourselves which is a great keepsake! The owners of the chapel were quite hospitable and lovely, the decor fun and the theme entertainingly and thoroughly executed. I mean, look at all that fog, guys! The chapel also does Rocky Horror Picture Show weddings, Oompa Loompa weddings (which Antho and I both cheered at when we saw it on their sign), Star Trek, and countless other themes to choose from! During our time there we saw a couple getting a Medieval style wedding where they were dressed in full garb and entered the chapel via a stunning cart pulled by knights. This place is a blast! Highly recommend it if you're ever looking to get hitched in Vegas, or at least commit. Since we didn't have rings prepared or anything, the chapel provided some for us. They were rubbery light up rings, which was fun! They have a wide variety of options available, so you don't have to go low-end like we did. 

Another Valentine's Day in the books, and another tough one to beat. I wonder what's gonna happen next year!

😂

Anyway~

Until next time!

💓

XOXO,

NAU

Art: February 2018 ice dye round three

Splish splash, ever more tie-dye shirts taking their baths!  It's always fun to try to capture the ephemeral process of dye runoff because the colours bleed away and grow ever fainter as the water rushes off down the drain. It's a colourful process no matter what shades we use, though some colours do have a noticeably longer rinse time. Maybe the dyes are more pigmented and all that pigment just takes ages to dissolve? Or perhaps we just went a little overboard when applying that particular dye powder and it ended up being a larger pile of powder than we anticipated. Whatever the case, there's ample opportunities for me to experiment with my camera and see what fun new angles or moments I can capture of our creation process and sometimes Antho will even jump in and play photographer, which is always great! Each and every one of our shirts is hand dyed by Antho and I, with occasional help from our friends when they want to jump in, and we put a lot of time and effort into the process. 

Beyond the dye process and rinsing, which tend to be rather photogenic and feature heavily here, there's a lot of time spent tying and untying, then sitting around the laundromat waiting for endless rinse cycles to work their magic before waiting around for another hour or two for the dryers... it's a labor of love, though, so even though it can be quite a time consuming endeavour we keep doing it time and time again! We've found that we can space out our tie-dye rinsing trips to the laundromats and do one large batch at a time to save some trips and time, but we rinse our newest ice-dyed (or regular tie-dye sometimes) shirts throughout the week so that they don't soak too long in the spent dye. Having Vanticore added to our family has made the time go by a little more pleasantly, too, as we can retreat to the solitude of our vehicle and relax or run errands between loads of laundry.

 We're happy you're here to share in the whole experiment with us and we hope you enjoy the behind the scenes peek! It's always so colourful, and it's fascinating to see how the different colours play together in the dye process. We've been experimenting with some different methods of applying the dye powder recently, and been fairly pleased with the results. It's not a super radical change, but it's enough of one for us to feel a rejuvenated curiosity and push to explore all the various results available. That's one of the most gratifying things in any creative hobby, though, in my opinion- there's perpetual room to evolve, learn and grow as you practice! The more you practice, the better you get, and the more excited you get to try new things that might have intimidated you before and on and on it goes.  

More photos below...

Art: February 2018 Ice-dye round two and exciting announcment

In yesterday's post I showed a behind-the-scenes batch where we applied the dye directly to the shirts as opposed to our usual method. These, however, are not those shirts. The results of those will be up tomorrow! Sorry for the wait, but we have so many shirts being produced these days that it's hard to keep up with them all. As I write this there's a stack of at least 15 pre-washed shirts waiting for their final rinse so that we can model them and get them up into the shop. We also recently took a big batch of shirts over to the Bubblegum Galley here in Vegas, where we're now having our first public brick and mortar shop! While the gallery doesn't have set opening hours, they host a wide variety of classes and events throughout the week and are open during Las Vegas's big monthly art event, First Friday. The Bubblegum gallery is conveniently located in the Arts District and is a short walk or Uber ride (or you could rent a bike!) from where the main First Friday event goes down. We're pretty excited, if you can't tell. 

💎 You are magical! 🌈 We are super excited to announce our first ever brick & mortar pop up shop at @thebubblegumgallery here in the Las Vegas arts district! While they aren't open every day, you can always arrange a visit with the owner or pop in for one of their many classes! They're open on First Friday, too, so don't miss out! . . . . . #710visuals #tiedye #icedye #shop #bubblegumgallery #shop710visuals #lasvegas #artsdistrict #handmade #local #art #artists #magical #pastel #pastelgoth

A post shared by 710Visuals (@710visuals) on Feb 12, 2018 at 5:33pm PST

The gallery is a super cool space full of creepy-cute artwork, jewelry, even taxidermy! Antho was super stoked that he was able to recognise a preserved rabbit's head before reading the label... While I'm not so keen on the taxidermy, myself, I can respect the skill and craft involved in making it and give my props to the artist. We'll be hosting some classes of our own soon, and hope to see you there! You can follow along with the class schedule here on the Eventbrite page. We are super duper excited to be part of a gallery showing and to have 710Visuals out there with a store presence. We love sharing our creations with people, but mostly it's been through Instagram and Facebook or our Etsy shop. This has been great, and I'm so happy you're here on my blog reading this! Tie-dye has been such a joy for us and has truly been the light in the dark for me at some points. Life is hard, and sometimes it can be monotonous or depressingly difficult, but tie-dye will always surprise and delight me with the vibrant colours and infinite folds. Hopefully posts like this can help pass along some of that joy to you, too. For now, here's a behind the scenes peek at how we go about some of our craft at our home studio. 

More photos below!

Art: February 2018 Ice dye round one

We're always creating, churning out new designs and experimenting with new techniques and color combinations. Tie-dye has been illuminating for us, and it's become something we do whenever the opportunity avails itself to us. We've really been cranking out an outstanding amount of product these last few months compared to some of the earlier days. This may have something to do with the fact that I've been trying to push towards buying in bulk more so that we have ample back stock ready to experiment with instead of ordering piecemeal one item at a time. Having such an abundance of blank canvases at our disposal stoked something in our creative fires and the results have been great fun! Unfortunately, I'd say our current store inventory is a bit uneven, to say the least, and we're working at expanding our options in all the sizes available so that none of you lovely rainbow-loving folks out there will be left out.  We've made shirts for infants up to 6XL and want to continue branching out! We recently made several 2XL/3XL tee dresses that have been doing really well, so we'll definitely be making more of those for the coming summer months! Plus size girls and boys deserve to feel like the gorgeous beings they are, right? No matter what your clothing size, everyone deserves to feel beautiful and to have options available to them. While searching for plus-size items to add to our shop I've been surprised at the lack of diversity! Trying to find a v-neck shirt alone has been challenging after a certain size, and that's not fair. I'll keep looking because it's our job as creators of clothes to try to ensure we have a little something for everyone, in my humble opinion. 

With some of these shirts, we tried something a little different. Normally we apply the dyes over the ice, letting the melting ice saturate the dye and drip it down onto the top. This creates a more abstract, space-like, water-colour sort of effect that we've enjoyed greatly. For this batch we went dye straight on the fabric, as this can allow a bit more control over the colour distribution. The photos here are just of the process, to see the results of how the dye-direct batch turns out you'll have to check back tomorrow! But for now, enjoy the photos of our tie-dye behind the scenes. 

Vegas: Ethel M. Lights of Love 2018

The Ethel M. Lights of Love event at Las Vegas's own chocolate factory is a limited time shindig and will, unfortunately, already be closed for the year upon the publishing of this post. By limited time I mean severely limited, lasting only ONE week, and they close it up at 8pm! That's right, from February 7th through the 14th the cactus garden outside of the chocolate factory will be open to the public, completely free, to enjoy the beautiful romance themed lights. We went to check it out more or less immediately after our adventure at Sunset park photographing some of our tie-dye and hanging out with the local wildlife. We were surprised by how sparse the crowds were, considering, and enjoyed our stroll through the grounds. We did pop over to the factory for our pieces of free chocolate, however the actual factory area was mostly under construction as they reconfigure their manufacturing processes a bit. We didn't spend too long here as the grounds themselves aren't very expansive, and it was pretty chilly for the boys. I found a onesie in the van and slipped into that to heat up, but the boys were limited to jackets. If you're feeling a bit of deja vu with this post, it's probably because we went to the Ethel M Cactus Gardens not too long ago for their Christmas lights. I, personally, still like to call them illuminations because that sounds more romantic to me, but they're whatever you want them to be. Either way, the lights are lovely to look at and fun to photograph. We weren't the only ones with a camera out as I think there was an engagement photoshoot or something going on, too. A trio of photogs with their tripods out and ready were dutifully chasing a cute couple around the grounds, occasionally offering suggestions or asking for them to make some adjustments. Everyone was courteous and scooted around trying not to interrupt anyone else's photos or strolls, which was nice. It's not hard to see why a romantic photoshoot would be so apt here! If you happen to be in the area around next Valentine's day, this is certainly something to consider checking out. You can always buy a hot chocolate in the gift shop to warm up, and don't forget your mints lovebirds!

More photos below!

Vegas: Sunset Park Winter Tie-Dye photoshoot

Sunset park should be a familiar sight for any Vegas resident who's opted to spend time outdoors more than a couple of times. It's one of our larger parks and is located conveniently close to McCarran International airport on the corner of Eastern Avenue and Sunset Road. There's a wide variety of events that are held in the park throughout the year and it's a popular spot for families and youngsters to escape to. Back when I was in college I'd roll up with my iced Americano and a book, happy to spend a few hours sprawled out on a blanket beneath a tree reading. These days we like to watch the geese and crank out some work while we're there, photographing an assortment of our newest tie-dye creations while out. Our good friend Ceedro joined us for this outing, kindly modelling some of our shirts and showing off his juggling skills in the process.  Whether you've been to Sunset park for Ren Fair, the Holi Festival of Color,  or for a pleasant day of recreation (you can event rent bikes or sports equipment on park grounds!) by the man-made lake, Sunset park has a little something for everyone. There's a less developed area of the park for hiking that lets you marvel at the bounty of wildlife the desert can support, because believe it or not there's over 200 different plant species proliferating the area! There's also a rabbit overpopulation problem sweeping through the valley, which means that you've got a pretty good chance of spotting a fluffy little interloper bobbing across the park at some point. We saw one big fat happy thing in the greens over behind where Ceedro is juggling above. It's no surprise they'd profligate in this park as there's lot of lush green areas during the warmer months...at this time of year the grass is on the yellower side, but I'm sure there's still plenty for the little foragers to nibble on. Ducks and geese also abound, and during the spring it's not unusual to find an array of different bird's nests tucked away among the branches of trees. All in all we had a wonderful day at the park! We made friends with some bees and I was even able to pet a goose! He walked right up to me and gracefully allowed me a gentle stroke of his back. Lovely! Most geese are little terrors, aren't they?

More photos below!

Art: More January 2018 ice-dye

Another day, another tie-dye. I suppose some people might consider it tedious work by this point, but for us it's a continual process of experimentation and discovery.  There's always new folds, new colour combinations, new alchemy to uncover. No matter how many times we've dyed there's always something new cropping up, some fun new melt, something to uncover. It always seems photogenic, to me, though I guess our viewers might have their opinions about such matters. Both +Antho Jay  and I have been pretty happy with our most recent batches of creations, and as each new batch is a further step in our journey of learning and creating, I like to imagine they keep getting better as we go.  We've been experimenting with applying the dye powder directly to the fabric and then applying the ice recently, in an effort to create more precise colour patterns and lines. We haven't been unhappy with the result- and we've had a couple of items come out that we were really excited about. I'll be posting about the reveal for those when the time comes, but for now please enjoy these photos of our behind the scenes creation process for our tie-dye. We're always trying new colours and techniques and though I've posted about our tie-dye many, many times in the past I can honestly say I don't feel that it's something that will ever become redundant due to the infinite methods for creation and combination available to us.  We recently invested in a big bulk box of shirts so that we could try to create whenever the impulse struck, and I've been very very pleased with the outcome of that. We've been making tie-dye on a nearly daily basis now and trying things we might not have otherwise delved into if we didn't have such a backlog of bounty to experiment with available. While Google might say otherwise, that's their problem. We love making tie-dye and are happy to share it with the world. We hope you enjoy our colourful creations! Plenty more photos will proliferate below, so enjoy the colourful alchemy occurring below. Cheers.