The Alchemy of Assemblage Workshops 2017

Last year I held my first ever workshop, in the beautiful antique & restoration warehouse, Elements I Love, located here in my neighbourhood in Sydney. It was a collaborative workshop with owner Brooke, who shared her fabulous expertise on woodwork finishing while I guided participants to connecting with their unique creative flow as they each made their own assemblage boards. It was great fun,  and the energy in the room was magnetic.

After some wonderful feedback and several consultations with a workshop specialist over the past months, I have designed & redefined The Alchemy of Assemblage into something delightfully unique & I cannot wait to share it with you! So without further delay, I am thrilled to announce  I have two exclusive & intimate workshops to be held at Elements I Love next month (and two to be held in Amsterdam in September, which I'll share the details of in a moment!).

The first one coming up is a weekend workshop, spread over 2 days - from 11-4pm on August 26 & 27, 2017. Join me for a rare opportunity to spend 10 hours together learning how to connect with your intuition to unlock your own unique style and journey toward finding the beauty & magic in your everyday.  With a limit of just 6 participants so I can genuinely connect to each person, this unique workshop is a life-enriching experience that reaches heart & soul. 

On Day One, you’ll acquire the knowledge to create your own distinctive piece of personal art on wood using a collection of elements you love. Through the process of creating your own assemblage board (collage on wood), I will guide you on how to recognise and follow your intuition, allowing your creative spirit to flow freely - a technique you’ll be able to practice and strengthen over time. I will help you discover how to approach a creative project by guiding you through making your own beautiful and evocative collage: it will be like learning to bring to life one of the pages from My Heart Wanders but even more wonderful - this will be your very own. 

We'll enjoy a delicious & nourishing French-inspired lunch with champagne surrounded by incredible antiques from all over the world and have the chance to talk in more depth about creative blocks and how to work through them. 

On Day Two, you'll have the opportunity to practice what you've learnt from Day One and take it one step further by creating your own styled vignette with selected objects from the beautiful Elements I Love collection. Through the styling of your own vignette in a supportive, nurturing and captivating environment, learn how to get in touch with your intuition and work with your creativity to find beauty in the everyday.

This is where you'll learn my creative principles which I apply to styling & photographing for clients as well as magazine and publishing shoots.

After another delicious lunch together and more time to deepen your intuitive connection, you'll be ready to head home feeling empowered, nurtured and with joy in your heart.  You'll have gained confidence in your creative abilities and be inspired to nurture and grow your heart connection in a new and magical way. 

Here are the dates and details for the Sydney Weekend Workshop:

Date: Saturday and Sunday, August 26 & 27, 2017

Time: 11-4pm on Saturday August 26 & 11-4pm on Sunday August 27. 

Location: Elements I Love, 124 James St Leichhardt.

Price: $800

Learn: how to approach a creative concept and learn skills that will enable you to craft other assemblages.  Gain insight & knowledge into the thought process behind creative and artistic projects whilst learning the stylist’s trade techniques that make it happen.

Bring: (optional) one or two mementos from home that represent a moment, a place, a time, a memory or a person you love. For example: a photograph, a scrap of fabric, a piece of leather or similar, an old letter or card, a ticket etc. 

Supplied: boards and materials, beautiful organic teas & coffee, lunch (please inform us if you have any dietary requirements), champagne and afternoon tea. 

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The second Sydney workshop is a single day workshop, incorporating everything from Day One of the weekend workshop, here are the details:

Date: Saturday July 22, 2017

Time: 11-4pm 

Location: Elements I Love, 124 James St, Leichhardt, Sydney, Australia

Price: $400

Learn: how to approach a creative concept and learn skills that will enable you to craft other assemblages.  Gain insight & knowledge into the thought process behind creative and artistic projects.

Bring: (optional) one or two mementos from home that represent a moment, a place, a time, a memory or a person you love. For example: a photograph, a scrap of fabric, a piece of leather or similar, an old letter or card, a ticket etc. 

Supplied: boards and materials, beautiful organic teas & coffee, lunch (please inform us if you have any dietary requirements), champagne and afternoon tea. 

There are only 6 places available for each, you can click on the link below to learn more and book your place...

Now for the details about Amsterdam...

Yes! Very excited to share with you my friend Leslie's incredible studio in Amsterdam for these workshops. All the details are as above, but they will be held at Swarm: Leslie Oschmann's wonderful world of making. Being an artist hermit (like myself, we are alike in that way :), this is definitely a rare opportunity! Here are the details...

Amsterdam Weekend Workshop:

Date: Saturday and Sunday, September 9 & 10, 2017

Time: 11-4pm on Saturday September 9 & 11-4pm on Sunday September 10.

Location: Swarm, Vereniging De Loods, Zeeburgereiland, Amsterdam

Price: $885AUS (600 euros)

Learn: how to approach a creative concept and learn skills that will enable you to craft other assemblages.  Gain insight & knowledge into the thought process behind creative and artistic projects whilst learning the stylist’s trade techniques that make it happen.

Bring: (optional) one or two mementos from home that represent a moment, a place, a time, a memory or a person you love. For example: a photograph, a scrap of fabric, a piece of leather or similar, an old letter or card, a ticket etc. 

Supplied: boards and materials, beautiful organic teas & coffee, lunch (please inform us if you have any dietary requirements), champagne and afternoon tea. 

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Amsterdam Single Day Workshop:

Date: Friday, September 8, 2017

Time: 11-4pm

Location: Swarm, Vereniging De Loods, Zeeburgereiland, Amsterdam

Price: $445AUS (300 euros)

Learn: how to approach a creative concept and learn skills that will enable you to craft other assemblages.  Gain insight & knowledge into the thought process behind creative and artistic projects.

Bring: (optional) one or two mementos from home that represent a moment, a place, a time, a memory or a person you love. For example: a photograph, a scrap of fabric, a piece of leather or similar, an old letter or card, a ticket etc. 

Supplied: boards and materials, beautiful organic teas & coffee, lunch (please inform us if you have any dietary requirements), champagne and afternoon tea. 

For more info, follow the link below...

If you have any questions at all, please send me an email.

With love, 

Pia xx

photo story for Christmas edition of Happinez 2016...

1. "let me take you for a walk through my favourite neighbourhood": hand drawn map of Amsterdam (which I made a few years ago for my Amsterdam: Made By Hand tour, antique French book from our bookshelf, gold fabric from Major & Tom. 2. "a wander on the beach": Bottle from Major & Tom, as well as gold scalloped dish, made by beautiful Bridget Bodenham.

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3. "I'll be your Marie Kondo for the day": everything found around my home - fallen bark from a nearby tree, found feathers, and beautiful velvet lined box gifted to me by an Alchemy of Assemblage workshop attendee. 4. "I'll knit you something warm this winter": wool bought in British Columbia many years ago, tiny knitting needles found in a vintage shop on King St, Newtown, blue silk fabric given to me by my friend Kaspia.

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In September last year, I produced, styled and photographed an 8-page feature for Dutch magazine Happinez, for their Christmas edition, 2016, issue 8. It was titled "What money can't buy", featuring non-traditional gift ideas for the festive season. The brief was to come up with some gift ideas that celebrate sharing time together and offering a skill, rather than going out and buying something. As you can imagine, I was pretty rapt with this assignment: challenge accepted!

Would you like to know a little about how I made these assemblages?

5. "I'll plant you a rose garden": back boards from Major & Tom, hand dyed silk ribbon from Tinctifolia, and tiny French pots from Elements I Love . 6. "I'll make you some healing soup": sari from Malaysia (details below), hemp string from String Harvest.

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Together with the Creative Editor, I came up with some ideas and then had to figure out how to visually capture them. For example, one idea was to gift a walk on a favourite beach together. When I thought about that idea, I began to visualise a beach in a bottle, so I created just that, using a small bottle, some sand, tiny shells and a little sparkle (shown in the top right image). The layering of the objects around the bottle created depth and warmth, and I used gold threaded fabric and ceramics for texture and a touch of festivity. That was the first photograph I made from the story, as in my mind it was the strongest, but it also took the longest to create (3 hours). 

Another gift idea was to make some delicious festive soup, but instead of creating an image of a bowl or pot of soup, I decided to bundle the ingredients together, giving a textural feast for the eyes (image 6). I deconstructed a variety of fresh mushrooms from the supermarket, choosing the most interesting ones and creating a bundle with fresh herbs and watercress, wrapped with string and bells. The sari used as the backdrop for the ingredients I had bought in Malaysia many years ago when I was a bridesmaid for a modern Malay wedding. 

7. "Private concert": Gold textile from Major & Tom, Indian festive circles from India in Balmain, music sheet from my personal collection. 8. A beautiful mess.

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Below each image is more information about each photograph, with links to wonderful prop suppliers and makers here in Sydney. And if you'd like to see a behind the scenes mini film of me in the process of making one of the photographs, you can see it right here. 

9. "I'll come to clean up your decorations": box of decorations from my personal collection, with collected seed pods dipped in glitter, vintage baubles, and an assortment of ceramic stars by Paper Boat Press. 10. vintage sari as above.

Would you like to learn how I create assemblages like these? This year I am scheduling a few exclusive and very intimate weekend workshops to share my techniques with you, connecting to our intuition. In the next couple of weeks I'll be announcing the dates, first through my newsletter to allow subscribers to get first choice with early bird specials, then publicly. There will only be 6 places available per workshop, so if you'd like to be first in line to book your preferred date, please ensure you have subscribed. 

And if you have any questions, please comment below! xx

The Alchemy of Assemblage Workshop 2016

On the afternoon of Sunday, August 27, I hosted my first workshop at the beautiful warehouse of Elements I Love, here in Sydney. After enjoying a few sips of champagne and a chat in the boutique, we lead fifteen wonderful women down the hall, past the antique rocking horse, French cabinets and dress mannequin to draw back the velvet curtain of owner Brooke and Tim's restoration workshop filled with wooden work benches and shelves overflowing with hammers, nails, sandpaper & beeswax. It was so special to be invited to host the event in the workshop itself, it felt like we'd been transported to an alchemist's secret lair. It was a creatively spirited afternoon of learning the alchemy of assemblage while drinking champagne and nibbling on Simmone Logue baked goods and French bread & cheeses. Everyone was eager to get started on their assemblage, it was wonderful to see...

With feathers, strips of vintage textiles, dried ferns leaves, painted sticks, old newspapers, and antique French lace along with the most gorgeous strings from String Harvest and hand dyed silk ribbons from Tinctifolia, everyone gathered the pieces that resonated with them and were soon assembling...

The two hours flew by, and before I knew it, everyone had created something so unique while learning about creative direction and assemblage from me and some woodworking tips from Brooke. It was a lot of fun...

At the end, while I was helping to wrap an assemblage in cloth for transportation, a rainbow of light from a tiny window high up fell on the table beside me, it was a beautiful sign of the magic that was made...

Brooke has written a great wrap up post on her journal, with lots more photos, check it out here. 

Many thanks to Brooke, Tim, Sarah and the whole team at Elements I Love, my dear friends Kaspia, Louise & Jo, and Zoë from Tinctifolia for supplying the gorgeous ribbon samples, and Cassie from String Harvest for supplying the incredible strings and yarn, Simmone Logue for the food and of course to all the beautiful souls who joined us. 

I will be hosting more Alchemy of Assemblage workshops in 2017, announcing the dates and locations in January. In the meantime if you'd like to express your interest in attending, please email me. 

With Love, 

Pia xx