#like i guess i shifted a lot more into experimenting with textiles and making clothes and more physical things

[rostii]

looking through the art i have saved on my laptop and god i used to draw SO much... i need to get back to that

[rannadylin]

Fluff, Network, Offspring for Vi; Alignment, Grudge and Question for Anselm; Law, Pistol, Upcoming for Audie; Jaded, Law and Question for Glynis; Alignment, Fluff, Kin, Question and Touch for Ianthe

A-Z Headcanon Asks

Violet:

Fluff :: What hits their soft spot? Doesanything them into emotional goo?Edér’s sense of humor, mostly. Vi is a Very Serious Fluff and hisability to make her laugh even when things are pretty terrible is a large partof her falling for him. Seeing him go all silly over every stray pet theycollect brightens her day, too.

Also, Eothas. It’s obviously gonna be a complicatedrelationship she has with her god after Sun in Shadow, and worse, after hewrecks Caed Nua, but the first time she gets to actually talk to him in theDeadfire just melts her. Her devotion after that point isn’t just theoreticalor practical; she’s delighted to find him, well, likeable, even in the midst of another of his crazy schemes.

Network :: Are they connected to the people?How much do they reach out to others?

She takes that aspect of priesthood very seriously, thoughshe has to push herself to reach out at times when she’s more geared toward thecontemplative, introspective side of her calling. In the Dyrwood, she welcomes secretEothasians to her secret chapel in Caed Nua and has Edér to help her find suchfolk through the Night Market. Apart from church folk, she keeps incorrespondence with some of her family – Audie especially, before the clanvisited Caed Nua, and more of them after that – and with friends from her Dyrwood adventures, especially Kana and, when he bothers to write, Aloth – but she’s not much for socialevents and that kind of networking.

Offspring :: What kind of parent would they be?Would they prefer one, or multiple?She’s got lots of experience wrangling younger siblings, but ofcourse it’s different when it’s your own. Vi’s compassion and resolve and tendencyto give every situation careful thought would all come in handy with her kidsthough; she’s a devoted and caring mother, though on the other hand that“giving things careful thought” can make her hesitate to act quickly whendiscipline is called for. And…given her clan/city traditions…I’m not sure shecould handle having just one child, if she’s going to have any at all. XDThey’re meant to have siblings, right? Lots of those?

In the Soul & Shield world state, she and Edér willprobably adopt. In other world states – Deadfire canon included – she andAnselm will have a bunch. I think that letter to Eidis mentioned at leastthree? There will probably be more after that.

[more behind a cut, so many wonderful questions! ;-D]

Anselm:

Alignment :: What would be their D&Dalignment? How might it come into play?Hmmmm…this is tougher than it seems it should be. I mean he’s got arather particular sense of honor but also does not hesitate to use his Watchauthority to bend the rules if they get in the way. And he was certainly moreselfish in his youth whereas he’s trying to be more altruistic these days, so Isuppose he’s mid-shift from something like Lawful Evil to True Neutral? Oof,that’s my best guess anyway.

Grudge :: How bad does an insult go over? Dothey hold a grudge long?He’s got a lot of confidence (or…well…retains the veneer of it atleast, possibly to cover up a self-doubt that’s been growing since Violet leftand only now being challenged) to shrug off an insult, or more likely fire asubtle comeback. Grudges…are beneath him, mostly. Vengeance is more effective. Why stew over an injury done to you when you have the power to retaliate and assert your own superiority?

Question :: How often do they feel doubt? Whattopics are they defensive about?He’s always doubting whether he’s really any better now than he was whenViolet left. (Recent developments regarding someItzli sisters’ views of him may help to quiet those doubts. 😉)And he’s a little defensive about being a cipher, always expecting people tomistrust him for it and having to prove himself.

Audie:

Law :: What do they think about abiding rules?Are they selective about it?Audie thinks people should abide the rules that she makes, basically. Those that stand in her way, on the otherhand, were ill-advised. (To be fair, the world would run pretty smoothly if she were running it. Pity she wasn’t around when the Engwithans were deifying people.)

Pistol :: Is this character skilled with aweapon? What’s their opinion of violence?Oh, very skilled with her knives, both for stabbing and throwing.Being in the Citlatl militia longer than the rest of the Itzli siblings has hardenedher to violence, as well, though not to a great extent as the city’s been atpeace for all her life and it’s just fairly routine patrols and scouting andsuch for now. She’s not necessarily looking for a fight (not physically, at least: she’s almost always challenging someone at least psychologically) but she won’t back down from one either.

Upcoming :: How much do they think of thefuture? Do they make long-term plans?Lots of contingency plans, I think. She has the most influence onthe family’s business pursuits these days, so she does a lot of networking fortrade contracts (oh, and I think I’ve settled on the family business being inthe textile industry… :-D They totally make fabric from Ginny’s alpaca yarn,too, and some of the embroidery on the finer bolts of cloth and on the garmentsmade for export is done by some Itzli siblings as well as hired employees…) and she oversees plans for production and that sort of thing. But then she also hasPlans B and C and several more degrees of what they’ll do if anything goeswrong. So it’s a long-term series of short-term plans? Sort of?

Glynis:

Jaded:: Do they buy into the “happily ever after” ideal? What’s their standard?Her life is the gods’. And…she’s a visionary. Like, literally, theHaven is the product of her visions (from the gods, she assumes, and she’s probably right). And theyhaven’t told her anything about settling down happily ever after, so that makesTicatl’s attempts at courtship kind of awkward for a while.

Law:: What do they think about abiding rules? Are they selective about it?She is a very rule-abiding missionary, convinced that only by being above-boardand doing all that they do among the heathen in the light of Eothas can theyconvince people to convert. (On some level she feels like consorting with Ticatl is breaking the rules, though asfar as I know there isn’t any such rule, but it’s more to do with her role asRectrix and her fear of dividing her attention too much if she falls in love…atsome point she was, ahem, selective enough about that self-imposed rule thatshe did in fact end up pregnant, though, so there’s that.)

Question:: How often do they feel doubt? What topics are they defensive about?She is not a philosopherlike Violet, so rather than welcoming doubt as a chance to examine the truth closer,she tends to try to outshine it and cling tighter to the tenets of Engwithanfaith, of which she’s pretty enthusiastically convinced. She’s a littledefensive about her visions of the Haven, when that first starts happening andshe’s trying to convince the other missionaries they need to build this thing.

Ianthe:

Alignment :: What would be their D&D alignment? How mightit come into play?Hmmmmm. Lawful neutral maybe, given her respect for authority evenwhen she’s not fully on board with Thaos’ methods?

Fluff :: What hits their soft spot? Does anything them intoemotional goo?Hugs from Glynis. Appreciation – Ianthina so regularly feelsoverlooked and persuades herself to just live with it, that if someone treatsher with genuine regard it’s a little overwhelming (and she’s forever grateful,once she gets over the initial suspicion depending on where said regard iscoming from).

Kin :: What’s their role among their relations? Do theyconsider others family?Hmmm well for actual blood relations, her parents died young but Idunno [yet] why, and I don’t think she had much other family – no siblings,maybe an aunt or uncle or something out there? And of course she ends upviewing Thaos as a father figure but that takes a while. I don’t know if sheeven got to the point of considering Glynis like family, though she’ll alwaysconsider her as her best friend, but their time together in training was brief,relative to the rest of Ianthe’s time in the gods’ service. (As for hersort-of-stepmother Deoiridh, in whatever version of the story gives them achance to get to know each other better, she kind of views her more asa…sister, or cousin or something, but keeps that view to herself. XD)

Question :: How often do they feel doubt? What topics arethey defensive about?Having had her doubts about the gods confirmed after theInquisition, and yet coming back to serve them anyway, she’s got a tendency nowto be even more skeptical and assume her doubts about anything are true. But tostill do what seems most practical, even if contrary to her doubts. She’s defensiveabout her role in the Inquisition, especially the lover she had who went overto Iovara’s cause, but she’s even more defensive about her inclination to mercyafter she returns to the gods’ service. It goes against all her practical nature,after all; but she’s just seen too muchruthlessness in the Inquisition to let that be her first resort anymore, evenif she feels at first like this disappoints her mentor…

Touch :: How do they handle contact? Is their personal bubblebig?She’s fairly aloof, definitely a big bubble, maybe something to dowith being an only child. Glynis was almost instantly granted an exception tothis standoffishness – look, when the first acolyte you meet in the barracks upon enteringtemple training greets you with an enthusiastic and very fluffy hug and then lookschagrined at overstepping and clearly hopes she hasn’t started off on the wrongfoot with her new roommate, sometimes you can’t help but set aside your awkwarddiscomfort and tell her it’s fine. And take a liking to this fluffy littleidealist with eyes as big as her dreams who clearly needs a more sensiblefriend to help rein in her wilder ideas. (Oh goodness, I really need to writesome early Ianthe & Glynis fic, don’t I?)

[savilerowmastertailor-blog]

Araminta Campbell is someone we have been following closely over the last few months. Her ethics, standards, quality and craftsmanship are very much in line with ours. A weaver by trade who uses an artistic approach to her work, developing her own designs taking inspiration from nature using the Scottish landscape, she fuses the old with the new and is making this traditional craft super chic and highly desirable.

https://www.aramintacampbell.co.uk

Araminta offers a service called ‘Heritage’ which is commission based for the design and production of bespoke tweeds and tartans. The fabrics are woven and finished in Scotland using world famous skills and expertise built up over generations and use naturally sourced, ethical raw yarn from UK farms.

We caught up with Araminta in London to discuss specifics for creating our own bespoke Featherstone London tweed and got the opportunity to ask her a few burning questions we had regarding her work:

Weaving is an unusual trade, where did this passion start?

My weaving journey began with a passion for textiles which was fostered by a wonderful teacher I had at Secondary School, which lead onto me taking a degree in fine art embroidery. In the final year of this degree I stumbled across the weave room and was completely captivated!

I loved the extra dimension that weave requires, the way precise mathematical workings are combined with artistic vision. I have always had a natural way with numbers and I had never realised that this could actually have a place within my creative practice.

How long has it taken you to fully learn this trade and become proficient in the craft?

It took me around 3 years to get my weaving skill to the exacting standards I expect of my products, however the learning is never done! I am constantly building on that knowledge, creating new designs and experimenting with new ways of doing things.

Where do you look for inspiration to come up with new concepts and designs?

My greatest source of inspiration is the Scottish landscape. I am at my happiest when I am out for a walk in the hills, and this love of the natural world translates into everything I do.

When I am designing a tweed, this is reflected in the colours I choose, and the woven patterns and textures I combine to create an impression of the land it represents.

My handwoven alpaca pieces often spring from a specific natural detail or motif I have noticed, whether that is the bark on an old Scots pine or the delicate structure of a feather. I often describe them as my ‘woven paintings’ – as they are my way of capturing the world I see, and have the same consideration and unique quality as a work of art.

How long does it take you to hand weave one of your bespoke pieces?

Usually my Handwoven alpaca pieces take around 5 days to create. This includes several days of preparing the loom and hand weaving, as well as all the washing and finishing. People often forget about this last part, but the difference that it makes if huge! Once a piece is woven, it is handstitched, cut off the loom and then put through a 6 stage hand washing process before being brushed, steamed and brushed again.

Although machine woven, the bespoke tweed process also takes time. Once I get a brief and I have discussed with the client what they are looking to achieve, the concept for the new design usually bubbles away in my mind for two weeks. I need a while for the ideas and inspiration to come together, as often it is my creative subconscious that gives me my most original designs! However equally, I can sometimes be driving through the countryside and have to pull over as a tweed design has popped fully formed into my head!

Once I have an idea for a design, it takes up to a month to develop that alongside my client, incorporating their feedback until we have something they love. The weaving process can then take several months depending on the yarns, finish and weaving mill we have selected.

There are a few cloth weavers in Scotland, what makes you unique?

I guess you could say that it starts with me approaching weave design from an artistic perspective.

With my handwoven pieces, the complexity of the patterns I create isn’t seen very often as they would be considered impractical for large production runs. However this was never my intention as they are my woven artworks –each one is a unique one off piece.

They are also woven completely by hand on my two old looms. These are beautiful objects in themselves, and have such character and history. They haven’t been modernised in any way so take a lot of TLC and patience, but it really means that the skill and aptitude of the weaver is laid bare and each piece is that much more connected to the hands of its’ maker.

For the bespoke tweeds I create, my artistic approach is also something I believe sets me apart. I love the idea of a design being able to tell a story; to speak of the people and places that it represents. As such, I work closely with each client to create something that is really unique to them, rather than just having a few options that they can adapt or customise. I then collaborate with other highly skilled manufacturers around Scotland to produce the woven fabric – which is unusual as most designers are connected to a single mill or don’t provide final production. This allows me to offer clients a wider range of options to cater to their every need, as well as meaning I can support small rural mills.

We are seeing a huge shift from fast fashion, mass produced items back to UK, locally sourced and bespoke/luxury goods. Why do you think this is and how has that impacted your business?

I think we are seeing a backlash against the exploitation and waste that has been highlighted in the fast fashion industry in recent years. People are becoming more widely aware of ethical and environmental issues and this has impacted the way people think about the things they buy. Customers are demanding to know more about the way goods have been produced, and are increasingly looking for quality items that last.

Being a small luxury brand we have come into the market at the right time, as actually being small and able to trace every single stage of our raw materials and making process is really valued. We are also able to offer people the personal experience and story behind each item, which gives them a lasting connection and appreciation for each piece. They become conversation pieces and future heirlooms rather than just here one season and gone the next.

What’s your biggest achievement to date?

Meeting prince Charles at a showcase of the best of Scottish Textiles at Dumfries House. Really inspiring to speak to someone who has such an appreciation and knowledge about textiles.

Any exciting projects coming up planned that you can reveal to us?

I am currently designing for the Fife Arms Hotel, which is a luxury hotel currently being renovated in the Scottish Highlands. It has been my biggest project to date, and I can’t wait to see how it will look when it opens in 2018.

What’s the most creative/unusual request you have been asked to create?

I think that would probably be taking a tweed design back in time – without knowing what it looked like before!

A few years ago I was commissioned by the Glen Tanar Estate to redesign and manufacture their estate tweed. The Estate tweed they had – over time and many contemporary reproductions – seemed to have moved away from it’s original colours and design. I was asked to bring it back to its former glory.

I started with a visit to the Estate. Situated in Royal Deeside, it is an area I know and love, full of dark Scots pine forests, rocky crags, heathered hills and the mighty River Dee. Working with a few examples of what the tweed had become, I returned to the colours and textures of the landscape to breathe life back into the design.

We were all really pleased with the finished result – and just a few months later I heard from the Estate. They had just stumbled across a hand woven Glen Tanar tweed blanket from around the 1930s and it almost exactly matched the design I had just produced for them! History had been recreated.

What’s the dream/future for your brand?

Become a destination Scottish textile brand, where people come to experience our unique combination of design, quality and craftsmanship.

We often host international visitors at our hand weaving workshop in Edinburgh, and I love sharing what we do as well as adding to their appreciation for Scotland’s culture and textile heritage.

I also always want us to maintain that personal quality, the direct connection with the designer and makers that makes our pieces so unique.

  Over the coming months we are planning to bring you updates documenting the production of our own tweed which we will reveal via this blog! We hope you enjoy following its progress and would love to hear your thoughts!

Craig

Featherstone London Tweed coming soon! Araminta Campbell is someone we have been following closely over the last few months. Her ethics, standards, quality and craftsmanship are very much in line with ours.

[eddiejpoplar]

TEST DRIVE: 2017 BMW 118d xDrive

It’s been roughly two and a half years since I last test drove a car with a manual gearbox, and the last press car I had the pleasure of driving with three pedals was a MINI Cooper. Therefore, I was rather excited when BMW called and invited me to take a BMW 118d xDrive out for a spin for a few days. I was reticent at first but after learning about the clutch pedal, I was sold on the experience.

The BMW 118d is almost the cheapest model you can get with a blue and white roundel on the hood especially and that makes it a good candidate for fleet managers wanting to get the best bang for their buck. Furthermore, this is one of the cheapest RWD cars you can get today. Chip in the fact that you can get it with a manual gearbox and things get quite interesting if you’re looking for fun on a budget.

I personally would’ve preferred if the car was rear-wheel drive as that would’ve made the whole experience a lot more enjoyable but for some reason, most of the press cars BMW has in its fleet lately come with all-wheel drive. That said, you can still have fun and be safe during winter months if you live in colder areas, and with a set of good winter tires and some skill behind the wheel, you could still deal with snow and ice.

But let’s not get ahead of ourselves. I found myself face to face with a diesel, RWD, manual hatch and I couldn’t wait to get behind its wheel and enjoy the times ahead. That may seem a bit weird, considering the car that stood before me, but getting to drive a manual press car is truly a rare occasion these days. That’s because most manufacturers kit their press fleet cars with all the tech they can so that the journalist behind the wheel can experience the best they have to offer. Getting to enjoy a more ‘pedestrian’ model is a relief from time to time.

In the case of the 1 Series there’s another reason why the 118d xDrive came with a manual: that’s the only gearbox available for it. What’s more interesting is that if you live in the UK, the 118d is not available with xDrive at all, so things are quite peculiar for this hatch. Therefore, you can either have a 118d RWD with a manual or automatic gearbox, or a 118d xDrive but in that case, you only get a manual gearbox.

No matter your choice, you’ll get the same 2-liter 4-cylinder diesel engine under the hood, the B47 mill being tuned to make 150 HP in 118d guise along with 320 Nm (236 lb-ft) of torque. It may not seem like a lot at first glance, especially since we’ve recently sampled the M140i by comparison, but it’s enough for your daily needs, rest assured. That’s because the 1 Series is the smallest car BMW makes today and it’s also one of the lightest. Were it not for the added 80 kilos of the xDrive system, the 5-door 118d would’ve tipped the scale at just 1,425 kg (3,141 lbs). Even so, the 150 HP drivetrain handles the 1.5-ton weight of the chassis pretty well. You won’t win many drag races but you’ll have plenty of power to do your daily chores.

From the outside, there’s nothing to set the car from the rest of the range. It didn’t stand out in the crowd whatsoever, even though it was painted in a nice shade of Mediterranean Blue and was wearing the Sport Line exterior package. The wheels were definitely a nice touch, the 17” Star-spoke 379 model with black faces and chrome spokes giving the general dark theme of the car a decent contrast. Chip in the tinted windows and you get the picture.

Inside the cabin things were just as standard, with the cloth seats and M Sport steering wheel dominating the cabin as the center points. Unlike the 2 Series, which received a new instrument cluster along with the facelift this year, the 1 Series is still using the old analogue orange cluster and that’s fine, giving you a retro feel, somehow. Alas the old iDrive system is gone and, in its place, we’re dealing with the most recent iteration of BMW’s infotainment system. It has had everything revised, from the menu and submenus to the graphics and works really well, being one of the benchmarks in the industry at the moment. On the 1 Series you don’t get a touchscreen but you don’t really need it as the rotary control knob on the center console will get the job done perfectly anyhow.

And right next to it you’ll find the gearshift lever, in this case wearing the M logo on the knob. The manual gearbox is typically Bavarian which means it’s a bit rubbery but the gates are precise and closely stuck together. Shifting gears is rather enjoyable but there’s a quirk that some people might find annoying: rev-matching. All the newest models in BMW’s range come with this function and it is probably intended more as a protection measure than a restriction on the driver but you can turn it off if you want to. Just deactivate the DSC and rev matching will be gone, it’s as simple as that. And while some have been complaining about the car automatically raising the revs as you downshift, to be honest I had nothing against it. In truth, it comes in handy and all those people claiming it’s for those who can’t drive are, in all honesty, hypocrites. It’s the same kind of argument people initially used when automatics started taking over the world. Nobody is stopping you from turning this function off.

When you take the BMW 1 Series to the limit you start to understand why it’s the best handling car in its segment. To put things in a different perspective, I should also mention that it’s the only rear-wheel drive model in the hatchback segment which makes it considerably better balanced with or without xDrive. There’s little body roll too and the suspension is perfectly damped, offering the most comfortable ride when compared to the likes of the A-Class or the Audi A3, especially when you go for the optional adaptive dampers. Our tester came with the 17” wheels and runflat tires and that took away some of the comfort but we still found the ride to be more than decent. Go for smaller wheels and maybe different tires and you probably won’t need adaptive dampers anyhow.

Switching between the three driving modes did almost nothing for the way the car handled since we’re dealing with a manual gearbox here. Sure, the steering becomes a bit heavier in Sport mode and the throttle response is a bit sharper but the differences are incredibly small or, better said, barely noticeable. In Eco Pro mode, the throttle response is toned down, allowing you to get better fuel consumption figures by helping you out with that heavy right foot.

Speaking of which, the 118d xDrive wasn’t all that impressive in terms of returned mpg around town. I guess my led foot had something to do with it but no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t get the fuel consumption to drop under 8 l/100 km (29.4 mpg) and that’s way off what BMW claims in the NEDC test. Outside the city limits, since there’s less variation and gear shifting, the fuel consumption came closer to the claims with the on-board computer showing 5.7 l/100 km (41.2 mpg). That’s a decent figure and it would’ve been lower if the car wasn’t all-wheel drive. Flat out, the BMW 118d xDrive is also quite quick off the line but not neck-breaking fast. It will do 62 mph from standstill in 8.4 seconds which is decent. Nobody’s going to buy this thing for drag racing anyway. On the highway, you’ll be fine as long as you don’t venture too far past the 81 mph (130 km/h) speed limit which isn’t great for your driving record anyway.

As for the practicality of the car, having so much fun behind the wheel does come with certain drawbacks. The driver’s seat is positioned low, offering a great driving position overall but not great visibility if you adjust it to the lowest position. You sit down low and the seats are comfortable and offer great side support, even though we’re not dealing with the M Sport variant here. The seats of our tester were actually textile and yet looked and felt great. If you’re on a budget, I wholeheartedly recommend skipping the Dakota leather.

There’s plenty of room up front but passengers sitting in the back might find their leg and head room quite restrictive. You definitely shouldn’t force three adults to sit abreast in the back, especially if they’re about 6-ft tall each as that could lead to all sorts of headaches. To put things better in perspective, you get a bit more room in cars like the Volkswagen Golf, Seat Leon, Audi A3 and the A-Class but that’s understandable since the 1 Series does have to make room for its longitudinally mounted engine and driveshaft sending power to the rear axle.

However, the cabin does come with plenty of storage spaces. The door bins are generous in size and there’s a lot of space in the center armrest to store various small items. With the back seats up, the boot can hold up to 390 liters of stuff which is 30 liters more than the old model. Fold the seats and that figure goes up to 1200 liters. And while those may seem like impressive figures, they’re both some 20 liters shy of what the A3 offers, for example. Furthermore, the loading aperture has a bit to suffer because of the shape of the taillights and the boot floor isn’t straight, dropping towards the back which can make loading things flush a bit of an issue.

Despite these drawbacks, the 1 Series is still the most fun to drive car in the segment. Get it with a manual gearbox and things get even better. To think that almost the entire range is available with a stick shift makes it a true driver’s car. The choice of engines is extremely varied as well, from 3-cylinder mills to the top dog M140i, every man and woman out there being able to choose their favorite easily.

As for the 118d xDrive model, it’s clearly been set up to appeal to the more frugal minds out there. It was developed to be a decent cruiser for those wanting to have a small hatch with a great feel on the road. Despite having a diesel engine under the hood, you can have plenty of fun with the 118d and, to make things even better, a small ECU tune can get the power levels up to what the 120d offers, 190 HP and 400 Nm (295 lb-ft) which is more than enough for a small hatch like this. The internals are the same under the hood and you can get a great bang for the buck this way.

Overall, I thoroughly enjoyed my time with the car. The diesel mill under the hood was hushed down thanks to proper sound isolation and it is well balanced, while the abundant torque band allows you to cruise around in almost any gear you wish to. Pinch the throttle and you get out of any sticky situation in a hurry while if you want to have even more fun, all you have to do is counter steer quickly to get the rear end sliding. And that, simply put, is something you just can’t do with any other hatch these days.

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