Buttonsplus

Here is a hand painted porcelain button showing a couple in their finest wear. It is detailed right down to the buttons on the gentleman’s coat. To set it off nicely it has an enamelled brass border making for a rather lovely button.

I made this Garden pincushion many years ago. My friend Suzanne and I were in a craft shop in Bendigo and saw one in the showcase. The lady didn’t have any instructions but sold us all the ribbons and threads we needed to make it. She photocopied the actual pincushion so we had a black and white picture of the design. We scribbled notes on the page telling us what colours to use where and we crossed our fingers and went home. Between us we made one each and were pleased with our efforts. It is quite unique.

This is just a simple pin cushion I made many years ago. When they were building my unit they drilled large holes in the wooden doors to put the handles on. I made this out of the circle of wood that came out of the hole. I thought I could use it to make something so I painted it gold then wound and glued the thread around it. Then I made a circle of cardbourd, padded it and covered it with material before gluing it on to the wooden shape. I finished it off with braid around the edge. It came out quite nicely. So you can do all sorts of things if you only use your imagination.

Here are two items I made several years ago by painting onto calico and then handstitching the detail which I really enjoyed doing. On the left is a glass pin tray with a typical English cottage with a thatched roof. The glass paper weight on the right is a painting inspired by a book I have called ” The Diary of an Edwardian Lady ” ( Edith Holden) She did beautiful paintings of all things in nature and was English. That was in the early 1900s.

This is a group of nine Bakelite buttons in different shapes such as square, diamond and triangle so that is a little different from the usual round buttons. Most of my Bakelite buttons are large and mainly brown or black; some with carving and some with metal trim.

Here is a dark brown Bakelite button with a decorative metal trim in the shape of a flower. In the middle is a domed white glass stone which is quite large. It has a metal loop shank and measures 4 cm.

This metal button is a nice example of a simple Art Nouveau style floral design. It would have been fun designing all the patterns for buttons and I can imagine in the late 1800s and early 1900s that someone drew with pencil on paper squiggling different lines until they achieved something they were happy with. No computers back then! Then the making of the moulds; how clever. This button measures a little over 2 1/2 cm.

Here is a large silver button in the Art Nouveau style of flowing lines. It features a lady’s face with some flowers underneath. The detail is quite fine and you can even see a string of pearls around her neck. It is a lovely button and measures 3 1/2 cm.

Here is a brass button featuring a Geisha girl with a fan, cherry blossom to the left and Japanese symbols to the right. It is mounted on an orange plastic disc which shows it off nicely. The button itself measures a little over 3 1/2 cm and has a brass loop shank.

In 2011 my friend Olwyn went for a trip to Burma and bought these two lots of buttons for me. They were bought in two different towns and are new. It was a nice surprise for me. They look similar to what would have been available in our shops at the time. I imagine that some of them were made in Thailand.