Friday, 23 January 2015
Thursday, 22 January 2015
Zodiac & the next tick
Its a very momentous day today, Daisy and I can tick a massive tick off our to-do list.
We will be posting all the yarn and first pattern instalment for the 2 Zodiac blanket clubs.
The Zodiac is the culmination of 10 months work, I started designing it last April, it took 2 months to come up with a workable design, we put the memberships on-line last June.
I had a few months off from the Zodiac, working on the book and the summer wool shows.
Our plan was to start dyeing the yarn after Yarndale, but due to our workload we just never managed to fit it into the dyeing schedule.
I did however start working on the pattern.
The pattern has taken months to write as I needed to turn a very complex design into a pattern that was understandable and easy to make, luckily I have Valerie, who has been with me through the whole process, tecing all my charts and written instructions, re-working all my maths, writing the motif patterns for the knitted blanket and just generally being an all round superstar.
Without her the Zodiac wouldn't exist
I have my fingers crossed that we've managed to produce a workable pattern.
So Daisy and I started dyeing at the beginning of the month, actually I should say Daisy started dyeing I was still working on the pattern.
The dyes have been playing up and its been a nightmare trying to get the colours right.
Due to the cold weather some days the indigo has refused to play, Dais dyed all the green and after she'd washed it it was far too pale, so I re-dyed some of it and quite a bit of the re-dyed green ended up far too dark, so there is a huge variation in the greens, so there is going to be a huge variation in the look of the finished blankets.
I've been really panicking about the green, but have come to accept that its out of my control, there is nothing I can do about it,
We can't afford to buy and re-dye another 15+ kilo's of green and it needs to be posted now and not sometime in February, so some of the members will get a dark teal, some will get a slightly muddy apple colour and maybe one or two will get the colour I'd planned to dye.
Now I've had time to think about the varying greens, I've decided that it will be quite exciting watching the different colour variation blankets emerge.
We finished the dyeing at the end of last week and have been struggling to get it dry, rewound, labelled and packed in time to send it before the end of this week.
I finished sorting all the yarn into colour packs yesterday and Dais is packing them into their mailing packages today.
I'm at home working on the blanket today, but I'll be taking a trip up the hill later this afternoon to fill the Beast with the Zodiac and bring it back down to the post office to catch the last post.
Next thing on my to-do list is crochet the actual blanket and listen to Phil complain while he makes the knitted one.
He's only ever made finished patterns and never been a pattern tester.
So he didn't completely understand what he was agreeing to when he said he'd make the knitted blanket and he's finding it very frustrating that I keep editing the pattern and taking away the charts he is working from and replacing them with newly edited charts.
Unfortunately he's not going to be happy tonight when he discover's that I have had to edit the main pattern as I had a couple of the colours muddled up.
He thinks he's finished knitting the February motif's, sadly he's going to have to re-knit 2 of them :-)
If you are a member don't worry about the pattern edit, I'll send a e-mail tomorrow with the new colour charts attached.
Monday, 29 December 2014
The end of NDS
This is a very difficult post to write, its very sad, but its also very positive for the future.
So here goes....
Daisy and I have decided to indefinitely mothball The Natural Dye Studio, to stop dyeing and close the website.
We don't want to kill NDS completely as, at sometime in the future, we may decide to revive it and start dyeing again. However if we do it won't be for several years and will be on a much smaller scale.
We have thought long and hard, and spent several months discussing our options, but we have come to the realisation that we both want to move on to follow our other careers.
Daisy wants to be a writer and I want to be a full time crochet designer.
There are so many reasons behind our decision and I want to explain some of them to you so you understand why we are closing NDS.
I'll start with a couple of the smaller reasons and work my way up to the major reason.
1 - Our lease is up at the end of April and even though I don't know for sure I suspect we won't be able to renew it as the ownership of the premises changed hands during our lease period and the new owner has little interest in our business.
If this is the case we would need to find new premises, and would probably mean moving the business off the moor into an industrial estate in Barnstaple or South Molton.
2 - It is getting more and more difficult to obtain our dyes. We have already lost 2 or 3 as they have been discontinued since moving to Devon and now we are unable to buy Fustic, which is our yellow.
Until recently we bought it 1kg at a time from our main supplier.
Recently they stopped stocking it but can obtain it from an outside source but we would have to buy 11kg minimum at an inflated price, which means it is way out of our price range.
Our other suppliers are also unable to source it.
We could use weld as a substitute, we used it previously in Suffolk. However we have been unable to get a good colour here in Devon, a colour which can best be described as pale and wishy washy - not nice at all.
There isn't a plant that dyes green, so to produce green we have to dye yellow first then over dye it with indigo, so this means not only do we lose yellow from our palette, but we also loose all our greens, leaving us with orange, pink, purple and blue.
Now onto the main reason.....
Daisy and I can't cope with the workload.
This is a very long explanation, so you might need a cup of tea to help you get to the end.....
Let me rewind you to a year ago...
Phil, Daisy and myself were all working for NDS, everything was under control and running smoothly.
I was in the process of deciding whether or not to write my book. It was a difficult decision as I didn't want to damage NDS and knew that Daisy and Phil would have to take on my extra work. They both assured me they could cope and that I should do it, so I signed the contract and started making blankets.
We managed to struggle through, it was hard work and meant we had to work weekends to keep everything under control, but we managed it.
Then in the summer Phil was offered a full time job by a very close friend. It was a proper job, with a proper wage and meant that if Phil and I stopped taking a wage from NDS Daisy could be paid a 'living wage' and there would be less of a financial burden for every one involved.
Phil had been working for NDS since his redundancy in 2010, and even though he loved it I always felt that it wasn't enough for him as he was used to big business, plus he wanted to turn it into a much bigger company that would have meant so many changes that the core and ethos of NDS would of been lost.
I know he was frustrated with Daisy and myself for wanting to keep NDS small and true to its self.
I was panic stricken as to what the future might hold, but happy and positive for him as I knew his new job was exactly what he needed.
So at the beginning of August NDS became just Daisy and myself with the help of Nicky one day a week.
For the first month it wasn't too bad and we managed to cope. It's always quieter in the summer and although we had to dye for the shows NDS was almost under control.
Daisy was doing nearly all the dyeing, clubs, wholesale and updates. She was also doing a lot of the winding, all the packing and posting, and all the wholesale and club management.
I was spending 3 days at the studio helping with the dyeing, working on the update, marketing, social networking, managing the website and trying to produce patterns for NDS.
The other 4 days of the week I was designing and making blankets for my book. I wish I could say I was writing the patterns, but I just didn't have the time.
We managed to struggle though to Yarndale, had a brilliant show, and hoped to relax a little bit during the autumn before starting to plan next years shows.
On the way home I started to sneeze and by the time we got home I had flu and have been ill ever since. Nothing major or life threatening just an endless lists of colds and infections (gum, sinus, tonsil), and was finally diagnosed with asthma. As soon as I recover from one thing I come down with a new one.
I've had lots of tests for various things and spent a lot of time at the doctors and the verdict is that there is nothing serious to worry about but I am run down and over stressed.
At one point during this period Daisy damaged the tendons in both her hands from over work and had to stop dyeing for several weeks. As a result she became very irritable and upset; she was hugely frustrated and I was left to take on her workload in the dye-room as well as my own.
It all came to a head one day when a friend of ours said good morning to me and I burst into tears for absolutely no reason at all. I was broken physically and mentally.
During all this chaos we went to Bath to see the Kaffe Fasset exhibit at the American Museum.
I love Kaffe and, whilst standing in amongst all his colour and knitting, I realised that this was what I wanted to do. I wanted to be a designer and make colour and crochet. I didn't want backache and brainache and the constant demands of the website or Daisy's stress and frustration or show panic or constant social networking and wholesale promotion.
I wanted to indulge myself, make exactly what inspired me when ever it inspired me and not have the constant pressure of trying to find new and exciting ways to sell wool.
I casually mentioned the idea of closing NDS to Daisy and she was so happy I'd suggested it as she'd felt the same way for some time.
Although she had been writing Murder on the Moor for the last 2 years she hadn't written anything of her own and was frustrated and exhausted with the constant pressure.
So we made the decision together, in total agreement, to wind down the business and I went home feeling that the world had become a much clearer and more positive place......although I did wake up in the middle of the night panicking and decided that I really couldn't kill the one thing that I had dedicated my whole life to over the past 13 years, hence the decision to mothball NDS and not close it.
I never set out to be a full time dyer. I was a textile artist who wanted to dye a little bit of fabric and thread to use in my work.
I dyed too much so sold it on Ebay, I only dyed little bit of wool as an experiment to see it it would sell, and the rest, as they say, is history....
I can't remember the last time I had a whole day off and we haven't had a holiday for years. My whole life revolves around the business I don't do anything else. I haven't baked a cake, sewn a seam or even read a book for the last couple of years.....my whole life is dedicated to NDS and I want it back!!
So the plan is we dye until the end of March. Hopefully during this period we can fill your stashes (and mine) with enough NDS yarn to last you a long time.
We will dye all the Chameleon club and so it is ready for me to post in the relevant months.
Zodiac will be dyed and gone long before March.
We only have one show booked for 2015 and that is Unravel in February. I'm hoping to do Yarndale as a designer, but that's not certain at this time.
I will finish my book, the deadline is Christmas 2015, and then I will sit back, take stock, and decide what to do next.
Maybe a tiny bit of dyeing in my courtyard, maybe apply for the 2016 shows as a designer with a tiny bit of NDS or maybe none of these things.....who knows.....maybe I'll just sit on the top of Hollerday Hill and crochet in the sun :-)
So here goes....
Daisy and I have decided to indefinitely mothball The Natural Dye Studio, to stop dyeing and close the website.
We don't want to kill NDS completely as, at sometime in the future, we may decide to revive it and start dyeing again. However if we do it won't be for several years and will be on a much smaller scale.
We have thought long and hard, and spent several months discussing our options, but we have come to the realisation that we both want to move on to follow our other careers.
Daisy wants to be a writer and I want to be a full time crochet designer.
There are so many reasons behind our decision and I want to explain some of them to you so you understand why we are closing NDS.
I'll start with a couple of the smaller reasons and work my way up to the major reason.
1 - Our lease is up at the end of April and even though I don't know for sure I suspect we won't be able to renew it as the ownership of the premises changed hands during our lease period and the new owner has little interest in our business.
If this is the case we would need to find new premises, and would probably mean moving the business off the moor into an industrial estate in Barnstaple or South Molton.
2 - It is getting more and more difficult to obtain our dyes. We have already lost 2 or 3 as they have been discontinued since moving to Devon and now we are unable to buy Fustic, which is our yellow.
Until recently we bought it 1kg at a time from our main supplier.
Recently they stopped stocking it but can obtain it from an outside source but we would have to buy 11kg minimum at an inflated price, which means it is way out of our price range.
Our other suppliers are also unable to source it.
We could use weld as a substitute, we used it previously in Suffolk. However we have been unable to get a good colour here in Devon, a colour which can best be described as pale and wishy washy - not nice at all.
There isn't a plant that dyes green, so to produce green we have to dye yellow first then over dye it with indigo, so this means not only do we lose yellow from our palette, but we also loose all our greens, leaving us with orange, pink, purple and blue.
Now onto the main reason.....
Daisy and I can't cope with the workload.
This is a very long explanation, so you might need a cup of tea to help you get to the end.....
Let me rewind you to a year ago...
Phil, Daisy and myself were all working for NDS, everything was under control and running smoothly.
I was in the process of deciding whether or not to write my book. It was a difficult decision as I didn't want to damage NDS and knew that Daisy and Phil would have to take on my extra work. They both assured me they could cope and that I should do it, so I signed the contract and started making blankets.
We managed to struggle through, it was hard work and meant we had to work weekends to keep everything under control, but we managed it.
Then in the summer Phil was offered a full time job by a very close friend. It was a proper job, with a proper wage and meant that if Phil and I stopped taking a wage from NDS Daisy could be paid a 'living wage' and there would be less of a financial burden for every one involved.
Phil had been working for NDS since his redundancy in 2010, and even though he loved it I always felt that it wasn't enough for him as he was used to big business, plus he wanted to turn it into a much bigger company that would have meant so many changes that the core and ethos of NDS would of been lost.
I know he was frustrated with Daisy and myself for wanting to keep NDS small and true to its self.
I was panic stricken as to what the future might hold, but happy and positive for him as I knew his new job was exactly what he needed.
So at the beginning of August NDS became just Daisy and myself with the help of Nicky one day a week.
For the first month it wasn't too bad and we managed to cope. It's always quieter in the summer and although we had to dye for the shows NDS was almost under control.
Daisy was doing nearly all the dyeing, clubs, wholesale and updates. She was also doing a lot of the winding, all the packing and posting, and all the wholesale and club management.
I was spending 3 days at the studio helping with the dyeing, working on the update, marketing, social networking, managing the website and trying to produce patterns for NDS.
The other 4 days of the week I was designing and making blankets for my book. I wish I could say I was writing the patterns, but I just didn't have the time.
We managed to struggle though to Yarndale, had a brilliant show, and hoped to relax a little bit during the autumn before starting to plan next years shows.
On the way home I started to sneeze and by the time we got home I had flu and have been ill ever since. Nothing major or life threatening just an endless lists of colds and infections (gum, sinus, tonsil), and was finally diagnosed with asthma. As soon as I recover from one thing I come down with a new one.
I've had lots of tests for various things and spent a lot of time at the doctors and the verdict is that there is nothing serious to worry about but I am run down and over stressed.
At one point during this period Daisy damaged the tendons in both her hands from over work and had to stop dyeing for several weeks. As a result she became very irritable and upset; she was hugely frustrated and I was left to take on her workload in the dye-room as well as my own.
It all came to a head one day when a friend of ours said good morning to me and I burst into tears for absolutely no reason at all. I was broken physically and mentally.
During all this chaos we went to Bath to see the Kaffe Fasset exhibit at the American Museum.
I love Kaffe and, whilst standing in amongst all his colour and knitting, I realised that this was what I wanted to do. I wanted to be a designer and make colour and crochet. I didn't want backache and brainache and the constant demands of the website or Daisy's stress and frustration or show panic or constant social networking and wholesale promotion.
I wanted to indulge myself, make exactly what inspired me when ever it inspired me and not have the constant pressure of trying to find new and exciting ways to sell wool.
I casually mentioned the idea of closing NDS to Daisy and she was so happy I'd suggested it as she'd felt the same way for some time.
Although she had been writing Murder on the Moor for the last 2 years she hadn't written anything of her own and was frustrated and exhausted with the constant pressure.
So we made the decision together, in total agreement, to wind down the business and I went home feeling that the world had become a much clearer and more positive place......although I did wake up in the middle of the night panicking and decided that I really couldn't kill the one thing that I had dedicated my whole life to over the past 13 years, hence the decision to mothball NDS and not close it.
I never set out to be a full time dyer. I was a textile artist who wanted to dye a little bit of fabric and thread to use in my work.
I dyed too much so sold it on Ebay, I only dyed little bit of wool as an experiment to see it it would sell, and the rest, as they say, is history....
I can't remember the last time I had a whole day off and we haven't had a holiday for years. My whole life revolves around the business I don't do anything else. I haven't baked a cake, sewn a seam or even read a book for the last couple of years.....my whole life is dedicated to NDS and I want it back!!
So the plan is we dye until the end of March. Hopefully during this period we can fill your stashes (and mine) with enough NDS yarn to last you a long time.
We will dye all the Chameleon club and so it is ready for me to post in the relevant months.
Zodiac will be dyed and gone long before March.
We only have one show booked for 2015 and that is Unravel in February. I'm hoping to do Yarndale as a designer, but that's not certain at this time.
I will finish my book, the deadline is Christmas 2015, and then I will sit back, take stock, and decide what to do next.
Maybe a tiny bit of dyeing in my courtyard, maybe apply for the 2016 shows as a designer with a tiny bit of NDS or maybe none of these things.....who knows.....maybe I'll just sit on the top of Hollerday Hill and crochet in the sun :-)
Saturday, 27 December 2014
Stupid EU Vat
Dear reader's
I'm sorry I haven't blogged for a while, we've been so busy dyeing clubs and wholesale that I haven't had any head space to compose a blog post that made sense.
I've also been trying to make sense and find a way through the new EU vat law.
So I'm afraid now I'm going to write a very boring post about the stupid new law that is coming in on the 1st of January, this new law will effect all of us and I want to explain what my plan is to cope with the law.
The law is as follows - from January the 1st 2015 all digital down load sales in the European Union will be liable for vat in the country that the customer lives, this means if you live in France and buy one of my patterns I have to pay the vat to the French vat office, this in turn means I need to be registered for vat in every European country I sell patterns to.
There are 28 countries in the EU, that means I would need to be registered for vat in 28 countries and fill out 28 different vat returns every 3 months!
The whole thing is ridiculous and unworkable, it has been in the pipeline for several years, however it wasn't made known to the little tiny fish like myself until a few weeks ago.
It has thrown the whole world of independent craft designers, musicians, writers, app developers etc etc into total chaos, anybody who sells a PDF or download will be liable to pay vat.
I know of numerous designers who are going to close their pattern shops and stop selling, or stop selling to the EU.
The big fish such as Amazon and I Tunes have known for a long time and have had time to come up with plans and strategies, its rumoured that the laws were designed to force them into paying the taxes they had managed to avoid.
However the wonderful Ravelry have teamed up with Love Knitting and so all my European customers will be directed to Love Knitting to buy my patterns.
Love Knitting will be selling directly to my customers, pay the vat, deal with all the associated paperwork, take their cut and then paying me the remainder.
Its not ideal, but its the only solution at the moment, so I am fairly happy.
So as a customer you don't need to worry, you can carry on buying my patterns without too much extra fuss.
You can find all my patterns HERE on Raverly, if you live in Europe you will be automatically directed to Love Knitting.
There are quite a few groups and forums that have sprung up from the chaos, small designers and other download business people have clubbed together to try and find a solution through the mess, there has been a twitter campaign, lots of threads in the shop keepers group on Ravelry, a very active campaign group on Facebook and several petitions trying to get the law makes to make allowances for the little people like myself.
I'm sure there are lots more groups that I don't know about, but these are the ones I have been involved with.
You can find more information here - http://euvataction.org/
This is the Facebook group - https://www.facebook.com/groups/DigitalVAT2015/
And if you want to help please sign one or both of the petitions below
Both petitions need lots more signatures before they are sent, unfortunately most people aren't interested or don't know anything about the new vat laws or don't think they have anything to do with them.
However wherever you live in the world if you have ever bought a pdf pattern, downloaded music or an app this new law will effect you in some way however small.
to PIERRE MOSCOVICI Commissioner for Economic and Financial Affairs, Taxation and Customs
https://www.change.org/p/pierre-moscovici-a-unilateral-suspension-of-the-introduction-of-the-new-eu-vat-laws-for-micro-businesses-and-sole-traders
And to President Obama
https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/call-european-commission-suspend-introduction-new-eu-vat-laws-micro-businesses/VH1P82X0
I'm sorry I haven't blogged for a while, we've been so busy dyeing clubs and wholesale that I haven't had any head space to compose a blog post that made sense.
I've also been trying to make sense and find a way through the new EU vat law.
So I'm afraid now I'm going to write a very boring post about the stupid new law that is coming in on the 1st of January, this new law will effect all of us and I want to explain what my plan is to cope with the law.
The law is as follows - from January the 1st 2015 all digital down load sales in the European Union will be liable for vat in the country that the customer lives, this means if you live in France and buy one of my patterns I have to pay the vat to the French vat office, this in turn means I need to be registered for vat in every European country I sell patterns to.
There are 28 countries in the EU, that means I would need to be registered for vat in 28 countries and fill out 28 different vat returns every 3 months!
The whole thing is ridiculous and unworkable, it has been in the pipeline for several years, however it wasn't made known to the little tiny fish like myself until a few weeks ago.
It has thrown the whole world of independent craft designers, musicians, writers, app developers etc etc into total chaos, anybody who sells a PDF or download will be liable to pay vat.
I know of numerous designers who are going to close their pattern shops and stop selling, or stop selling to the EU.
The big fish such as Amazon and I Tunes have known for a long time and have had time to come up with plans and strategies, its rumoured that the laws were designed to force them into paying the taxes they had managed to avoid.
However the wonderful Ravelry have teamed up with Love Knitting and so all my European customers will be directed to Love Knitting to buy my patterns.
Love Knitting will be selling directly to my customers, pay the vat, deal with all the associated paperwork, take their cut and then paying me the remainder.
Its not ideal, but its the only solution at the moment, so I am fairly happy.
So as a customer you don't need to worry, you can carry on buying my patterns without too much extra fuss.
You can find all my patterns HERE on Raverly, if you live in Europe you will be automatically directed to Love Knitting.
There are quite a few groups and forums that have sprung up from the chaos, small designers and other download business people have clubbed together to try and find a solution through the mess, there has been a twitter campaign, lots of threads in the shop keepers group on Ravelry, a very active campaign group on Facebook and several petitions trying to get the law makes to make allowances for the little people like myself.
I'm sure there are lots more groups that I don't know about, but these are the ones I have been involved with.
You can find more information here - http://euvataction.org/
This is the Facebook group - https://www.facebook.com/groups/DigitalVAT2015/
And if you want to help please sign one or both of the petitions below
Both petitions need lots more signatures before they are sent, unfortunately most people aren't interested or don't know anything about the new vat laws or don't think they have anything to do with them.
However wherever you live in the world if you have ever bought a pdf pattern, downloaded music or an app this new law will effect you in some way however small.
to PIERRE MOSCOVICI Commissioner for Economic and Financial Affairs, Taxation and Customs
https://www.change.org/p/pierre-moscovici-a-unilateral-suspension-of-the-introduction-of-the-new-eu-vat-laws-for-micro-businesses-and-sole-traders
And to President Obama
https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/call-european-commission-suspend-introduction-new-eu-vat-laws-micro-businesses/VH1P82X0
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