Browsing “DiYVR”

Who doesn’t love tacos? And hats? And while many of us don’t own a television, we still love those shows that are made for it. So Taco Hat TV is sure to be something great!

Wait, what?

What do you mean it’s got nothing to do with tacos or hats? And I can’t watch it on TV? Well what’s it all about then?

“Taco Hat TV will be a web show for curious people and makers,” explains co-creator Kim Werker. “Each episode will focus on a particular DIY skill or topic, like cooking, electronics or mending. We’ll have a guest on who will discuss and demonstrate things related to building skills and knowledge about that topic. So, say it’s a cooking episode. Rather than going step-by-step through how to make a particular recipe, we’ll discuss what kinds of seasonings taste good together. Our goal is for our viewers to finish an episode feeling more competent and confident to experiment on their own and to seek out more information.”

If you’re a long-time reader of Vancouver is Awesome you might recognize Werker’s name as she is the former editor of our DiYVR section. She’s also a freelance writer, editor and speaker in the world of crafts and creativity.

“I’ve written and/or edited a few crochet books, and I’ve been both a guest and a host on crafts television shows. I also run Mighty Ugly, which is a project about facing the negative crap that keeps us from pursuing creative projects.”

Her partner in Taco Hat TV is Ben Z Cooper, a local filmmaker who has worked on projects from music videos to reality TV, and, according to Werker, has a special excitement for panoramas.

“Ben and I met in the lead-up to the first Vancouver Mini Maker Faire in the spring of 2011. We were both involved in helping to put the event together, and after the second VMMF this past June we finally decided to grab a coffee and talk about all manner of things related to making stuff. He’s a filmmaker and I’m a writer, and we discovered a shared passion for spreading info about makers, making, and creative acts in general.

“I’ve had a web-show idea slow-cooking in the back of my mind for years, in part as a response to my experiences with craft-related television, and in part inspired by the vast potential of web-based media both as a learning/cultural tool and as a mode of distribution. When I realized my freelance schedule was, shall we say, light this fall, I knew this is as good a time as any to dive into this project. I emailed Ben and convinced him it would be a great idea to co-produce a web show about DIY skills and know-how, and that we should do it *now*.”

The pair have launched an Indigogo campaign to finance a bare-bones pilot season of eight, eight-minute episodes.

“Assuming we get funded (please support our show, VIA readers! We have great perks to thank you for your support!), we’ll shoot the whole pilot season the first week in January 2013, with the goal of a spring 2013 launch.” …READ THE REST OF THIS ENTRY>>>

If you’ve had your eyes open the past few weeks, or spent last Sunday at Car-Free Day on Main Street, you’ve probably seen some strange looking bikes (Well, stranger than normal.) The Art Bike Project has been creatively promoting an event that in itself is all about promoting creativity, ingenuity, design and DIY.

After last year’s stellar debut, Vancouver Mini Maker Faire is back this weekend, showcasing some spectacularly creative and engaging projects you probably had no idea were being made right here in town.

From bamboo bike frames to 3-D printing, altered books to a Legion of Flying Monkeys, from an electric Porche to knitted scarves, more than 100 Makers will be showing off their grand creations in this family-friendly, hands-on extravaganza, filling the PNE’s Forum building with interactive booths, live music, demonstrations and more.

The two-day event goes this Saturday & Sunday from 10am-6pm. Adult tickets are $17 or $28 for a weekend pass, while tickets for kids 5-18 are $12 and $15.

Here’s a video Vancouver filmmaker Ben Z Cooper made at last year’s event:

DiYVR is a spotlight on all things handmade, done-by-oneself, crafted and hacked around Vancouver, featuring profiles of makers, event announcements, exhibits and general DIY fun.

Our local version of Broken Pencil magazine’s Canzine Festival of Zines and Underground Culture is this coming Sunday, November 13, from 1:00pm to 7:00pm at the Ukrainian Hall in Strathcona.

Zines and indie publishing are at the heart of Canzine West, but guests will also have the opportunity to hear a reading from Kevin Chong’s new book Beauty Plus Pity, make their own zine in an hour with Geist’s Eve Corbel,
learn about the state of artist book publishing from Keith Higgins and Kathy Slade of Publication Studio and watch local authors battle in a live version of Broken Pencil’s annual contest, Indie Writers Deathmatch.

The only local event of its kind, Canzine West showcases a variety of independent publishers—from small-circ magazine and small-press publishers to artists, illustrators and zine makers—providing a cross-section of
this vibrant and diverse cultural community.

DiYVR is a weekly spotlight on all things handmade, done-by-oneself, crafted and hacked around Vancouver, featuring profiles of makers, event announcements, exhibits and general DIY fun. Know someone or something we should cover?Email me!

Oh man, I so did not accomplish the ambitious goals I had for my own participation in this challenge. I was going to hem some jeans I’ve had for a few months. I was going to sew on a bunch of fallen-off buttons. I was going to silk screen a dozen outgrown baby onesies. Instead, I worked like a dog toward a work deadline and did absolutely nada.

(Later this week, though, I will totally be sewing crocheted spots onto a thrifted onesie to be part of my kid’s Hallowe’en costume. So I’m calling myself a winner, whether you think I’m cheating or not. Whatever.)

I’m pleased to report, though, that other Vancouverites were far more industrious than I was. If you missed my tweeted requests for descriptions and photos, tell all in the comments! (And follow me for next month’s challenge, eh?) Behold:

@unicorn_meat told me: I altered all of mine and husbands jeans! We both wore flair but now wear skinnies! Go me!!

@dianasof completely blew my mind: I turned a pair of pinstriped dress pants into a pencil skirt for my Doctor Who costume. I also made a 3D TARDIS felt purse. I couldn’t embed the photos rotated properly, but here they are: costume, purse.

Honourable mention goes to @emmalawson for her from-scratch TARDIS costume (it is a sure way to my heart to show me your Doctor Who crafts, FYI) and to @ChristaGiles for spending an hour stretching out an accidentally fulled lace scarf instead of throwing it out.

DiYVR is a weekly spotlight on all things handmade, done-by-oneself, crafted and hacked around Vancouver, featuring profiles of makers, event announcements, exhibits and general DIY fun. Know someone or something we should cover? Email me!

Remember back when I wrote about the Vancouver Modern Quilt Guild, and how I was so inspired by the creative energy of the group that I joined despite the fact that I’m not really a quilter? Well, Saturday I attended a day-long retreat in Lions Bay, and now I’m more of a quilter.

What with the DiYVR Challenges, and my general thinking about crafting and making, I’ve been fascinated by how much is to be gained by not merely doing oneself, but doing together.

At the quilting retreat, I learned more from the friends around me than I would have learned in a formal class, mostly because I got to ask only the questions I needed answered, and then I got to mess around and learn from my mistakes and from others’ experience.

Like, I learned about chain piecing, when you sew squares to border fabric without cutting the border fabric first. So efficient!

Almost every Friday night, I attend the knitting/crochet night at Urban Yarns in Point Grey. We often set challenges for ourselves to undertake on our own, together. Often, everyone will choose the same project to make at the same time. Recently, though, we’ve been talking about crochet, and not everyone in the group knows how but they want to learn. So we concocted a group project to get us all crocheting together, on our own. We each pitched in to buy a skein of yarn, and each week the all the skeins are passed to a different person in the group. That week, the yarn keeper makes granny squares with the yarn, and on the following Friday night, they pass it on to the next participant. Eventually, we’ll sew the squares into baby blankets we’ll donate.

It’s hard to express how satisfying it is to learn from my peers, and to participate in a large project made more doable by cooperating.

There are tons of groups all over town that do similar things. I’ve written here about the Vancouver Hack Space, and there are other hack spaces in town, too. The Vancouver Tool Library holds workshops.

So tell me, Vancouver – Which groups do you learn your DIY skills from? Are there things you want to learn in a group, but don’t know where or how to find one? Let’s have a comments-fest, and hook each other up.