ButtonMad

ButtonMad
Teeny Tiny Bird Buttons

Saturday 26 February 2011

The Sunshine Team



This is a picture of our 'sunshine team'. A fabulous group of women who have been working with us for many years and many of whom are the sole providers for their large families. Here they are pictured in their traditional dress. Different tribal families have unique headgear, colours, beading and adornments.



Once we had moved to Johannesburg and with the arrival of the eighties, Jen continued to make large pots and dinner services but slowly started to phase these out as the work was back breaking. She started to focus on smaller items. Beads and jewellery were the next big thing.

Then one night out of the blue, Jen woke up, promptly woke dad up and told him she'd had a good idea - and was going to start making buttons. Dad mumbled 'good idea' or 'go back to sleep' or something unremarkable, turned over and continued snoring.
Jen lay awake thinking about this new idea and was ready to tackle it first thing in the morning.

After throwing away shelf loads of failed attempts she was undeterred and slowly started to find the perfect combination of factors which we still use today to make our famous Incomparable Buttons.




Each button has to be individually handmade and dried in the African sun before the first firing. They are also all hand painted. This means that every button is unique. Each one a tiny work of art created with love and care. If you look closely you may even be able to see the artist's fingerprint on the back.

Incomparable Buttons are completely washable and incredibly durable. They are perfect for replacing generic plastic buttons or used on quilts, needlework and cross stitch. When so many hours of care and effort have been painstakingly put into a quilt or a hand knitted item, only the best handmade buttons will do.




They can be used purely for embellishment and will transform a plain item of clothing,  hat or bag into a special piece. The best part is that once the item of clothing is tired and ready for recycling, our buttons can be snipped off and used again. The possibilities are endless. 

Incomparable Buttons are fabulous & fun and delight both young and old alike.

And as our tag line reads: 'Why settle for plastic?'







3 comments:

  1. Great blog!! I am an Incomparable button fan!! Quite remarkable. Quite unique!!!

    ReplyDelete
  2. caf 'e tricot studio in Paris, was delighted to meet you in "l'aiguille en fête", and has already sold your precious buttons to his customers.
    I've always been with South Africa, we 'll soon start a business with incomparable buttons !
    Have a look on our blog, blog.cafetricotstudio.com
    Yours is grandiose !
    Good luck

    ReplyDelete
  3. I've always been in love with South Africa !
    My first message was badly written
    Baci, baci
    Véronique

    ReplyDelete

Thank you so much for visiting our ButtonMad blog. Although we don't have time to reply to everybody who leaves a comment, we do really appreciate the feedback.

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...