Needlework, Honey and Labels

 Surrey bee keepers are really rather fortunate to have the national honey show almost on their door step at St George’s college, Weybridge.  It was just too tempting ..I had to enter something into the show.  But with only 11lbs of honey to show for my efforts this year I decided it wasn’t going to be honey…..

Thankfully I had this sampler piece of black-work sitting in a drawer looking very unfinished and in need of an excuse to be finished off…

Now let me say from the outset that this isn't my own design. I bought it as a pattern from the Meineck Design group  - sadly I can't find them on the internet any more, but this is a lovely black-work sampler and I obviously bought it a fair while ago long before I ever thought I might be a real bee keeper.

I was rather thrown by the rules and regulations that stipulated that the back of the piece of work needed to be accessible for judging.  After all who goes into the Louvre and takes the Mona Lisa off the wall to peer at the back to know it’s a great painting? 

Anyhoooo with a bit of assistance from ‘im indoors a simple wooden frame was made, covered in muslin to protect the needlework…

The edge of the work was hastily bound..

And I stretched it across the frame to get rid of all those nasty creases.

(note to self: don’t leave needlework folded in the drawer for years after you’ve finished it)

Those mitred corners leave a little to be desired…but hopefully the front will impress the judges enough....that they won’t feel the need to turn it over…

Now onto those labels.

It has to be said honey jar labels are a bit of a “thing” for me.  Thanks to trading standards and EU legislation there a number of fairly tedious regulations that have to be adhered to if you are going to sell honey.  Yes I understand its all about protecting the consumer and ensuring the integrity of the supply line should a problem occur..but frankly the part designed labels you drop your details into from print companies are just too twee and “meh” for my tastes. 

I wanted something a bit special and different to make my honey stand out against the competition.  You may have noticed that in that though process there’s already a little bit of thinking that I may one day have enough to be able to sell it on a bit of a larger scale.  Thankfully I had a bit of help (well a lot of help) from a friendly graphic designer.

So here’s my label...

On little half pound jars and big pound jars..

I think they look fab! Far better than my photography shows… Lets hope those honey show judges do too!!