Hello Earthlings,
I hope you are all staying safe out there so we can have tea some day in the future. I am long overdue in letting you know what has happened to date. As you have probably guessed the Tea House has not yet been built, however there has been much else that was completed... actually everything else but it was.
I was in South Africa for about 48 hours before Afrikaburn was cancelled. I debated staying in the country but after careful consideration decided it was safest to come back home. I'm in Santa Fe and have been isolating and figuring out how to keep the project alive in the digital world so the Tea House phase can still happen later.
What was completed? The costume, Codex Nexus, and various commissions for objects to help bring Space Grandma's world to life.
Below you can see the costume in all its splendor. Tina Matthews and Saori Mitome really knocked it out of the park. They were both impressive in their craftsmanship and creativity to make the design come to life. You can also see the Codex Nexus getting its first reading for a new friend.
I have a new found respect for pattern making. For every item it took several fittings, multiple full prototypes, and several partial ones. For the helmet Tina made a plaster cast of my head and built a metal wire armature from there to get the shape right.
We ended up going with a variation on the design for the satchel. I was excited to get to commission another local artisan, Natalie (getting preferred contact info and will put on the website collaborator page once received).
The boots took a ton of research to find a vendor who didn't use black soles. Although it varies from the original design I'm very pleased with the outcome. They were made in Spain by the Etsy company DCueroZaragoza.
Other costume details are this vintage pair of goggles and tea leaf earring. The retailer found the goggles in the back of her uncles hardware store. They appear to be from sometime around the 1940's and were never previously used. The silver cast tea leaf is by a local jeweler, Clementine and Co Jewelry and adds a delightful detail to the costume.
Here you can see a wonderful painting done by Casey Cripe of Space Grandma's home planet, Loalo. In front is one the 7 Tea Samplers. The wood base was done generously by Michael Hart using wood scraps to help save on cost. The woven mat is by a wonderful local woman, Christine Hernandez (Lil Weavy).
Personally I'm proud of the Codex Nexus. The author, Aléjo Leo, and myself worked for two years on it and continue to even though the first edition has been printed. The book ended up being 213 pages, but I have a feeling the second edition could end up being over 300. You can see one of the 3 printed copies, favorite stories bookmarked, and one of the tea trays behind it. If you'd like to download a PDF version you can get it here: tinyurl.com/y94btqmr (it has typos and other errors, but I'm proud of it all the same).
An illustration for the original art reward.
Although there are no good pictures to show for these, other accomplishments include the sewing of the cushion covers for the Tea House by Summer Human, purchase of crew flights (most weren't able to be refunded and its still unclear if they can be utilized within a year), deposits & purchases for camp provisions, all the tea that was to be served was blended and packaged, and probably some other details I'm forgetting at the moment.
I'd also like to give a special thank you to Epiphany Jordan and Theo Badashi whose advice for the Kickstarter process was invaluable.
The tale that is now being woven is that Space Grandma has indeed made it to the planet. Didn't land or end up where expected, as happens in life, but ze is around and making cameo appearances at digital art events. The Tea House had ideas of zir own and has boldly gone off to seek the far corners of the planet and get some 'me time' in.
There are new collaborations on the horizon and some already happening. Space Grandma most recently collaborated with XNN Systems in their research bunker. When they attempted to contact aliens, it was Space Grandma that picked up the call. They have started creating an Earth Archive (or Aya Archive as SG would call it). More on that as it develops.
This tale is not over...and only time will tell where it will go from here.