I remember saying to Clare one afternoon, “The coolest girl in the world was in our shop earlier.  I have no idea where she sprung from, but she was quite, quite  amazing – beautiful and oh-so-stylish!”  Clare knew from my description I was talking about illustrator and animator, Lesley Barnes.

Before I’d met her,  I’d seen Lesley around – on the street, at Made in the Shade events…  I often wondered who she was, what she did for a living, what her background was.  I think about people I see around, y’see.  Probably more than is normal actually.  It’s a sort of hobby now.  Anyway,  as it happened, it turned out this particular gal is a super-talented artist, film maker and animator and before long we were stocking her work at The Maisonette :)

Most recently, Lesley has been making an animated music video to accompany a remix of Belle & Sebastian‘s ‘I Didn’t See It Coming’.  On Wednesday evening, Beardy & I were invited along to Offshore in Glasgow (a fabulous coffee shop in the westend with a lovely basement gallery space) for the film premier.

Standing wide-eyed infront of the big white screen, I gripped onto Beardy’s arm as the music started and coloured shapes started moving around.  I grinned, I whooped, I eeped, I grinned again.  I gave Beardy’s elbow a little squeeze.

Watch the video here…

I was already SO excited to take home one of the bear puppets Lesley had made for the occasion but then I was gifted a bag too! Beardy liked my gifts but was clearly more taken by the gingerbread biscuits.

Bear puppet tales coming soon.