Bird Brain

So here's what happened. 

Back in 2011, after nearly a year of not being able to find a proper job (sadly working part-time in a chocolate shop will not buy you a house), I decided to take the plunge and get loads of pigeon cards printed and turn full-time pigeon card seller. The first design was printed to test the water, I put them in shiny cellophane pouches, got lots of snazzy cardboard envelopes to send them off to people in... and then a job came. 

In London. 

Which is very far away. 

In a flat that had no space for several hundred pigeon cards.

Oops.

In conclusion, I have many, many pigeon cards to shift!

Do you know any clever folk? If so, let them know, and pop over to the Etsy shop, where Mr.P and his fancy academic hat are back in stock. E-mailing directly might get you a better price and postage ;-)

Happy Valentines Day!

The Pigeon Loft Hits the High Street!

Last year I waved goodbye to these three little chaps as they were put in a box headed for Hallmark HQ in Yorkshire...

One year later these magically appeared in Marks & Spencer ...

They seem to be in the larger branches, so do pop in if you want to wish your friends and family a very woolly Easter.

Sadly the profits from any cards purchased will not go towards Mr.Pigeon's Ferrari fund, but it's exciting to see these little crocheted creatures out in the wild nonetheless.

The Show Must Go On...

Apologies for the lack of Famous Friday posts recently, the camera cable decided to wander off and I was under pressure to find it and update you on Mr.P's latest costume. Fortunately, as if by a kind of magic, it showed up today, so the show must go on.

Mr. Pigeon has already dressed as royalty (I thought he made a killer queen), but today he decided to pay homage to rock royalty. Can you guess who Mr. Pigeon is?

If you guessed Brian May and Freddie Mercury of Queen, then you are correct.

(Though if you thought the first one was Cher or Jimi Hendrix I can forgive you. Pigeon hair-styling is no easy task)

Mr. Pigeon will be on holiday for a little while, feeling the sun on his feathers and pecking paella by a pool*, so ¡hasta luego, amigos!

*more likely he will be getting squashed in my bag between a bottle of water and an iPod.

Greetings!

This post has been a long time in coming. My sketchbooks are full of ideas for greetings cards, but I finally took the plunge, went from sketch to reality and got the very first batch of Pigeon Loft cards printed.

Look how snazzy they are!

They have a nice silky finish and come with white envelopes and everything!

Yes, yes, you're quite right, graduation season is nearly at an end, so who will you send a "bird brain" card to? Well, GCSE and A-level results are out this week and Masters and PHD students have to wait a while yet. (I should know- a polyester gown and mortarboard are not enough to keep you warm during a snowy November degree congregation!) Maybe you just fancy telling somebody what a huge clever clogs they are.

Mr. Pigeon cards are available in the Etsy shop now, but a lucky comment-leaver or two *may* be randomly selected to receive one in the post :-)

Famous Friday: Here You Come Again

Have an Oxford Dictionary definition:

dolly bird (dol·ly bird)

noun

British informal

i. an attractive and stylish young woman, considered with reference only to her appearance.

ii. crochet pigeon disguised as country music legend.

Mr. P does Glee

It's Mr.Pigeon's "Famous Friday" again!

Making pigeons is a fairly unexciting, repetitive business, so it helps to have something fun on in the background. Since starting in 2007, I've been through an Andrew Lloyd-Webber phase (Phantom and Evita on repeat), crocheted to Almodovar films in Spain, Bauer Sucht Frau (a rather excellent German farmers' dating show) in Heidelberg, and watched every series of Desperate Housewives, Dexter, Mock the Week, QI, The Simpsons, Futurama, Blackadder, Scrubs and Nurse Jackie. 
Several times over.

To celebrate the Pigeon Loft's 100th blog post, I set myself a 15-costume tribute challenge to another show that keeps me entertained when making what seems like the 100,000,000th pigeon foot, wing or beak. It's fun, it's colourful, it's musical. It is Glee.

(l-r, top to bottom: Mercedes, Emma, Mr. Schu, Artie, Santana, Puck, Quinn, Rachel, Sue, Finn, Kurt, Lauren, Blaine, Brittany, Tina. Phew.)

Famous Friday: For Your Eyes Only

Newcomers may not know that every pigeon and hen produced comes with a number. I have just sold Mr. Pigeon 072 and hen number 021.

The pigeon you see featured in this blog is not the first Mr. Pigeon, but the seventh. That's right, he's Mr. Pigeon 007.

The name's Pigeon... Mister Pigeon.

I'm afraid this association has given him a taste for speed, danger, gadgets, martinis and, of course, bikini-clad chicks...

I think the other pigeons are a bit jealous.

It may explain why I found Mr.P 069 dressed like this...

"I shall look forward personally to exterminating you, Mr. Bond"

Putting the cat among the pigeons is never a good thing.

Dear Pigeon Fanciers...

Hello. Just a note to remind everybody on the mailing list to make sure that their spam filters are set to allow messages from thepigeonloft[at]gmail.com. This is to make sure you receive pigeon release alerts. The next release is on Thursday at 9pm GMT. Good luck!

Famous Friday (sort of): Mr.P and Bea

After all the hard work I've been doing making pigeons and little costumes for Mr.Pigeon's blog, he kindly offered to give me a break this week. He offered to buy his own new fashion item. Something classy, chic and memorable.

I wasn't quite sure where he was going to get the money from, but my piggy bank now feels strangely light.

I was also intrigued to find this up on my computer screen the other day...

...looks like Mr.P is a fan of online shopping.

Sure enough, a few days later a little parcel arrived and Mr. Pigeon scheduled a photo shoot for his latest accessory.

What do you think?

I guess we now know who the mystery bidder was!

See Twitter for another stunning shot :-)

Famous Friday: Imperial Mr.Pigeon

After last week's post it could be assumed that Mr. Pigeon is in favour of Monarchism. In actual fact, I don't think he even knows what that means. He's just in it for the fancy hats.

The Pigeon Loft is an unbiased blog and Mr. Pigeon has no political affiliations... at least he doesn't think he does. He doesn't remember buying any and, if he did, he must have left them somewhere.

So, in the interest of balance, Mr. Pigeon has gone to the other extreme this week in time for Bastille Day on 14th July.

Vive la France! Vive la république!

Let's just hope Mr. Pigeon doesn't meet his Waterloo any time soon.

Famous Friday: His Royal Fly-ness?

When I suggested that Mr. Pigeon dress up as "the one with the curly hair from Queen" I had Brian May in mind.

Not this...

That pigeon's getting ideas above his station. He'll be wanting his face on stamps next.