When my family and I were living as expats in London, we had the opportunity to do a great deal of travel throughout Europe and Asia. One of our very favorite destinations was Istanbul, Turkey. The exotic mix of people and culture and art was intoxicating. It is truly a world set apart, where East meets West (both literally and figuratively), and history is measured not in years or decades, but millennia. I was extremely inspired by all that I saw in Istanbul, and hope that, now, YOU will be too!
For this challenge, I would like to show you some pictures from my own travelogue. I hope that you will be motivated to create some cookie art inspired by one of the most beautiful and captivating cities in the world: Istanbul.
Of course, as with all of these challenges, there will be prizes for one lucky entrant, who will be chosen at random. This challenge's prize will a grab bag of mystery cookie loot generously donated by Cookie Connection's own Julia M. Usher, and, as an added bonus, the winner will also receive this super-fun kissy face plush emoji pillow from plushmoji.com!
- something that makes someone want to do something or that gives someone an idea about what to do or create; a force or influence that inspires someone
- a person, place, experience, etc. that makes someone want to do or create something
- a good idea
The operative words in the definition of "inspiration" are "idea" and "create". Inspiration provides the spark to create something NEW. It is NOT COPYING the object of inspiration. Likewise, in this challenge, I would like you to draw inspiration from a set of photographs. I do not want you to directly copy any of the photos. Instead, look to the colors, textures, lines, techniques, architectural elements, and themes that you can glean from the photos, and create something fresh and unique.
The full set of 25 inspiration photographs for this challenge can be found on this Pinterest board. To whet your appetite, here are some of the patterns, textures, and architectural features that will form the base of our inspiration for this challenge.
The Blue Mosque
Turkish Tiles
Turkish Rugs
Religious Art and Mosaics
The Bosphorus Sea
Rules:
1. Create a set of five (or more) cookies inspired by this Istanbul Pinterest board. The overall theme for the cookies themselves does NOT have to be Istanbul.
2. State which photo(s) on the Pinterest board provided your inspiration for your set in the comments under your entry.
3. As always, we ask that you make a brand new set of cookies for this challenge.
4. Think outside the box, take some healthy risks, and HAVE SOME FUN.
- Please post an image of your cookie set to the site under the Practice Bakes Perfect clip set no later than March 27, 2016 at 5 pm central.
- Again, please state which photo(s) provided the inspiration for your cookies in the first comment under your entry photo. This information is a requirement of the challenge; photos without it will be disqualified.
- Because these challenges will be ongoing, we ask that you put "Practice Bakes Perfect Challenge #15" in your photo caption (subtitle field) AND in a tag, so that we can tell the challenges apart from month to month. Please use the main title field to uniquely name your cookies as you normally would.
- Please also assign other relevant clip sets and tags to your images, as you normally would. (Meaning don't just use the Practice Bakes Perfect clip set and leave it at that, or your photos won't easily be found with keyword searches.)
- You can enter more than once, but please post only one clip of each distinct entry/cookie set. Multiple clips of the same entry/cookie set are not allowed unless added in a comment beneath the one primary clip.
After the challenge has closed on March 27, we will announce the winner in the Saturday Spotlight the following weekend (April 2). The next challenge will be announced after that Spotlight.
And one last thing . . . This is NOT meant to be a competition. The only person you should be competing against is yourself. Period. These challenges are intended to inspire the artist in you and push you to be the best cookie artist YOU can be at this snapshot in time. Remember, the whole point of this exercise is to get you out of your comfort zone - to "take healthy risks," as my wise-beyond-his-years son always reminds me. Plus, prizes are given entirely at random, so healthy risk-taking has its own rewards!
I would love to chat with you as you journey through this process, so if you have any questions about the challenge, are having trouble getting started, need help bringing an idea to life (by, say, inviting me to Istanbul so we can do some "field research"), or want technical advice, please leave a comment below.
Christine Donnelly began her professional baking career at 16, when she was hired on the spot at her local bakery to work the counter and decorate cakes. After detours to college and law school, she worked as a trial lawyer in Chicago for many years, ultimately leaving that career to become a stay-at-home mother to her two children. In her “retirement,” she continued to bake at home, at last finding her preferred artistic medium in decorated cookies. In February 2013, Bakerloo Station was born with a presence on both Facebook and Instagram. Christine makes cookies to balance her left brain, to inspire and share creative ideas, and to feed those needs that only art can satisfy.
Photo credit: Christine Donnelly
Note: Practice Bakes Perfect is a bimonthly Cookie Connection blog feature written by Christine Donnelly that poses inspiration or challenges to get you to stretch as a cookie artist - for practice, for prizes, and for fun! Its content expresses the views of the author and not necessarily those of this site, its owners, its administrators, or its employees. Catch up on all of Christine's past Cookie Connection posts here.
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