Introducing Smoky

Heirloom Bluebell Bears are wise, knowledgeable and mellow. Each one has a history, a past, and most importantly, a story. They have been there and done that. They do not judge. Heirloom Bluebell Bears appreciate the simple things in life. They value family, friendship, autumn colours and the warm kiss of a summer breeze. Heirloom bears are limited and come in all shapes and sizes!

The inspiration for the heirloom collection of bears was my father. Shortly after he passed away I took a trip to the Stieff Schulte factory in Duisburg to collect mohair for my existing kits, Niko and Roxy. As always when I’m at Stieff Schulte I have a good look round at what else is available at the time. During this trip I came across a gorgeous warm toned, soft grey ratinee mohair. Instantly I knew that was the one for this very special bear. Designed in honour of a very special person. Below is a picture of my dad with a very rare photo of me.

If you have followed my blogs you will already know that Milo was the original bear I designed as a beginners bear for workshops. He is now the original Bramble Wood Bear kit. This kit is now sold as Nico.

Smoky, however was to be part of a new collection of limited edition bears. The Heirloom Bluebell bears. Smoky was the first, heirloom bear swiftly followed by Fern. Smoky in honour of my father and then Fern was designed in honour of my mother. Well, I colouldn’t have a bear for my father without also having one for my mother. Now that wouldn’t do at all!

Even before I had completed the design of my first heirloom bear Smoky I knew that I wanted him to be accessable to students who were reletavely new to bear making yet still appealling enough for the more experienced bear maker. So I introduced this beautiful grey mohair into some of my workshops. Really lovely how my experienced bear makiers gravitated to this gorgeous mohair. In many ways it’s traggic that this will be only a limited edition. No more of this beautiful mohair will ever be produced. But that’s a different story. Stieff Schulte 2026.

Dad was a sociable guy who went with the flow of a crowd rather than against. He was always up for a social opportunity, even days before he died he was entertaining. “Why would I want to miss a party darling,” was his mantra.

In his younger years he sported a pipe. Well it was all the fashion then, don’t you know! When my siblings and I were teenagers dad was compltely against smoking. For all the right reasons. But we did tease him. Because in the old family albums was photographic eveidence of Mr Smoky. The baby in the picture I’m told is not me but one of my siblings.

It’s also worth mentioning in this blog, just because this happened along side of designing Smoky, that Jacqueline’s Bears has new and even more glamourous information booklets to accompany our kits. Each of the new information booklets has 70+ process images that have been enhanced for clarity and printing. This means that the images are able to support the text so much better.

Jacqueline runs 2-day, mixed ability, small group bear & bunny making workshops, in various venues, at scheduled times throughout the year. Do come and join us!