Sugary biscuits and a nice sit down are usually what's advised after giving blood. Leigh Bowser, creator of The Blood Bag Project, suggests a similar after-care treatment for her crafty donation.

Leigh first put her craft hat on when her niece Chloe was diagnosed with a super-rare blood condition, Diamond Blackfan Anaemia. To put it into numbers, Chloe requires transfusions every four to five weeks for the next ten years. The average person is only able to donate blood once every three months. On realising Leigh herself was unable to give blood — and therefore unable to support Chole in her treatment — she decided to raise awareness of the importance of blood donation through craft.

Using the traditional blood bag design, Leigh's website allows you to download a template (blood) bag for your arty imagination to run wild. By designing on blood bags, Leigh hopes the message will hit home as to how important it is to donate if you can. As well as unlocking your own creativity and crafter satisfaction.

Looking at submissions so far, there has been a lot of the out-of-the-bag thinking. Some of our favourites include; toy soldiers, buttons, feathers and even Super Mario themed bags. Leigh's target of 100 individually designed bags is now exceeded, and she holds regular workshops in and around Huddersfield to keep awareness going — check their Facebook page and website for dates.

An exhibition for all submissions will run for two days in September 8th-9th at the Lawrence Batley Theatre in Huddersfield and we can't wait to see just what people have been up to; sewing, sticking, painting, gluing, gripping and knitting for a very good cause.

We think it's a fabulous way to get brains ticking about this condition and to motivate people into thinking about giving blood. So if you've been looking for a good reason to put your craft foot forward, head over and support Leigh's goal. B.Y.O.B (Bring your own biscuits!)

Pretty paper dolls joining hands in one neat and far off row is a good way to think about Cat Morely's blog community, Cut Out + Keep. Full of creative people from across the globe, making and sharing step-by-step craft tutorials, Cut Out + Keep lets you wake up to see which new projects have been posted while you've been asleep.

We spoke to founder Cat about having a job that never gets tedious.

Where did the name Cut Out + Keep come from?

Cut Out + Keep was the name I gave my first ever blog. I loved the idea that people might like to "cut out + keep" (or bookmark) tutorials from my blog to make themselves later. The name stuck as my blog transformed in to a community for everyone to make and share projects. And today it feels more appropriate than ever.

Have you always wanted to create things?

I've been crafting for as long as I can remember. I recently found a huge box in my parent's attic filled with creations I'd made when I was little. I'm not sure what the very first thing I ever made was, but two of the most memorable creations are; the Spice Eggs four eggs decorated like the Spice Girls for Easter and a comic book series about a couple of criminals called Spitgroan and Smellfighter. Both creations had been kept pristinely over the years in that box in the attic!

Cut Out + Keep is a truly flourishing community, what does it mean to you? Tell us about a moment from the community or its journey that has inspired you.

The growth of the site has been really gradual, so it's sometimes hard to get a perspective on how large the community is. I always get so excited when a friend tells me they were speaking to someone who's heard of the site - especially if they're in a faraway country. One of the most amazing moments for me was recently through a new feature called, Crafter To The Stars where I'm making projects for my favourite celebrities. It's so inspiring to see something I've made worn by my heroes and real life stars.

Can you tell us about three of your favourite projects?

My all time favourite project is the Rainbow Cupcakes, which people still add versions of. There are over 100. Another favourite is a Chipfork Necklace, shared by London jewellery designer Tatty Devine - it's so quirky and cute and a great representation of the projects on the site. A recent favourite is the Illuminated Love Canvas. Which is a really simple idea but looks absolutely amazing. I can't wait to make one for my bedroom!

A big thank you goes to Evo hair for inviting us along to Latitude festival last weekend past. The Australian hair brand ran a travelling salon at the festival. This was basically a huge, 1950's-style cabin — called 'Hair of The Dog Trailer Park' — where Evo's army of stylists performed hair magic on the (very muddy) Latitude crowds. Think naturally-powered hair product vs. hungover festival hair. 

Photo: Evo's Hair of the Dog salon at Latitude under a cloudy sky. 

Who won? Well, Evo's tagline is 'saving ordinary humans from themselves' and they certainly saved my hair from the edge of decrepitude. When you're stuck in a muddy English field, with the company of 35,000 people and a 340-page programme of events to catch up on — and I never thought I'd say this — a cosy shampoo and condition has never felt so good.

The unlikeliest recruit to the world of Evo hair was not me, but my younger brother. He was over at Latitude to see headliners Elbow and the German electro band Apparat, but his surprise styling at Evo changed things a little. He went into Evo's cabin modeling traditional hair of the dog territory, as seen here:

After a wash and style he emerged looking like a retro gangsta, utterly converted to the grooming ways of Gangsta Grip, an uber-strong hair gel that does exactly what it says on the bottle:

Actually, let me quote exactly what it says on the bottle, since Evo's product blurbs are like wee bits of aesthetic poetry. Here's Gangsta Grip:

"Designed for all those retro gangstas, dominatrix wannabes and business ginas who, provided with the opportunity, will provide themselves the fantasy."

Rocking out into the festival, it held down my brother's stray locks until dawn the next day. 

Photo: Latitude's fields of mud and tents.

We're excited to say that oh comely 11 is out now, in little shops and big ones. 

It's quite a beauty. We were lucky to collaborate with Ellie and Anna from the Flower Appreciation Society on a shoot. They were quirky and down-to-earth and all-round-awesome. The shoot and the cover were both photographed by Liz Seabrook and the model is Mikaela Carlén.  

We love poring over maps, so we asked four illustrators to draw an imaginary one. They came up with everything from Underneath of the Sofa to the History of Western Thought. Bertrand Russell and dust bunnies in the same feature? Not something we expected.

Also in the issue: adventures in experimental tourism, sniff-testing air fresheners, the story of a handmade toaster and a striking portait series of people from Toronto by Jamie Campbell.

You can spot a white peony from Ellie and Anna peeking onto the cover below.

This week issue eleven is printed. Tracey Doxey read her copy on the edge of the wilderness. She says: "It arrived in the post and after work, I cycled eight miles up hill out of Sheffield to Burbage Edge into the Peak District to open the new mag under a big sky."

What's your copy of oh comely up to? Send photos to [email protected]

This summer the Tate Modern is opening a new gallery. That's no unusual thing, sure. 21st-century museums are flexible structures, opening new spaces or revamping old ones as the seasons change.

But this is no ordinary space, no polished white cube or cavernous display room. It is three old oil tanks. Drained of their oily cargo, the tanks are relics from the days when Tate Modern’s colossally-proportioned redbrick building had another purpose as Bankside Power Station.

In a fashionably honest way, Tate’s new space is called ‘The Tanks’. And they have been given a further dollop of character with a designated purpose as live art and film venues. Being given such a large, dedicated gallery space is an uncommon gift to the arts of dance, live performance, experimental film and cinema. Only in the latter-half of the 20th century have these media found a place in the museum’s catalogue.

To celebrate The Tanks opening, a fifteen-week showcase of live art and film begins from 18th July. Our coverage of the event starts with an interview of Belgian choreographer Anne Teresa De Keersmaeker.

Photo by Mirjam Devriendt.

One of the most important choreographers of modern dance, Anne Teresa De Keersmaeker is The Tanks’ opening act. (Not too long ago, you may have heard of how Beyoncé controversially borrowed De Keersmaeker’s dance for the music video of Countdown.)

Anne Teresa preforms her influential dance work, Fase, this week — a work she conceived of in 1982 aged just 21. The dance is complex and beautiful. It explores patterns of everyday movement and the emotion of a quiet gesture. Don’t miss watching it in person this week at the Tate. For a teaser, watch her performance Rosas Danst Rosas here. 

You’re opening Tate Modern’s new live art space, The Tanks, with a performance of Fase. What do you think of the space?

The space is like a womb. They aren’t really ‘tanks’. The presence of the concrete is very strong. It’s a totally non-conventional space for dance because it doesn’t invite the audience to the front to watch the performance. Dance is seen in the round, and so invites movement from the audience. Performers and audiences will get into different relationships as a result and that will be a challenge.

For Fase, we adapted the piece so it will be radical and stripped down, to get the bareness of the dancing and the bareness of the space. There’s something harsh about the tanks.

Were you always going to be a dancer?

No, first I was into music, not dance. And if I hadn’t been accepted into MUNDRA dance school in Brussels, I might even have gone into classical language or medicine.

Photo: A still from Fase (1982). Note the simple, almost casual costumes, and the beautiful manner in which the two figures, (Anne Teresa is on the left) are joined by their shadows.

You also studied in New York at the Tisch Dance School after your studies in Brussels. How did the dance culture in America compare to that you experienced in Europe?

I was 21 and it was my first time out of Belgium. New York in the early eighties was very different from how it is today. It was poorer; it was dangerous. Artistically, there were a lot of things going on both in music and dance. It would be a lie to say that Belgium has no dance history but it is definitely not one you can compare to the history of dance in the United States.

You’ve spoken about how children dance in the past, and how this has inspired some of your work. Can you elaborate on this?

When I started dancing, it was nothing particularly spectacular: just like how many little girls dance. So from the beginning I was developing a language of dance that was based on a simple, childlike vocabulary of movement.

When you ask a child to dance they will start turning, jumping, waving their arms and swinging their hips. And that is what dance is about: turning, jumping and waving, all combined with music. There’s also a tension between something extremely controlled and a sense of anarchy, of letting go. Combining extreme control and disorder is my dance.

You’ve been a professional dancer and choreographer for thirty years now. How do you experience ageing in this profession?

When you dance you make something that is very human. It’s your body that you’re using and of course the passage of time is in your body as well. To feel those changes is hard sometimes.

For dancers, the body is a means of communicating: it’s a tool. I’m extremely lucky that I can still dance the performances that I’m doing at the Tate Modern, and the other pieces that I made first thirty years ago. That’s a long time to live with the same dance.

Photo: A still from Fase (1982).

I think one of the most common experiences of dance today is in popular music videos. Do you feel an appreciation for this context of dance?

Yes, definitely. Dance and music work in the 21st century more than others. It’s the way of global communication in a sense. It’s what we share. And it gives people the possibility of expressing what is extremely close and dear to them, and with which they can identify with larger communities. But I have more questions about it than statements.

What would some of your questions be?

I don’t know. A lot of that dancing is more and more explicitly sexualised. Although, I think that dance is always about that basic drive and seduction is crucial in it.

Find information and details on the collaboration with Tate online. Anne Teresa’s dance group, Rosas, have an online home here.

Ever since it first developed the tools to destroy itself, the human race has been obsessed with the idea of its own extinction. In cinema, this fascination with potential apocalypse has found willing analogies that reflect the threats and traumas of specific times, in everything from Japan’s post-Hiroshima monster movies to North America’s AIDS-influenced body horror films in the 1980s.

Perhaps indicative of our self-absorbed, self-documenting present, Seeking a Friend for the End of the World’s apocalyptic vision has little to do with the fear of colossal death, but with the concern that we’re somehow not living right. Set three weeks before an asteroid strikes the planet, the film follows morose, recently-single Dodge (Steve Carrell), and his rent-a-quirk neighbour Penny (Keira Knightley) as they join together to reach old flames and family members before their untimely ends. Really, though, their journey is an opportunity for self-examination, as Dodge reflects upon a life of timid living and missed opportunities.

It’s apocalypse as therapy session, with the bitter joke being that any realisations are too late anyway. The downside of this is that Carrell spends most of the film depressed and disengaged from the world around him before his inevitable conversion, which dampens the comedy more than it should. Knightley gamely tries to bring energy to the proceedings and almost succeeds, but her part is essentially a stock “Manic Pixie Dream Girl” role rather than a recognisable human person.

While it’s commendable in an age of big-budget disaster movies for such a film to eschew spectacle and focus on a personal experience, Seeking a Friend for the End of the World is a little too mawkish and safe to fully take advantage of the opportunity. By far the film’s strongest (and funniest) scene comes near the beginning when Dodge attends a house party where all of the guests are embracing manic, bitter hedonism, desperately pretending that they’re not completely miserable as mainline drugs and sleep around frantically. It’s a bracing, perceptive take on how people might react to the prospect of their short-lived existences suddenly rendered meaningless, and makes the film all the more disappointing when writer/director Lorene Scafaria leaves those more interesting characters behind in favour of a wet blanket and a kook who keeps screwing up her face and going on about vinyl records all the time.

Post-apocalyptic worlds remain attractive to filmmakers and audiences because even though the reality would unbearably grim, they’re fantasies in much the same fashion as stories of the Wild West or Tolkien-esque adventures are. Such stories portray worlds without society, or at least worlds without water bills and commuting and National Insurance numbers. The freedom almost seems worth zombie attacks or mohican-sporting biker gangs. As such, Seeking a Friend for the End of the World is not without its pleasures, but it largely shuns these for a tired road movie plot, filled with life lessons and budget-trimming countryside exteriors. The film at least has the courage to end well, and finds itself as a sweet, funny, completely passable missed opportunity.

What with all this rain, it's rather comforting to gaze at the heady-heat in Kirsty's polaroid. She took the photo on holiday recently and, if you look closely, you'll notice issue ten catching up on some sun.

If you have a picture of oh comely sun bathing or puddle splashing, we'd love to see it! Send stories and pictures to [email protected].