New Products: Unique Bowties

New Trends in Dog Fashion: Silk Bow Ties Fashionable gentlemen dogs deserve the best in fashion, too. While many accessories like flowers are considered to girly for boy dogs, there are some great dog collar accessories for boy dogs. Bow ties are a great accessory for a dapper dog’s collar. Arcadius Dog has your dapper […]



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Your Dogs in Your Wedding: Furry groomsmen and bridesmaids

The newest trend in weddings this season is having the furry members of your family as part of the bridal party. You love your dogs and your fiance, why not show your love of your canine family on your special day?

With dog wedding collars and leashes, your pets can be in your special day!

Ways to Have Your Dogs in Your Wedding

Your special day needs to include your beloved pets, but it can be hard to know just what your furry friends can do in the festivities. Here are some fun and easy ideas for having your dogs in your wedding.

Ring Bearer & Flower Girl Dogs: You can dress up your canine friends just like your young family members. Put a boy dog in a fancy bowtie, and get a dog collar and flower for a girl dog. The dogs can either accompany the children or walk the aisle with a groomsman or bridesmaid. Just like with children in a wedding, it’s a good idea to appoint the dog a trusted guardian for the event, as you and your new spouse will be busy enjoying yourselves.

Best Man & Maid of Honor Dogs: Man’s best friend, right? Your dogs are your best friends, and they can be your best man or maid of honor at your wedding. With stylish leashes in wedding colors, your dogs can also walk down the aisle with your human bridal party in an outdoor wedding.

Doggy Groomsmen and Bridesmaids: You can also have your dogs accompany your human bridal party, and your friends can get their dogs involved too. With matching dog wedding accessories, they’ll be the perfect little bridesmaids and groomsmen!

Wedding Photos with Your Dogs: If your wedding is an outdoor affair, dogs can be part of the ceremony, but they can also be in your wedding photos if you choose a pet-free venue. Your pets were there with you as your love grew, so have your dogs in your save the date or proposal photos. Your pets are also part of your new family, so they can pose with you for your wedding photos in matching collars with dog wedding accessories.

Your Dogs in Your Wedding: Furry groomsmen and bridesmaids

The newest trend in weddings this season is having the furry members of your family as part of the bridal party. You love your dogs and your fiance, why not show your love of your canine family on your special day? With dog wedding collars and leashes, your pets can be in your special day! […]



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At Arcadius Dog Collars, we love to give back to our local community, and what better way than working with local dog rescues! This is why we have our signature collections named for dogs from Madalin’s Used Dogs rescue in New Orleans, LA. On our blog, we’ll be featuring a new rescue dog from Used Dogs every week!

This week’s rescue dog: Daisy!

Daisy! Labrador mix, possibly pit bull - approx. 5 yo

Daisy is a Labrador / Pitt Bull mix, around three years old, with a lot of energy who loves to play on a bright spring or hot summer day. Daisy was found in the 7th Ward in New Orleans in 2010, in poor health and with injuries that indicated she might have been hit by a car. With some TLC, Daisy has recovered and turned into an inspiration for everyone who works with Used Dogs.

Daisy has her own line of designer dog collars!

Chris from Arcadius Dog Designer Collars was inspired to make a dog collar collection with Daisy in mind. Lazy Daisy’s Collars are all about that perfect summer day. They feature hand-dyed marble prints and classic spring gingham with unique handmade flowers or bowties to accompany the collar.

Hand dyed orange and yellow collar with cotton mum - from the Lazy Daisy collection

Daisy is a happy high energy dog that prefers to be inside most of the time but loves to spend the evening relaxing with a chew bone after a nice leisurely stroll. All the fabrics in Daisy’s collection are hand dyed, and many have a tie-dye look to reflect this dog’s sunny disposition.

Daisy - Available for adoption to the right NOLA home!

The bowties featured in Daisy’s unique dog collar collection are for the easy going but masculine dog. He can’t be afraid to wear pink or too cool to kick his paws up and relax for the evening.

Pink hand dyed dog collar and bowtie! - on Etsy

See Daisy and other rescue dogs at Used Dogs “Adoptable Dogs” page on Facebook! Just click here.

Daisy - a friendly Lab/Pitt mix who needs a good home!

Featured Rescue Dog: Daisy!

At Arcadius Dog Collars, we love to give back to our local community, and what better way than working with local dog rescues! This is why we have our signature collections named for dogs from Madalin’s Used Dogs rescue in New Orleans, LA. On our blog, we’ll be featuring a new rescue dog from Used […]



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Wedding Colors: Blue and Silver

One of the most exciting things about planning a wedding is choosing a wedding color scheme. There are lots of different popular wedding colors, and we’ll be featuring different wedding color schemes on our blog to help you pick the best colors for your perfect day.

Blues and Silver!

wedding colors - silver & blue

This week’s wedding colors are blue and silver! These are classy colors that pair well with traditional wedding white and black. A blue sash on a white wedding dress can tie in your colors. You can also pick a blue and silver flower for your dog’s collar so they can match your bridal party.

 Silver and teal handmade kanzashi dog collar flower on Etsy

There are so many shades of blue that pair well with silver or gray! For your wedding colors, you can choose a light baby blue to pair with silver, or a teal or turquoise blue. Both shades are popular with modern bridal parties. Your canine best man or maid of honor can also wear blue and silver at the wedding. 

baby blue & silver wedding bouquet

There are many blue flowers that can make a lovely bridal bouquet, and you can pair blue flowers with silver ribbons and accents. You can also incorporate vintage silver jewelry in your wedding accessories. Brides who love their dogs can get a matching turquoise pearl collar for a flower girl dog. Silver pearls are also lovely with this wedding color scheme.

turquoise pearl dog collar with bow

At Arcadius Dog, we want to help you have your furry family in your wedding party, and make sure they look their best too! Our wedding collars feature custom silk kanzashi flowers and bow ties handmade in the most popular bridal colors, including blue and silver. 

New Products: Pearl Dog Necklaces

Puppy models classic white pearl collar with purple bow.

You get to wear lovely hand-beaded jewelry, why not your dog? One of the newest trends in dog collars is beaded necklace collars. Yes, for dogs. Made with sturdy jewelry wire and glass pearls, these collars are safe and secure enough for your dog to wear for special occasions like weddings, photo shoots or parties.

Arcadius Dog presents dog necklace collars with glass pearls for a classy wedding look for your furry friend. Let your dog look as fancy as you do on your big day! Our glass pearl dog necklaces are available in a ton of popular wedding colors like teal, pink, lavender, moss green, brown and champagne. Your furry maid of honor will match your wedding party in her fancy pearl wedding collar.

Pearl dog necklaces are also great for other special occasions when you want your dog to look as nice as you do. Burgundy or wine colored pearls make a lovely Christmas look, while dark gray pearls paired with a rhinestone flower make a classy dog necklace for New Year’s Eve or a cocktail party.

My dog really loves wearing her pearl collar for photo shoots. You can just tell she feels so fancy!

If you’re looking for a unique dog collar for your wedding or special event, Arcadius Dog Collars has many different colors and styles available. Visit us on Etsy to find the perfect pearl necklace for your fashionable dog! Our Cocktail Party section features lots of pearl collars.

gray pearl dog collar by Arcadius Dog

My Favorite Fabric Flower - Tutorial

I'm going to kick this blog off with one of my absolute favorite flowers and a tutorial for it.  I swear, I make this flower so much I could do it in my sleep and it's a pretty commonly made flower.  I'm sure not EVERYONE makes it the same way and I frankly make it with my own special touch of complete OCD (you'll see in the tutorial).  I apologize now for the darkness of the pictures - my house is surprisingly dark when it comes to photos.  However - enjoy!

Okay.  First off.

Materials:
Fabric
Circle form
pen/pencil/marker
scissors
sewing machine
upholstery thread (or just some strong thread)
Iron/Ironing Board

Optional:

Rotary Cutter
Sparkly button

The above picture is just a picture of some of the supplies.  My circle-form is just a top of a jar and it measures about 4-5" in diameter.  If you can see on the fabric, I used a water-soluble marker to trace my form.  If you can't see it, well, it's there.  For this flower, you're going to need 8 circles.  My fabric is already folded and layered eight times

Next (this is where my weirdness starts), I use pins to pin the fabric in place and I use my scissors to cut out the circle.  I have really really nice fabric scissors.  I used to, however, use my rotary cutter. It takes longer but it's a lot sharper and cheaper than going out to buy scissors.

I'm obviously making two flowers, here.

Okay! Once you're done cutting the layers of circles out.  Just for a recap you need to have EIGHT circles.  You're going to fold the circle in half.  Make sure if you have a fabric with a right and wrong side, you fold it where the WRONG side is showing.

Like so.  And then just cut it where the loop is

So that gives you sixteen half circles.

Now slide over to your ironing board (mine is permanently up because I use it every single day - it's crazy, I know).  Fold the half circles in half so you have cute little triangles.  It should be pretty thick from all the layers.  And then just iron it to get that crease.  Again, make sure the WRONG side is the one facing out.  You will flip it right side out later.

See?

Next stop is your sewing machine.  Go ahead and unfold all of the little triangles so you have a nice stack of them.  You're going to run the open straight side through the machine.  Leave the curved side and the folded side alone, of course.

Voila!

Some more pictures of stuff.

Okay, now you cut between each petal of the flower so they're not all connected.  For this flower I counted out eight for the bottom and six for the top.  You should end up with three extra (I like to have extras just in case something happens, like there's a smudge on one or something).

Okay now take a flower, open it up and turn it right side out (I'm using Kona Cotton I think so both sides are the right side).

Now thread your needle and hand sew starting from the sewn part across the curved part.  I have a certain way of sewing.  When you get to the eighth one, go back through the first one to make the complete circle.

Do the same thing with the next layer - I used five petals on the top layer.

Now this is the hardest part of the entire thing.  I sew both of the layers together going through each top petal.

See.

And See.

Then pull it tightly and you're done.  Pick a button center and either sew the button through the center or glue it (I usually do both).  That's it!!  I do it so often I'm sure I probably skipped out on some steps or didn't get the best pictures for everything but I tried to explain it the best possible way.

If there are any questions about the tutorial feel free to ask here or email me at arcadiusdog@gmail.com

I make them for dog collars, obviously.  But you can make them for hair pieces or brooches or anything.

Have fun crafting, guys :)

Chris

Beginnings

I have this romanticization with blogs.  I always try to start them but I can never follow through.  I attempt, I plan, I have incredibly wonderful ideas but because of my lifestyle it ends up falling through.  Even as I write now I can see Titus’ (the cute dog) little face bored already with my attempt this THIRD time.   But I promise to myself that I will keep up this time.

A little about myself:

I am 25, a female (for biological purposes –not that it matters), a lesbian (once again, things that really don’t matter).

I live in New Orleans and I love it (things that do matter).  I have a part time job as well as the fact that I own a business that is growing at a speed I never expected but am happily pleased with (look to your right and you will see a link to my Etsy shop which is the current but not forever home of my business).

I love musicals, sewing, and things that sparkle.  

The last five things I watched on netflix from what I’m watching now:

Gossip Girl (again)

RuPaul’s Drag Race (again)

Powerpuff Girls (!!!)

The “L” Word (Wasn’t that good, sorry, couldn’t even finish it all)

Glee (Like fiftieth time)

I am seeing someone and it is complicatedly simple, if that even makes sense.

I am messy but organized and I love crafting and cooking and trying new recipes. I love sweets (love. Sweets.)

I work very closely with a rescue called Madalin’s Used Dogs as essentially the go-to trainer and Maddie-back up, so to speak. I love every minute of it even though it is a free job. 

I don’t like dogs – I like my own dogs, which is strange to say but whenever I see someone else’s dog I simply think about how (usually) badly behaved they are in my opinion and I have no interest in them.  Once I know them better, I tend to like them more.  I am a spaniel person (I have a cavalierking charles and a cavalier-daschund mix).  They are my children as I never plan to have any otherwise.    One is a boy who is mostly known as the “cute dog” and the other is a girl who is known as the “smart dog”.  They are very aptly named.  I will talk a lot about dogs.  I will, I will.

I also have a cat (and that’s really about all you can say about cats, isn’t it?).

The purpose of this blog is to be a crafting blog because I am that person.  I am that person that you say “Hey do you know where I can buy a chalkboard?” and I say “No but I know how you can make one.”  I’m that person.

Chris J