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Jacqueline one free solution to identify members of the jolly band on here, is to stand at the theatre bar during the interval and start doing plies. You would, no doubt, get some strange looks, but you would be easy to spot. Failing that, I think the aforementioned badge idea is an excellent one. A minute or so of looking online shows that the more badges you buy, the cheaper they get but a rough price is around £2.50 each for a soft enamel 15mm diameter badge on an order of 250. If it is decided to be a goer, then launching the BalletcoForum badge design competition would seem a ideal method of coming up with a badge.

Mmm, interesting idea about the plies. But if there was an interval bar scrum, I would be rendering myself invisible. Not to mention probably being unable to straighten up and needing medical assistance. You enter the scrum at your peril as people can be very focused at drinkie time. I would be trampled into the carpet. I could perhaps demonstrate my twenty to six extension instead?

A badge would be safer for me and my audience. :)  Perhaps the design competition could be offered to dancing children of forum members. It could be done without revealing anyone's identity with perhaps a small prize for the winner. Just an idea anyway.

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There is a website that sells pointe shoe badges if you think we could use that as a motif. Have a look.

 

 

This is an excellent idea, the zazzle ones. Then no-one would have to organise it, people could just buy their own. We could all vote for one, I like the black pointe shoes on white, for instance, and have Balletco as the name.

Edited by cavycapers
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If you search on zazzle for 'ballet shoes' rather than 'pointe shoes' you get other designs. I rather liked the red shoes on a black background. 

 

If we do decide to do this, (and I think a badge is an excellent idea), it will need to be a unisex design. From the fascinating discussions we have on the forum it is very clear we have a wide variety of tastes. We could spend months going round in circles trying to agree on a particular design. Perhaps we should ask the moderators to choose something they think suitable.

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If we do decide to do this, (and I think a badge is an excellent idea), it will need to be a unisex design. 

 

 

I think I might stick to saying hello to those of you who are sporting a badge rather than adorning my own lapel with a pair of pointe shoes  ;)

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I could perhaps demonstrate my twenty to six extension instead?

I wish I could get mine that high! When I used to take a class with Julie Felix, she would say "You can lift your leg off the bar" after I'd hoiked it up there, except I couldn't, and still can't.

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I wish I could get mine that high! When I used to take a class with Julie Felix, she would say "You can lift your leg off the bar" after I'd hoiked it up there, except I couldn't, and still can't.

 

I watched ENB company class last week - in the stretching/warm up, Jeanette Kakareka, who is admittedly tall, casually 'stepped' onto the barre, i.e. with her leg folded vertically and her knee up by her ear....  then flopped over so her body was parallel to the barre with her legs still in that step position.  It hurt just to watch.

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I would like to be flexible - and fit enough to benefit - for a day, just to see what it is like to be able to do splits, somersaults and generally supple things. I was always too scared to even try handstands in case I hurt myself. :rolleyes:  I know these people do hours of training as well as having a natural ability, but for someone like myself who is naturally rather inflexible and earthbound, it would be a revelation. I could then spend the rest of my life trying to recover, but at least I would have had the experience.

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http://www.lapelpinbadges.co.uk/school/11.jpg

 

How about a simple bar with Balletco on it, then men could wear it too?

 

A simple, unisex-type badge sounds good. It would be lovely to have such an easy, informal way of spotting & meeting other BalletcoForum members. Especially as you'd be confident to introduce yourself, because you'd know that by wearing the badge, the BalletcoForum member was indicating they'd be happy to meet others & have a chat.

 

Another plus might be that by meeting & getting to know other members a little in person, it will bring benefits to BalletcoForum in encouraging more people to de-lurk (!) or continue contributing. Or help avoid misinterpretations of posts which seems to happens from time to time, because you'd recall meeting that poster & know it was most unlikely they'd meant the post to come across in the negative way it could be interpreted (a peril of writing online).

 

I really hope this great idea can be implemented & BalletcoForum badges will be sighted at the ROH & other venues in the not too distant future  :)

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I've just discovered this thread and wanted to add my voice to the chorus of thanks. It is wonderful to have a place to read/talk about our shared passion and I've picked up lots of very useful tips.

I've so far only met a couple of other forum members, but hope that will change if we manage to have some sort of identification. I'm a member of an Italian ballet forum, and once I thought someone looked like a member of that forum (don't ask) at a performance at the Teatro dell'Opera in Rome. The horrified and suspicious response I got when I tried to talk to them put me off ever doing that again!

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Thanks are due, then, to Bruce Marriott, without whom this forum - and its predecessor - would never have existed.

 

I just wanted to thank Alison and the 27 folks who liked/supported the post - you are all most kind and it's appreciated. Thank you.

 

 

I think I ran forums, or their equivalent, from 1997 through to 2012, including the initial setup & funding of this current forum. I learned much along the way - like it's all rather harder than people think! And you also make mistakes and blunders but a cheery apology can help no end in taking the whole community forward.

 

I also wanted to reminisce a little because the idea of the forum having a badge or t-shirt isn't entirely new. I think it came up in the early noughties and a member kindly looked into it, but I think at that time it needed an initial order that was a bit too big. That and needing to design something around the "balletco" logo at the time - which takes time. I hated (and still do) the idea of something un-designed and perfunctory.

 

I did though produce some T-Shirts. I made up 25 by hand (one Saturday night!) in a variety of sizes, all with the logo on at a discreet size above ones heart!  I sold a few but many were actually given away to contributors at the time. It was all too much hard work for me on my tod and to be honest there easn't lots of pent up demand that would help pay the costs of running it all.

 

One thing the old forum regularly had was a Christmas Party and very occasionally a summer party - usually when distant readers or contributors were passing through. In the 90's and early noughties there was a real feeling of braking new ground and the audience having a say and being able to more easily exchange thoughts for the very first time. It was all new! Then social media arrived and new groups started going though the same process and generating excitement - Tweetups arrived etc! But the forum goes on, steadily changing and morphing over time, if always constant to the ballet in it's title rather than wider dance.

 

The idea of badges associated with the forum now has its own thread - so go there if you want to make it happen and/or see whats happening:

http://www.balletcoforum.com/index.php?/topic/12342-balletcoforum-badges/

Edited by Bruce
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29 - I think?

 

I have actually sent PMs to individual moderators, asking them to pass on my thanks to everyone.  Never thought of doing it on an open thread, though.

 

Just one small point.  It isn't only Northerners who happily chat to strangers.  Some of us Southerners are quite good at that.  :)

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