...by a thread...

Since late last year I have been involved in a research residency at Gawthorpe Textile Collection funded through the Esmee Fairbairn Foundation Museum Collections Fund. The collection is based at Gawthorpe Hall near Burnley in Lancashire and I have had the pleasure of working with their curatorial team getting to know the collection and exploring narratives within it.

The Elizabethan hall has been closed for repair and renovation for much of the last year and to mark the reopening of the building a new group exhibition ...by a thread... has just opened. Inspired by the invisible mending techniques used on the stonework of the building ...by a thread... is an open call exhibition exploring visibly mended textiles.

The curator writes, "While the stonework within the Hall was being mended - quite invisibly - we became interested in repair which did the opposite. We started looking for examples of mending which were invisible and actually made a feature of wear and tear. We discovered that with textile items, repair can be storytelling, creative and commemorative. It can add something extra and bring new meaning and emotion to an object. It can tell us more about people, history, memories and lives."

The examples exhibited display thoughtful and careful mending and include Bridget Harvey's blue jumper, Jacy Wall's Japanese boro jacket, David Worsley's darned jeans, Angela Maddock's denim jacket, Coreen Cottam's family quilt, a restored teddy by Karen Suzuki, Jenni Steele's 1930's nurses apron and a pair of Japanese boro bloomers from my own collection. The items are accompanied by a piece of writing by each lender. These words are sometimes tender, sometimes defiant, and are full of the emotional and material connections we make when we take the time to repair something.

 ...by a thread... is at Gawthorpe Hall until 20th June. A masterclass inspired by the exhibition and by items in the Gawthorpe Textile Collection will take place on Friday 15th July. For further details please visit the website.

Lasting Impressions

I'm delighted to be involved in this year's Saltaire Arts Trail, where I will be working with Hannah Lamb on a new performance work called Lasting Impressions.  Aiming to provoke conversations about the value of cloth and clothing, we will be collecting an archive of Arts Trail visitors' clothing as impressions in porcelain. Visitors will be invited to emboss porcelain tiles with textures from their clothing, an edge of a dress, the corner of a cuff, a coat zip... In exchange for leaving a mark from their clothing, each person will be offered the chance to have a gold or silver stitch added to their clothes.

Salts Mill is a former textile mill in Saltaire, just a few miles from the centre of Bradford, West Yorkshire. When it was built in 1853 it was the largest factory in the world. Lasting Impressions will take place in the Spinning Room in the roof space of the mill, a space not normally open to the public. The room is 168m long and once contained 16,380 cap spindles for spinning yarn. Whilst many visitors to Salts Mill will be well aware of the mill’s textile heritage, how many make the connection to the clothes they wear day-to-day? This project asks us to consider the cloth we carry with us all the time; Where does it come from? Where will it go? What impression will it leave on our own lives? What mark will it leave on the world?

Lasting Impressions takes place as part of Saltaire Arts Trail from 28th to 30th May 2016 and is supported by Arts Council England. Saltaire Arts Trail presents contemporary craft and visual arts in houses and historic venues around Saltaire village, a UNESCO World Heritage site. For further deals about the performances including times, and about other events during the Arts Trail please visit the website.

Slow Stitch - book update

I'm pleased to report that the reprint of Slow Stitch will be available in May. Huge thanks to everyone who purchased the book when it was first printed. I will have signed copies available, and if you wish to pre-order a copy from myself please contact me using this contact form.

new workshop dates

I've listed some workshops for 2016 on my big cartel site here. These will be held at my home-based studio near Bradford, West Yorkshire. I'm starting the year with a Slow Stitch day, and in March and May will be running two day sessions for the first time, featuring dyeing and stitching. For more information and to book please visit here.

Other things...

:: The above image shows some stitch on indigo. The colour is from my small henna-based vat (I keep it in an old spaghetti jar). I've been mordanting my fabric before dyeing to get darker tones and finding the results are very pleasing. The two day workshops advertised above will include this technique.

:: Signed copies of Slow Stitch are now available here. The book is reviewed in the November/December issue of Embroidery, on the Textile Artist website and in the Winter edition of UK Handmade magazine. Thank you so much to all those who have purchased a copy and who have sent me so many positive messages about it. 

material evidence

I recently spent a day at Sunny Bank Mills near Leeds in preparation for an exhibition that opens later this month. The mill dates from 1829 and was an important part of the huge woollen industry that once dominated this part of Yorkshire. Production continued until 2008, the spaces in the building now used for a variety of new businesses, a gallery and artists' studios. 

Material Evidence will feature the work of Clare Lane, Hannah Lamb, Lorna Jewitt and myself. The work is a response to the extensive buildings around the site, some now semi-derelict and the textile processes fundamental to the development of the place. 

View fullsize

I am excited to be exhibiting my work in this space, the former Finishing Room. I've been researching and writing about a dye works just over the boundary in my home city, Bradford, for the last two years, partly as I worked towards my Masters degree. The area I researched is lacking in traces of the former dyeing industry - just paths and  the edges of the space remain. Exhibiting in this space, where the traces of the industry, the work and labour connected to the building have been so recently in use has been an interesting contrast. I'll be showing 'Dyers' Field', a slow, performative absorption of colour into woollen cloth, alongside some altered fragments of cloth, wood, and plant material. I've also made some smaller stitched pieces of work and these will be for sale.

Material Evidence opens at Sunny Bank Mills, Farsley, Leeds on October 24th and runs until November 29th.

:: Thank you to all of you who commented on my last post, and for the lovely things you said. My six year old kindly assisted in drawing a winner who was Tess Hardy - Tess, contact me by email with your address and I'll put it in the post to you.

slow stitch - book giveaway

I am very pleased to share that my book 'Slow Stitch: Mindful and Contemplative Textile Art' was published last month by Batsford with wonderful photography by Michael Wicks. I am hugely grateful to the artists and community groups who contributed beautiful images, words and stories to this project. They are: artists Abigail Doan, Alice Fox, Pat Fuller, Lotta Helleberg, Celia Pym, Roanna Wells, Hannah Lamb, Kate Bowles, Christine Mauersberger, Mandy Pattullo, Judy Martin and Roz Hawker, The Manitoulin Circle, Naye Subah, Parkside Creative Threads and Hive community projects, and stitchers from my community education classes for the Workers' Educational Association, Cath, Pat, Sue, Mary and Vicki. It has been such a pleasure working with all of you. 

I have one copy to give away (and will post worldwide),  if you are interested in receiving one please leave a comment on this post and I'll draw a winner on Sunday (11th October). 

Update:: Thank you to all who commented on this post and for all your kind words. Congratulations Tess Hardy, please email me with your address and I'll pop it in the post.

summer yellow

Yellow dominates in the dye bed at this time of year. Tansy, goldenrod, dyer's chamomile and tormentil (which actually produces a red dye if you use the roots). This season I've been admiring the plants in full bloom more often than using them for dye. It's been a different experience and as some of these were grown from seed this year gives them a chance to get properly established. 

(Although today I harvested a handful of chamomile flowers and steeped them in boiling water to quickly dye a skein of silk - the vibrancy of the shade is too good to miss). 

Slow Stitch - book news

I've been quiet about this but can now share some news. I'm delighted that my first book, 'Slow Stitch: Mindful and contemplative textile art', will be published in September by Batsford. A practical book that shares ideas for creating a meaningful and thoughtful approach to textile practice, it also includes wonderful work from international textile artists. I'll be sharing more information about it soon and the book is available to pre-order here.

The images are not from the book, but the beginnings of 'Dyer's Field' - a four month stitch and local dye project.

Home Ground film

I recently had the pleasure of working with Richard and Arron from R&A Collaborations on a film as part of the Devon Guild of Craftsmen project Home Ground. They came and spent a day with me at my studio and allotment (pretty cold in early February and not many dye plants growing...) and talked about slow, localised craft practices. Here it is...

studio

Slow work in the studio today. Oak galls and iron travelling along the edge of some local worsted cloth, dyer's detritus in the sink. Making time for a few stitches on my stitch journal. I should be tidying up, working out quantities and weights for some mordanting. Another day.