The Stitchbook Issue No 10

Trisha

Roberta

DON’T PANIC or feel stressed! Take a deep breath and just get started ... see where it takes you!

The group is here to support and encourage everyone. We have members with enormously varying levels of expertise remember to share knowledge and ideas generously, and BE KIND. The archive of 12 techniques is permanently available to you whenever you want to try something new, and the monthly workshops and the magazines are there as inspiration and encouragement.

www.thestitchbookcollective.com presented by Helen Birmingham

Issue No 10: first published October 2023

This month we will be looking at simple, but really effective, methods of HAND PAINTING fabric. All you need is some watercolour paint (pans or tubes), or some acrylic paint or even tester pots of emulsion will work!

If you look up ‘fabric painting’ you will find an enormous amount of technical stuff, telling you that you need all sorts of fancy equipment, lots of technical knowhow and expensive purchases .. but you really don’t!

of course if you are wanting to make clothing or soft furnishing you will need specialist materials, but for slow stitch ….. just relax and enjoy the simplicity of this workshop ….

REMINDER:

STITCHBOOKS are about self-expression. There is no right or wrong. You aren’t being marked. It isn’t a competition or a race, and a good teacher can only show you where to look, not what to see!

WORKSHOP

INTRODUCTION

The key to this whole workshop is what happens when you put a drop of water onto your chosen fabric

Does it sink in or stay

You can now spend a happy few minutes dropping water onto your fabric samples to see whether they soak up the water or leave it as a droplet on the surface.

on

the surface?

With almost any recycled clothing which has been worn and washed, you will find that the water soaks straight into the fabric. Any treatment will already have been washed away.

The water will also soak straight into unwashed, untreated fabrics like polycottons for sheeting/bedding, muslin, silk and linen (as long as they have not been surface printed). (Figure 1)

It is surprising just how many different fabrics have been pre-treated.

The process is called ’sizing’, and it protects the warp yarns during the weaving process. It is a bit like adding starch or cellulose, but the stiffeners used in manufacture could also be wax, emulsifier or polyvinyl alcohol. Sizing the warp fibres improves the surface strength, printability and water resistance of the fabric and can also be added as a surface finish.. It is really difficult to tell if fabric has been sized, even by the look, feel or texture. But actually finding out is SIMPLE

If you add a drop water onto a fabric and the water stays on the surface in a ‘drop’, you can be certain that the fabric has been treated or surface printed.

Figure 2 is ’loomstate, unwashed calico’. This has a huge amount of size added, and indeed, if you are going to dye this fabric you HAVE to pre-wash it to get the dye to penetrate the fibres at all. But you will see that we can use this water-resistant quality to our advantage when it comes to painting the surface.

Figure 3 is a printed curtain fabric. Fabrics which are intended for soft furnishing will have been treated with a flame retardant. For our purposes, this will have the same effect as the size, in that the water droplets will remain on the surface.

Sized fabric is NOT WATERPROOF. If your fabric has been treated with a waterproof spray, you will not be able to colour it with water-based paint.

Figure 1

Figure 3

Figure 2

WATER-BASED PAINTS

There are lots of different fabric paints and mediums on the market, some are relatively cheap, some are very expensive. As long as you don’t want to wash your finished work, I’m going to suggest that you just use whatever water-based paint you have to hand.

A very basic set of children’s watercolour blocks are great to get started with if this is all you have access to, but, if you do need to buy something, I would recommend a cheap tin of artist’s watercolours.

You will find that artists’ watercolours come in pans or tubes. I find that the pans are much easier and cleaner to use, and they are perfect for this workshop. If you have watercolour pencils, these are also useful .

You may have access to crafter’s acrylic paint, poster paint or ready-mix or even gouache. These are all fine for this workshop too. Use whatever you have!

m not going to go into detailed chemical differences between all of these paints (because it’s not necessary to know at our level of practice) but what is useful to know is that:

Watercolour paints are TRANSPARENT. Poster, Gouache and Acrylic paints are OPAQUE. Acrylic paint is permanent after drying

It is possible to use watered-down decorator’s emulsion paint on fabric too. The slight downside of this is that it tends to form a hard, almost crispy surface, which isn’t great for stitching into! You can avoid this by manipulating the fabric as it dries. But if you have another type of paint, I’d use that instead!

In addition you will need:

• water-based paint

• jar of clean water

• embroidery thread

• needle

2 paint brushes

polycotton sheeting

calico and muslin

freezer paper

• embroidery hoop (optional)

• Iron and ironing pad

• hair dryer (optional)

MY THOUGHT PROCESSES

This workshop is really a follow-on from the Introduction to Painting, Dyeing, Staining & Printing onto Fabric workshop which you can find in the ARCHIVE. www.thestitchbookcollective.com/ video-archive

There are some great ideas and examples in the old workshop and they are still really useful, but repeating them here seems to be rather pointless, when you can access the original very easily.

At the end of this workshop I will however, reprint some of the basic information about colour theory, and stitch size and placement because this may be very useful for you to have immediately to hand.

So what is this workshop for?

I want to share some NEW information with you. Not new to the world, but new to me, and maybe to you too. I fairly recently became aware of some VERY SIMPLE information how different waterbased mediums behave AND THE TRUTH IS that they are all pretty much of a muchness! You can get a very similar effect with most sorts of colouring medium.

The greatest difference is what MATERIAL you use.

In this month’s magazine there is a FREE GIFT, which includes samples of untreated and treated fabric. I want to make sure that we can all see the difference in the effect that can be produced, even if we are all using different types of water-based paints. I’ve also put a couple of paintbrushes in. This is a throw-back to when I was teaching art at secondary school. Most of my departmental budget was spent on good quality brushes. Making marks with a stick is all very well, but it is also useful to learn about how the bristles hold the paint, and how you can vary your line weight by using lighter or harder pressure on the brush.

I hope you enjoy this month’s exercise. As always, let me know (and see) how you get on

Please email words and images to: thestitchbook@aol.com

EXAMPLE 1

Polycotton SHEETING on FREEZER PAPER

You will need: polycotton sheeting or some other untreated fabric. Freezer paper, paint, paintbrush, iron and water

EXAMPLE 1a

PRINT from Freezer Paper

In addition to Example 1, you will need some muslin cloth

EXAMPLE 2

Loom-state unwashed CALICO

You will need: calico, paint, water (an embroidery hoop is optional)

EXAMPLE 2a

PRINT from Calico

In addition to Example 2, you will need some muslin cloth

EXAMPLE 3

Use of STITCHING to describe distance and direction

This is covered on pages 8 & 9 You will need threads and needles. Again, an embroidery hoop is optional.

EXAMPLE 4

There is a small section on the workshop video discussing the use of watercolour pencils and Inktense pencils and blocks, although we may cover this in more detail in a separate workshop.

EXAMPLE 1 Polycotton Sheeting on Freezer Paper

Before you start working on a fabric which absorbs water, think about ironing it onto a piece of freezer paper first. This will give you 2 advantages. It will hold your fabric nice and flat while you work on it, and clean-up is MUCH easier. I would still advise using newspaper or kitchen roll underneath to protect your worksurface, but the freezer paper will catch most of the excess wetness, and you can then use it later, Waste not want not! - see example 1a).

Of course you can use just kitchen roll underneath to soak up any paint/water which passes right through the fabric, but we might as well make use of it rather than it go in the bin.

Also think about reapplying paint once the sample is dried. This gives you some wonderful ‘watermark’ effects.

What is FREEZER PAPER?

Freezer paper is transparent like greaseproof paper, but with a thin wax layer on one side only . It is a popular tool used in sewing and patchwork to help with applique designs. It is also used for drawing and tracing quilting designs. By ironing on the un-waxed side of the freezer paper you soften the waxed side that is next to the fabric so it sticks slightly.

You can buy it in rolls or sheets. See the workshop on transferring images to see how you can use this as a backing to allow you to put fabric through an ink using it to print, I recommend buying it in ready cut A4 sheets!

EXAMPLE 2

Loom-state unwashed CALICO

Remember that the water is unlikely to soak right through this fabric, but you should still protect your worksurface, or use an embroidery hoop. I like to use a hoop because I like the tautness of the fabric. Keep a hoop just for painting paint getting onto clean work in the future.

EXAMPLE 1a

You are basically using the muslin as a ‘clean-up’ cloth, and all the excess paint which has gone through the fabric can be wiped up and re-used. I love the effect of multiple clean-ups with the same cloth, which has been dried between projects.

When dried, these muslin cloths are wonderful to tear

Rember that the paint colours will only run into each other if they are actually touching. You can leave wonderfully crisp unpainted areas if you choose to. You have the option of painting wet on dry, or wet on wet. You can leave the paint to dry between layers of colour, but remember that some bleeding of colour will occur when the water reactivates the original paint.

EXAMPLE 2a

Because the wet paint remains on the surface rather than soaking through, it is possible to print from the surface of your painting. Muslin works really well, but other absorbent fabric can be used too. The resulting ‘print’ can be used to echo elements of your design, or any be used to stitch into in their own right.

These notes are taken from the 2022 Workshop

‘An Introduction to Painting, Dying, Staining and Printing’ which you can find in the ARCHIVE on www.thestitchbookcollective.com

Primary Colours

Red Blue

Yellow

Secondary Colours

(2 primary colours together)

Red & Yellow = Orange

Blue & Yellow = Green

Blue & Red = Purple

Tertiary Colours

The thee primary colours mixed together will always make Brown.

Harmonising Colours

These are colours which sit next to each other on the colour wheel. i.e.:

Red & Purple

Blue & Green

Green & Yellow

Complementary/Opposite Colours

These are colours which are opposite each other on the colour wheel. If you mix them together they will make brown, but if they sit next to each other, they will clash with each other.

Red & Green

Blue & Orange

Yellow & Purple

Cool /Cold Colours

Purple

Blue Green

Warm/Hot Colours

Red Orange Yellow Shadows

Shadows are not grey! You can make a colour’s shadow by adding a small amount of it’s opposite colour. i.e.

red & green yellow & purple orange & blue

Perspective using colour, tone and size (depth of field/atmospheric perspective)

This is going to be unapologetically simple!

In very general terms:

• The nearer something is to the viewer, the darker and larger it will appear.

• The further away, the lighter and smaller it will appear.

• Warm colours tend to feel closer (red, yellow, orange)

• Cool colours tend to feel more distant (blue, green, purple)

Here is an example of how stitching can enhance the illusion of depth in your work …

Interpretation

For this first sample use a very limited colour palette and just two or three different types of stitch. If you are using 6 strand embroidery thread, use various numbers of threads and use a variety of stitch lengths. Keep working layers of stitching one over another, and maybe add some extra layers of muslin or other fine fabric. It is VERY easy to overwork this type of image. It is really an example of less is more. Stop every now and then, and try to connect to the work when you return, it will tell you when it is finished!

The best piece of advice I can give you is to begin with a very simple image, and interpret it as loosely as possible in the early stages.

You are trying to express the ‘feeling’ of the photograph, rather than recreate every single detail.

‘To paint is not to copy the object slavishly, it is to grasp a harmony among many relationships.’ Paul

Cezanne

‘By using patches of colour and tone it is possible to capture every natural impression in the simplest way, freshly and immediately.’

Paul Klee

‘Lots of people will protest that it’s quite unreal and that I am out of my mind, but that’s just too bad ..’ Claude

Monet

LIGHTER in the background

DARKER in the foreground

Horizontal stitching in the background, with rows getting closer together towards the horizon-line

Vertical stitching in the foreground, with stitches getting smaller towards the horizon-line

Roberta Wagner

Come explore the world as seen and felt by my hands

www.robertawagmer.com

Come Walk with Me

artist statement

I have used many mediums to make art over the past 40 years including ceramics, paint, textiles, and stitch. Most of my work is inspired by landscapes and skyscapes both real and imagined. The fields of Minnesota, the plains of the Dakotas, the night sky, and the tidelands of Puget Sound often find a place in my work. Much of my recent work has a feeling of age reminiscent of memories and buried treasure. I love to incorporate color and texture in my work. I have been deeply influenced by the Asian aesthetic and abstract expressionist painters.

I’m going to suggest that you put this on your Christmas List!

It feels like quite an expensive book to buy through Amazon (£25.18) but as we all seem to agree, there is nothing like actually holding a book in your hands, and being able to turn the pages. (But, you can download it as a pdf for $9.99 from Roberta Wagner’s website. ) It feels like a book which I will come back to again and again, and it’s format is such that you can dip in and out, without having to settle down for a marathon reading session.

REVIEW by Helen Birmingham

I first came across this artist while browsing through Pinterest images. I kept clicking on images which I liked, and noticed that more and more of them were work by Roberta Wagner .. so I followed one of the links, and came across the wonderful book called ‘Come Walk with Me: exploring why art matters’ written by Roberta Wagner. Just on the strength of the cover image, and the images I’d followed to get there, I bought a copy of the book online without hesitation. And wow was it money well spent

Although there are less images of her work in the book than I might have expected, there are WORDS. Words which speak to me, words which make me think, words which stop me in my tracks, words which so resonate with the way I see the world. . . the book is really an illustrated autobiography divided into 3 sections.

The Back Story

The Infill Section

The Long Walk

The Back Story section provides background on how she came to different art mediums and some of the most influential people in her life.

The Infill section has snippets of what inspires her, her ways of making art and how it has woven itself into her life. The sections contains essays on the flow and struggle in making art and in making a life. It is also about an artistic practice and how it illuminates life.

The Long Walk includes sections about Parkinson’s disease, hospice, and how the wisdom gained from making art has helped her rally during times of great sorrow.

‘Usually I have an intuitive feel for what I want the piece to be, but I have to find my way through the fog to get to the point when I know I got it right. My hands know more than my head.

Perhaps this is why artists are sometimes considered flaky or irresponsible. Honouring the process and the time that a piece deserves is tricky in the ‘real world’ of schedules and deadlines. A new life is trying to come into being, and it is still frail. As an artist, my responsibility is to guard that new young life, not the deadline.’

Roberta Wagner

‘The problem in middle life, when the body has reached its climax of power and begins to decline, it to identify yourself, not with the body, which is falling away, but with the consciousness of which it is a vehicle. This is something I learned from myths. What am I? Am I the bulb that carries the light? or am I the light of which the bulb is a vehicle?’

Unbraided Rope Installation

by Janaina Mello Landini

Audition by J Warren Welch

Old habits die hard, so I’m still standing, anxiously, desperately holding everything I am in front of me. Everything I have to bring to other people’s tables is spread out in the perpetual audition that has always been my life, and the echoes of a million times that I’ve heard ‘This seat’s taken’ still haven’t taught me to stop trying to sit where I know I’m not wanted.

Joseph Campbell from The Power of Myth

Deep Ocean/ Deep Space by YUKO KIMURA

Hearts & MIND

MAKE SURE YOU RETURN YOUR HEART by 15th November 2023 for guaranteed inclusion in the online

Private View

info@oldparcelsoffice.org

Saturday 21st October from 2.00pm - 4.00pm

Open 26, 27, 28, 29 October 2, 3, 4, 5 November

Thursday, Friday Sat and Sun 11.00am - 4.00pm

Artist included in the show: Helen Birmingham: a mixed-media and textile artist who runs Untangled Threads from her studio in Scarborough

Curated by the artist, and OPO Trustee, Rob Moore, ‘Obsessions’ brings together work by fifteen Northern Artists who dedicate their lives to art. With art practices ranging across painting, printmaking, ceramics, sculpture, textiles and film, what unites all the artists is an almost compulsive need to be in their studio making new work. Whether their work is abstract, figurative, romantic or challenging, this zealous application to an art practice has resulted in each of them developing their own, very distinctive style of work.

Taken from OPO Press Release 21.09.2023

The Butterfly Effect

Get involved in the decision-making and design-process for a NEW quilt for Festival of Quilts 2024 and you could WIN a hard-backed copy of ‘The Art of Embroidered Butterflies’ by Jane E Hall.

All you have to do is to email a suggestion regarding the potential Festival of Quilts entry for 2024. EVERYONE who emails a suggestion of any kind BEFORE 27th OCTOBER 2023 will be entered into the draw.

ALL suggestions will be considered and discussed over the coming months. The only things which are already decided are:

• The title of the quilt will be ‘The Butterfly Effect’

• The quilt will include hundreds of origami butterflies made from scrap/recycled fabric by members of the Collective

• The butterflies will be made in batches and delivered to Untangled Threads every 2 months

• e.g. January/February butterflies will be in shades of blue/ green, March/April butterflies will be in shades of red/ orange etc

• The target is 5 per member over the year. This would potentially give us 1,000 butterflies but more could be amazing!

Things you might like to think about:

 Suggestions for the overall design and size of the quilt?

 Which category do you think we should enter?

 Does the quilt need to be flat, or wall mounted? .. have a look at this year’s categories and winners for ideas..

 Could we incorporate the idea of Stitchbooks into the design?

 Can you make any suggestions about how to involve more members in making the quilt itself (not just the butterflies).?

Give it some thought, and email me before 27th October with some ideas! Winner of the

I’ve had some great suggestions already and key ideas will be published for further discussion in next month’s magazine (Issue 11), together with the name of the WINNER of the BOOK: The Art of Embroidered Butterflies

by Jane E Hall

Here are some images from our facebook pages of butterflies which members have

MEMBERS PAGES

by Glennis Walton

Having selected some fabrics from my now limited selection of fabrics, I made five butterflies. They were more fiddly than I anticipated but I enjoyed making them. It also prompted me to purchase some new batik fabrics so that I can make more, and improve my technique when I have a spare moment.

by Anne Jackson

I experimented with different sizes of fabric pieces using rectangles and squares. I like a bit of realism so researched the different wing shapes each type had. I wanted to shape the wings, but thought they may fray, so I backed some blue and yellow fabric with the fine, iron-on G700 interfacing you introduced us to earlier in the year.

I coloured the interfaced side with pro-marker pens. I could then use single thickness fabric and cut the wing shapes with minimal fraying, after folding and stitching the butterfly shape..

The blue and the yellow butterflies were made from a square shape, single thickness backed fabric - all were folded in the way you showed us.

The large Camberwell Beauty is double rectangular fabric. I cut the wing shapes and used blanket stitch around the edges to stop any fraying. Wire for antennae.

I then embroidered a garden for them to dance in, using some eco printed fabric I did a couple of years ago.

by Sarah Reed

I then collected together all the butterfly reference and guide books I had on my book shelves. There was only one buddleia still flowering in my garden, so I waited until the sun was shining and the temperature a bit higher. For an hour I recorded all the butterflies that visited the flowers still in bloom. Seven species were recorded, plus a Holly Blue that flittered past the bush, but moved parallel to the Ivy on the fence, their second generation food source…Holly being the first in Spring.

I sketched them in aqua crayons, and will add water to complete the illustrations. Inspired by Jane E. Hall’s book, brought to our attention by Helen in the Magazine, I hope to make 3.D embroidered butterflies of the eight species recorded in the garden on the ‘butterfly bush’.

I have now ‘painted’ the aqua crayon sketches. Now to find a way of making some in 3.D fabric and thread.! A few butterflies still flitting about in the late afternoon sunshine as I write this.

A very enjoyable project this month, Helen, but need more hours in the day.

First experiments with origami butterflies. After my Father died a few years ago I made about 50 origami cranes, he used to make them when I was little, then after my mother died I made lots of paper butterflies. This is the first time I’ve tried with fabric. I’ll have to make some for my granddaughter. I’ve used 100% cotton, some pieces are more bulky than others and they’ve all been hand stitched in front of the tv. Some seem to sit better than others, I find the bulky butterflies need a stitch a bit lower down wings. I also prefer the slightly larger pattern. I trim the hem a bit closer too.

The embassy asked that rather than taking photographs, instead we use their information sheet which had a QR code linking to the artists' work. It's attached but I can’t guarantee that the Google Drive link will remain active.

The exhibition at SOAS, (which Ruth Lozano’s article featured in the last magazine), was perfect - I thought, a small gallery with a beautiful display of such ancient recycled fabrics. Sadly though, at three months my grandson, whilst giving it attention, was not as enamoured of the art as I had hoped, preferring instead the second exhibition downstairs featuring the bold brightly coloured Indian art of A.P. Santhanaraj.

A month on and it was time to try again.It is afterall in the child’s blood…his mother studied textiles at uni, his great aunt produces wonderful work and his great great grandmother was an amazing seamstress

by Caroline Tracy

Self portrait in stitch! I've used a variegated embroidery thread as I felt it reflected something of myself; not quite got one of the eyes and face outline right, but this is a first for me! Found it quite straightforward to do, and would like to try other portraits.... someday! Thankyou Helen Birmingham for providing the opportunity to try this it's opened up a whole new line of stitchery for me and my imagination .

ARTICLE by Mo Bergson

Never too early … to appreciate textiles

With a new little family member taking up my time… but still wanting to seek out textile exhibitions, what better than to combine the two...?

(From left to right)

TOP: Fujisawa Emi; Yatsumoto Kaori; Janice Gunner

CENTRE: Rhyannan Hall; jane Callender; Asai Naoyuki

BOTTOM: Luisa Uribe; Erna Janine; Rob Jones

This time we ventured to the Japanese Embassy for Aizome (the craft of indigo dyeing). Although indigo is one of the oldest plant dyes and, according to the information provided, was first used in Japan 1400 years ago, the point of this exhibition was to celebrate the work of nine modern artists.

Being located in one of the rooms in the embassy, the venue was beautifully set out. The white walls and abundance of light were perfect for showing the stunning variety of blue work. Each of the nine artists presented pieces with background notes on the techniques and materials used.

Being keen on Shibori, I was drawn to the works of Rob Jones and Jane Callender.

Rob produced a quilt for the exhibition which included 32 different techniques. Rather like a Shibori sampler, while Jane had done a mandala which was truly mesmerising.

Having tried this myself with results usually resembling happy accidents, I was in awe of her precise geometry.

In addition to this more traditional application of indigo, there were several examples of modern use.

Erna Janine is a Saori weaver (literally Zen weaving), so her pieces are more freeform in contrast with Asai Naoyuki who uses a traditional wax resist technique, producing patterns on a range of materials including leather and pearls.

Alongside the pieces of work on display, there was an explanation of how indigo is produced which included a short film showing the laborious hand processing needed to dye the fabric. I was particularly drawn to the shade chart which showed 22 examples from the palest blue to black.

Finally my young grandson’s verdict He awoke just as we were going into the Royal Academy cafe! Thank you to the stitch club members who suggested these exhibitions and apologies to those who are not in easy reach of London. If any of the artists' work appeals however, there are some great examples of their work online.

I was absolutely enchanted by these embroideries and weavings. They were made by one of our members, Elaine Craddock, and she wrote: I wondered if the group would be interested in something that I’ve been doing over the years.

I love the drawings that my grandchildren make, they have a unique naivety that we adults often lack. These are drawings that my nature loving grandson made that I turned into small pictures using machine and hand embroidery . I simply created a darker outline cartoon and stuck it on the window behind calico to trace the design. If the drawing is too small or too large simply take a photo and resize before printing it out.

These are small weavings (approx 3” x 5”) made using an old picture frame as a loom and woven with embroidery threads from drawings by my granddaughters. All good fun and the children love to see their artwork recreated in this way

Elaine, yes, I am sure that members will be VERY interested to see these, and, no doubt, might even like to try to make their own. What a fabulous idea!

Thank you so much for sharing!

by Judith Claire Rags or Riches

Repurposing scraps from fabric stash to make new fabrics. Going well - very raggy! I am trailing threads all over the house.

Crayfish

Mole

Life Cycle of a Frog

Grandad in the shower

Grandma & Grandad

Mum with a Cup of Tea

by Li z Hirst

Going back to the start of the year and ‘Collections’, this caused me various conundrums; is my stash of fabric a collection? Or my yarn-in-waiting, or indeed the ideas in my head that come about when I’m gardening? None of these seemed to really fit, so I put ‘Collections’ to one side. Then, inspired by other Stitchbookers’ stories I got to thinking about where my creative inspiration comes from.

So, here is the story of Auntie Edith.

Edith, the third of four children born in Rochdale in 1913, grew up with her 3 brothers in the family home near to the woolen mill where her father was the dyer. She followed her dream to become a primary school teacher and always said she enjoyed the challenges and delights of teaching junior children.

My Aunt loved to learn new skills and made full use of the varied night-school program available in those days. One of her favourites was painting china, usually with intricate colourful patterns the ideas for which she often borrowed from her embroidery books.

Another was leatherwork, and yes, she produced embroidery but not the usual flowery tablecloths but intriguing cushion covers she designed and executed in perfect detail. Then, there was always knitting on the go, her preferred yarn was 4-ply, be that socks for her brothers or cardigans for us all –even in summer a cardigan was a must growing up in the West Riding at 600’ up!

As a child and growing up I was always fascinated to watch what she was doing and delighted when allowed to ‘have a go’, her despair when I learned to crochet rather than knit was most noticeable, in later years I redeemed myself! She, in turn was always interested in what I was doing and would help me out with little ideas. I remember making an embroidered cushion cover as a sampler of all the stitches in one of her books. So, I have come to the conclusion that the collection I would like to share with you is some of the ‘Auntie Edith’s’ I still have. The leather coasters she ‘tooled’ 45 years ago to mimic the pattern on our crockery, the wool tapestry bell pull originally made for my Mum, and the unfinished embroidery she did in her late 80’s using wool as her fingers were no longer dexterous enough for fine work, at the time she said she was ‘just playing’ with stitches and seeing where they took her

I think we all know that one!

by Jan Dowson

Examples of some ‘Memory Cloths’ stitched during Covid

DELIVERY ADDRESS: