Tea and Textiles with HGA

I’m very honoured to have been invited to discuss my work as part of the “Tea and Textiles” programme run by the Handweavers Guild of America. The HGA describes the programme thus: “Each week HGA will host a conversation with some of the most respected fiber artists in the field today. In our 45-minute discussion […]

Exhibition in pictures (and video)

The Prism Textiles exhibition “In Search of Possibilities” is now over, and very successful it was too, with lots of really positive feedback about the work and the venue. If you didn’t manage to visit, here are a few pictures to give you a flavour – plus an interesting video of my bindweed piece by […]

Rebound: hanging the bindweed

I managed to finish weaving the last of the 50 bindweed pods a couple of weeks ago. Then I had to start thinking about how to suspend them. My original idea was to use a metal grid, which would be robust enough not to bend. But my friend Magdalen suggested that it would be better […]

In Search of Possibilities, 21-31 October 2021

It’s just under two weeks until the Prism Textiles exhibition “In Search of Possibilities” opens at the Art Pavilion in Mile End, London. Our last physical exhibition was in Birmingham in October 2019 – of course, last year’s exhibition was cancelled (though we did manage an alternative version online). So it’s exciting to be back […]

Bubblewrap basket

A couple of weeks ago we started back at City Lit on the second year of the Creative Basketry course. It was great to be back in the classroom with my fellow students again. We spent the first two sessions developing visual designs and processing materials. In the first week we played with newspaper, seeing […]

Bread baskets, and much else, at MERL

Last Saturday I spent a very pleasant afternoon at the Museum of English Rural Life (MERL) in Reading. The occasion was a commons feast, to launch the project The Commons: Re-enchanting the World. The commons is a social system that cares for and preserves resources that we all share: land, air, and water. This project […]

First place in Basketry of the Year competition

I’m thrilled to share the exciting news with you that I have been awarded first place in the contemporary category of the Basketry of the Year competition 2021! Every year the Worshipful Company of Basketmakers organises this competition for members of the Basketmakers’ Association. The Worshipful Company of Basketmakers is one of the many ancient […]

Twining in an embroidery hoop

One of the commonest ways of starting a twined basket is a bundled start, where you lay one group of stakes on top of another at right angles and twine them together, gradually separating out the individual stakes. I wondered what would happen if I created a circular “warp” by winding thread around an embroidery […]

Tony Cragg at Houghton Hall

Last week we spent a few days in Norfolk. An unwelcome encounter between a pothole and our front left tyre meant our itinerary was more rushed than we would have liked. But we did get to visit Houghton Hall, which is currently hosting a Tony Cragg exhibition. Only a couple of the rooms in the […]

Making a camel muzzle (sort of) with daffodil stalks

Every year I normally collect daffodil leaves as they start dying down and turning brown. After drying them, I spray them lightly with water to soften them and use them to make cordage (string). This year, however, as well as collecting a few leaves, I focused on collecting the flower stalks after the flowers had […]