Exploring green in the garden
During my first nature-based residency in 2023, I read that humans can see more variations of green than of any other colour. That’s because we evolved to live in green places, needing to identify plants and food.
I developed a lovely activity to explore this, using threads in many shades of green (and I had a great excuse to buy more threads too).
We chose sticks from the gardens and then carefully matched threads to the colours of nature and wrapped them around the sticks. We talked about the challenge of colour-matching by eye and of selecting from so many variations of green. It’s a lovely, absorbing activity which encourages noticing and paying close attention.
I’ve written more about green and textiles in this post
The Absence of Green
A delve into verdure, or the lack of it, in textiles and in my studio As I sort through my textile collections, re-packing them into new (antique) drawers, I notice how little green I actually have. I don’t often work with green cloth, I don’t tend to wear a lot of green either, yet natural…
Keep reading
During my second residency in Mill Field Forest Garden, I chose to take the same idea but into a stitched textile project, and created a sampler of a year of colour-collecting (as well as wearing the garden!).
This slow, careful noticing, connecting with colour and plants, is at the core of my new workshop Stitching the Garden, taking place in August.
- Create your personal garden colour palette
- Design inspiration from plants
- Dye threads with plants
- Stitch into leaves and cloth
Making leaf crowns might well come into it too!
Saturday 8th August 2026
11am-4pm
Mill Field Forest Garden, Mill Lane, Thurmaston, Leicestershire LE4 8AF
Bring your own lunch, hot & cold drinks available. Clean, comfortable compost toilet too. And now, three wonderful new large tables perfect for working on. We also have a shelter from the sun/rain, a small cabin and a lush, plant-filled polytunnel.
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