Category: textiles
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Dr Isabella Rosner: Making Meaning Podcast Episode 55
Episode 55 is more of the summer of stitch series, this time with the brilliant Dr Isabella Rosner, Royal School of Needlework curator, podcaster and all round historic embroidery enthusiast. She has been part of the Mary Linwood fan club for years and we had a wonderful time talking about all the complexities of Linwood’s career…
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Mary Linwood events open for bookings
What’s coming up for the Mary Linwood exhibition from September 2025 to February 2026. Events start with free Social Stitch sessions in the gallery, where there are tables and stools alongside the Mary Linwoods. These take place monthly on Monday afternoons, the first is 22nd September which I hope to attend. The first ticketed event…
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Claire-Louise Hardie / The Thrifty Stitcher: Making Meaning Podcast Episode 54
Today’s episode is more in the summer of stitch series, this time with a very different kind of maker. Claire-Louise Hardie is a costumier and sewing teacher, expert in making clothes and understanding how clothes work and how they make us feel. This is a really fun conversation exploring very different things than this podcast…
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Moving The Needle
The under-appreciated originality of Mary Linwood (1755-1845) This essay is inspired by the prompt of Originality, posed by Beth Kempton on Substack for the Summer of Substack Essay Festival. You are welcome to subscribe to my substack but for now I intend to keep copying my writing over here on my website, so you could…
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Jennifer Collier; Making Meaning Podcast Episode 53
Continuing with the summer of stitch theme, in this podcast episode I am talking to the brilliant maker Jennifer Collier, who makes amazing objects in paper using textile techniques. I’ve known Jennifer for years and we’ve worked together and supported each other plenty but still needed to twist her arm to do this podcast, for…
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Textile Book Group
A social online group to talk about our favourite books about textiles. First meeting Monday 4th August I love reading books about textiles and I love talking to people about books about textiles, so I have created a book group to do just that. It’s an online meeting, on the first Monday of every month.…
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Writing the stories of damage
An exploration into the details of my textile collecting This short essay was sparked by a writing challenge on Substack, set by Beth Kempton. It’s may first post there, and I am probably not going to change over to writing on Substack rather than on my own places – this website, my printed publications and…
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Wendy Ward; Making Meaning Podcast Episode 52
This week’s podcast episode is with the amazing Wendy Ward – researcher, maker and campaigner around clothes, sustainability and emotional connection to the things we wear. Wendy is a PhD researcher at Sheffield Hallam University investigating product attachment, craft and broken-ness in fashion. Prior to her PhD she taught sewing to adults and wrote five…
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Artwork blossoming in the woods
I have two artworks in the Beacon Sculpture Trail until 17th September Blossom and Thorn, my textile homage to hedgerows, is on display in an old hedgerow in the country park’s sculpture trail. This work was made in 2023 with volunteer hedge-researchers exploring alongside the National Forest Way, a long distance footpath weaving through the…
