Category: Work With Me
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Narrative in textile practice
I look for the stories, the challenging subjects, the social justice, the personal and emotional research in creative practice all the time and am delighted when I find it. I recently visited the textile degree show at my local university, Loughborough, to see what the graduates have to say about why they are making what…
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Supporting Artist Projects
I’m always looking for new ways to share what I’ve learned the last 20 years or so and to support other artists to do brilliant work.
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Freestyle embroidery
I recently got to revisit this embroidery I made a few years ago to write a post for my Textile Study Space about freestyle, no rules embroidery. The post (for subscribers) is about techniques, experimenting and finding your own style and about knowing what feels right and what doesn’t. I ended up getting very self…
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Creative Growth online exhibition
My Maker Membership is all about creative growth – learning new things, looking at your own work in new ways, connecting and sharing with others and taking your creative practice forward. I have invited current Membership to share their work in a new online exhibition focussing on how they have grown creatively through the membership…
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Stitches That Speak Symposium
On 20th April I’m giving a talk for a symposium at De Montfort University, Leicester. The programme is full of fascinating talks and presentations about biographies through objects. My presentation description is below. The event is free and all are welcome. Emotional Repair: personal stories in cloth and stitch My artist practice is entirely tied…
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The Power of Personal Stories
I was thinking yesterday, on a museum visit, of the power of personal stories in heritage and in art practice. I often use objects as my source material but the stories about real, named women are what has made Criminal Quilts so impactful. It’s been important to me all the way through this 12-year long…
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Let’s talk about Maker Membership
I truly believe that connection and community are vital to creativity. It’s hard to be making work on your own without conversations, feedback and inspiration from others. I created Maker Membership, my online community, during the pandemic to bring makers together to share, talk and be inspired. One of the problems of running an online membership…
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Freelancing & Finance
I’ve been working with the brilliant coach Sarah Fox for the last few months, trying to pin down exactly what it is that I want to do with my freelance / consultancy practice. One of the issues of building this side of my work is that I don’t talk about it online very much so…
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The People of 2022
My review of the year through the brilliant people I’ve worked with. I’ve been thinking about lots of different ideas or lenses to review of 2022. I don’t want to just write a list of things that I have done, or even to list the things I have made. Celebrating success is important but also…
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Find Your Focus
The world is pretty distracting at the moment isn’t it? Creative practice is pretty distracting too. Confusing as well. It’s all too common to find ourselves wading through too many ideas and not knowing which to concentrate on, or struggling to know what ideas are worth pursuing. Running a business and keeping moving forwards with…