The proverb ‘one person’s trash is another person’s treasure’ reigns supreme with these five artists. Each of them rescues neglected and tossed away items to help tell significant truths and stories in their textile art. These artistic hunters and gatherers keep a watchful eye out for overlooked gems and then breathe new life into their found treasures in unexpected ways.

Certainly, there’s a pragmatic satisfaction found in helping the environment by reducing items headed for landfill. But these artists also tap into the joy of imagining the prior lives of their found riches and seamlessly blending the old with the new. Every recycled object bears its own bumps, bruises or sparkle that can’t be purchased or recreated. And that’s where the creative magic of working with secondhand materials lies.

Paul Yore’s works incorporate recycled objects as metaphors addressing the social challenges of queer culture. Louise Baldwin uses salvaged fabrics and construction materials to explore her feelings toward building a new home. Zipporah Camille Thompson celebrates her paternal grandmother through an installation featuring beloved colours and a special rice from the American South. Stacey Chapman builds Her Majesty’s coronation gown from surprising castoffs. And Melissa Emerson portrays a mother’s love on a simple netted fruit bag.

Paul Yore

Paul Yore’s interest in recycled materials initially stemmed from environmental concerns, as well as wanting to pursue a sustainable practice. During his art school days, the free or reduced cost of secondhand goods was also appealing when expensive art materials were out of reach. But Paul’s main driving force in choosing recycled materials connects to queer culture.

‘As a queer artist, my choice in scavenged material centres around an aesthetic of ‘bad-taste’. I’m interested in pop-culture, trash, camp, and lowbrow humour, all qualities which form part of subversive queer culture. I find the conceptual richness of found, thrown-out or waste materials serves as a metaphor for marginality, and by extension, queerness.’

Paul is also motivated by the idea of rescuing pre-loved materials and giving them new life. For example, he uses a lot of secondhand pet blankets with embedded hair. Nothing is off limits in terms of materials and media. Glue and paint may be used to cobble items together, or for tougher materials like plastic, hole punches, eyelets and cable ties work well. Other everyday fibres such as rope, string, fishing line and wire are also used.

Thanks for Nothing features a map of Australia conflated with a skull and the Union Jack flag as the background. Paul says it began as an interrogation of contemporary themes such as nationalism, colonialism, capitalist modes of production, consumerism and the politics of identity through a queer lens. However, the work is quite open-ended and offers a variety of possible interpretations. The work also incorporates diverse words and phrases that are also ripe for interpretation.

‘My interest in found materials extends to using found and borrowed phrases, expressions, slogans, symbols and logos. The layering of those images and sentiments further opens my work as a site for possible critique and speculation. They explore how language informs the ideology that underpins our cultural settings. Interestingly, the words text and textile share an etymological root in the Latin word textere meaning to weave.’

The construction of Thanks for Nothing is essentially a needlepoint embroidery with an appliquéd, quilted border. The wooden frame is embellished with found objects and paint. For the needlepoint section, Paul traced his design onto embroidery canvas and then stitched the main outlines in dark colours. He then slowly covered the rest of the surface with free-form designs, intuitively choosing colours along the way. The border was formed using scraps of off-cuts from larger appliquéd works. After stretching the work onto the frame and fixing it with cable ties, the piece was embellished with hand sewn sequin details and beading.

‘It can be a technical challenge to use materials that vary greatly in their constitution, from coarse materials like denim, jute and thick blankets to fine materials like lace and silk. However, an exciting aspect of my methodology is a sense that things don’t necessarily easily fit together. For me, the variety of degraded or broken-down materials becomes a metaphor for creating a new whole from salvaged parts.’

Paul Yore is based on the unceded land of the Gunaikurnai people in Gippsland, Victoria, Australia. He has exhibited widely, with a major survey exhibition called WORD MADE FLESH (2022) at the Australian Centre for Contemporary Art, which featured 15 years of work and included over 100 textile pieces.

Instagram: @paul.yore

Louise Baldwin

Assemblage art is not for the faint hearted. Juxtaposing disparate elements into a cohesive whole can easily lead to visual chaos. But Louise Baldwin’s ‘bodging’ technique helps her expertly overcome that challenge.

‘My work may appear to take a bish-bash-bosh or that-will-do approach, but in fact, it’s a very slow process squeezing things together and shifting them around, so they work collectively. I like the term bodging to describe the way I combine, mend and repair things. It means using what is to hand rather than going out to find the correct piece of equipment. There is a frugality, inventiveness and accidental beauty to bodging that totally appeals to me.’

Louise admits she also has sentimental attachments to the variety of objects she incorporates into her textile art. She particularly enjoys weathered and handled materials, things that bear a history. Odd things find their way to her collection, from friends’ donated scraps of fabric to items found in London’s plentiful skips to ordinary household packaging. Containers are also of interest, as they often have unexpected details and shapes.

‘I really enjoy the challenge of thinking how materials can come together and have what I call conversations. Materials that have been discarded or lost their original purpose can be transformed and reinvented to take on new meaning. I also always enjoy the lack of hierarchy in the materials I use, treasuring an old plastic top as much as a pearl, and a sweet wrapper as much as gold leaf.’

When using hard materials like wood, linoleum or metal, Louise first drills holes for stitches and then uses simple running stitch, back stitch or anything that looks like sutures. She also uses a random weave stitch to work needle and thread over hard materials. The weaving technique was learned through a meander into basketry techniques, and Louise found it’s great for building up a surface and tethering down threads.

Temporary Condition is a series developed while Louise was building a new house next to her current one. When clearing and sorting out her studio, she found all sorts of ‘nonsense’ and decided to push it together into stitched assemblages.

Louise worked intuitively to create a record of the building process with its scaffolding, wiring, noises and tied down things. A thick wool felt was used as a contrasting material, creating a sense of insulation and calm. It was also functional and provided a blank canvas against the chaotic and worn materials discovered in the depths of her old studio. The materials are held together with staples, binding hand stitch and random weave stitch.

‘There was a lot of anxiety as we prepared to move, so I created the assemblages to describe the change that was occurring. The process of building on such a large scale as a house and making something on a more intimate and emotional level helped me capture some of my history and some of our future.’

Louise Baldwin is based in London, UK. She studied textiles at Goldsmith College London in the 1980s at degree and postgraduate level. Her work is held in public and private collections and has been shown in various exhibitions in the UK. Louise is a member of the 62 Group and Art Textiles: Made in Britain. 

Instagram: @louisebaldwin_textiles

Zipporah Camille Thompson

There’s a special colour of blue found in the American Carolinas. It’s called ‘haint blue’ and it’s Zipporah Camille Thompson’s colour of choice. The rich indigo and cobalt blue connects to the coastal ancestral connections that inform her work, and this work is no exception.

‘This work was part of an exhibition that honoured and memorialised the life of my paternal grandmother, Allean, originally from South Carolina. She loved the colour blue, and she always reminded me of strong, gentle ocean waves in the way she greeted, encouraged and loved you endlessly. Her life was difficult, emerging gracefully from an abusive relationship and raising 11 children on her own. She worked fields, as well as working as a washerwoman, and she spectacularly cleaned everything from cotton to kitchen floors.’

Carolina Gold features a quilted hammock and altar that symbolise eternal rest, with printed silhouettes of sublime psychological and physical landscapes of labour and survival. The pots hold candles and other objects, and the prized rice of Carolina was included to pay tribute to Allean’s endurance, faith and compassion.

One can spend days looking at Zipporah’s collections of recycled works and see something new every time. And it’s remarkable how everything stays together! Drills, rope machines and sewing machines are among her chosen tools. But her favourite technique is weaving.

‘I love weaving! It allows me to continue finding the best kinds of junk and find connections between recycled materials and the woven cloth. It’s so satisfying finding ways to bring everything together through installation and sculpture. It challenges me to see found objects differently and in a new context, while using my creative problem-solving skills.’

Nothing is off limits for Zipporah, including chicken bones. She reports they are incredibly hard to clean and require bleaching and layers of painting. She’s also discovered no matter how much bones are cleaned and sealed, a greenish blue chemical oxidation happens over time. It’s a natural process she’s grown to love and embrace.

Zipporah’s sources for recycled materials are as unique as the items she finds. Of course, thrift stores are a given, but she reports there were plenty of times she scavenged along highways and ocean shores. Friends and family also provide gifts of old or neglected items.

‘For me, the more materials, the better. I’m all about high texture, bizarre surfaces and exquisite details. Roadside tarps, crystals, rocks, shells, fabric scraps, marine rope, hair weave, chicken bones, antlers and bedsheets are some of my favourites. It’s all about juxtaposition, and in my studio, my mantra is ‘everything is sacred, nothing is too precious’.’

Zipporah Camille Thompson is based in Atlanta, Georgia (US). Zipporah is represented by Whitespace Gallery (Georgia) and is an Assistant Professor of Textiles at Georgia State University. She is a recipient of many awards and residencies, including the Margie E. West Prize (2023).

Website: zipporahcamille.com

Instagram: @zipporahcamille

Melissa Emerson

The fact Melissa Emerson’s tender scenes of a mother’s love are stitched onto plastic refuse tickles the brain in remarkable ways. Bubble wrap, bin bags, caution tape and, in this case, fruit netting, hardly seem loving and cuddly. But be assured, a fierce mama bear message is embedded in all of Melissa’s works.

‘I have an inherent need to document my motherhood experiences and feelings. In this piece, the netting is vibrant in colour and features strength and containment. It replicates my own protectiveness, strength and fragility as a mother. The netting can also be easily pulled apart and has areas of transparency, creating a further narrative exploring my vulnerability and fragility.’

Melissa especially enjoys working with found plastics in response to increased plastic waste problems across the globe. She also likes materials that can easily break to enhance her emphasis on vulnerability and fragility. She rarely starts a piece with a definitive meaning in mind, but instead lets the combination of her starting photograph and chosen material inform how the artwork develops.  

Plastic materials also inform Melissa’s stitching techniques. Thinner plastics require very fine needles and slow and careful stitching. More transparent materials require overlapping stitchwork to keep them in place.

To stitch on such tricky surfaces, Melissa typically uses soluble fabric. Sometimes she’ll attach the soluble fabric to the plastic object, stitch and then wash away. Other times she stitches onto the soluble fabric separately, and once washed and dried, she’ll attach the stitched artwork to the object.

‘I really enjoy the unpredictability of working with recycled materials. There is always an element of risk, and I’m never certain how the finished piece will look or if it will even work as an artwork. In many ways, the act of making becomes more important than the outcome. Plus, I’m always looking for ways I can reduce landfill , including only using fabrics that are found or of significance to me.’

I Know Your Face started with a sketch from a photograph onto soluble fabric. Initially, Melissa worried the netting would fall apart after washing the soluble fabric, so she stitched in a very detailed fashion whilst creating many overlapping stitches to create a strong mesh surface. Before washing the soluble fabric, she pinned the artwork to cardboard to prevent the stitches from moving. There was still a bit of movement where the stitching was fairly sparse, but Melissa felt that only enhanced the piece.

‘This work represents the changes that occur over time and accepting I cannot hold on to key moments or control future events. My son and I look directly at each other, and our unspoken words acknowledge we are both present. A single glance demonstrates our shared understanding: I know him, and I get him. Cocooned in a sleeping bag, he’s comforted and secure in the strength of our connection. His innocence and trust in my strength and protection radiates.’

Melissa Emerson is a UK-based artist that recently returned to Northamptonshire, UK, after living in Canberra, Australia. She has exhibited in both the UK and Australia and has won several drawing category prizes for her textile work.

Instagram: @mel_emart

Stacey Chapman

Upcycling is how Stacey Chapman describes her process of building her fabric ‘palettes of paints’ from second hand materials. And she confesses her method has led to hoarding on a grand scale. She’s unable to stop turning something worthless into something of value, especially when the perfect material appears at the perfect moment.

‘I don’t think a psychology degree is needed to diagnose what’s going on. My practice is steered by my obsession of turning rubbish into works of art, as each work always starts with collating and touching materials before any making happens. The end result is like alchemy!’

For this work, that alchemy came to life when a long-time neighbour donated fabric to Stacey. The neighbour had never done so before, but the day she did was the same day Stacey was starting work on the coronation dress. It was the perfect fabric!

Stacey also shopped dead stock fabric stores when she realised her stash of tiny offcuts wouldn’t work for the large-scale figure. Those speciality stores sell leftover fabric rolls from high-end retailers and designers at discounted prices, giving the materials a second life and preventing them from heading to a landfill.

‘Every element of upcycled materials changes the overall look of an artwork. No one can recreate the fabrics or notions that have lived and seen many things before making their way onto my palette. Their back history becomes embedded into the quality of the art, and to me, that is unique and ever so special.’

1953 Coronation of Queen Elizabeth II is essentially a large, quilted jigsaw puzzle, as each element was created separately. Stacey used a wide variety of techniques, including hand stitch, appliqué and beading. Stacey also added her own hair, retrieving clean strands from the bath, coiling them into curls, and stitching each curl down with clear thread.

Stacey especially enjoyed creating the orb. Stitching the faux pearls and diamantes was a challenge, but Stacey was pleased with the layering of metallic gold fabrics and organza. The jewels came from costume jewellery she was gifted as a teen, and she was thrilled ‘they waited 30 years’ for a worthy project.

The sceptre’s long, thin shape proved to be a challenge as it bent easily, even after being created on mount board. So, Stacey used various shades of gold stitching to reinforce the sceptre’s gold rope, various shades of brown organza, and blue chunky glitter fabric.

Sadly, Queen Elizabeth II died before Stacey’s work was finished. Having lived in the UK all her life, the news led to an emotional rollercoaster. Stacey felt immense sadness but also huge gratitude to have had such an inspirational and unshakeable figurehead.

‘Her Late Majesty’s passing gave my project even more meaning and gravitas. It was very important to me that the finish be literally fit for a Queen. I wanted it to be sumptuous, rich and impressive. I also heard the Queen was fond of a remnant and a bargain, so I hope she would have approved of my thoughtful sourcing with sustainability in mind.’

Stacey Chapman is based in Margate, Kent, UK. She exhibits her work in galleries and accepts commissions, and she was awarded the largest artist sponsorship to date from Janome UK. Stacey is also a presenter and has been featured in many publications, including writing as a columnist for Love Sewing Magazine.

Artist website: artseacraftsea.com

Instagram: @art_sea_craft_sea

Facebook: facebook.com/ArtSeaCraftSea

Key takeaways

Each of these artists demonstrates that nothing is off limits when incorporating recycled materials into their art. Here are a handful of ideas to help you add secondhand treasures to your own textile art.

• Like Paul Yore, consider using recycled materials as metaphors. What ideas or themes might your second hand object represent? 

• Look around your tool bench for possible items to include in your work. Louise Baldwin used construction materials like salvaged wood, metal, pegs and staples.

• Don’t limit yourself to thrift shops for materials. Some of Zipporah Camille Thompson’s best finds were found along the beach or highways. Keep an eye out when you next go for a walk.

• Experiment with stitching onto packaging materials. Melissa Emerson especially likes using bubble wrap, fruit netting and other plastic materials. 

• Let family and friends know you’re seeking second hand materials, especially fabrics and embellishments. Stacey Chapman’s neighbour provided the perfect textile for Her Majesty’s coronation dress.

Want more recycled textile art? Check out these additional six artists. 

Contemporary textile artists often seek to challenge traditional values and conventions, and that can make their work unique, aesthetically stimulating and highly engaging. Their compositions may be abstract and experimental. Sometimes they’re provocative, controversial or eclectic.

Modern communications have not only helped to make today’s world an artist’s paradise but also make the work of contemporary artists so much more accessible to the public. Plus the range of materials and processes has probably never been so diverse. 

These artists no longer need to conform to ideologies or techniques that once constrained even the boldest in the past. They are free to express themselves – and that can only be encouraging for budding textile artists who also have a desire to create with abandon.

Meet seven contemporary textile artists who are making statements and pushing boundaries with their work. Vanessa Barragão’s love of marine life, and her distress at textile waste, encouraged her to use only waste materials for her giant coral reef sculptures. Hale Ekinci and Gurjeet Singh both tell stories: Hale uses embroidery, quilting and crochet with found materials and photographs, while Gurjeet makes unique soft sculpted heads from recycled and rejected materials. 

Kristine Stattin and Meri Sawatzky work intuitively and dynamically with a small range of embroidery stitches, while photocopy processes and Xerox transfer are the go-to techniques for art quilt pioneer Joan Schulze. Finally, Patricia Kelly takes her sewing machine needle for a walk across a sandwich of natural fabrics creating a striking contrast.

This work can help to shape a new world and we can’t think of a better way of going about it.

Kristine Stattin

Just two stitches

We’ve always maintained that you don’t need a vast array of stitches to create artistic textile embroideries, nor is it necessary to have formal training. Kristine Stattin is living proof of both. Apart from a few workshops, she is self-taught and uses only straight stitch in different lengths – both machine and hand stitched – plus a lot of French knots.

Despite this simplicity, her work is striking. Kristine’s thread paintings are abstract explorations in colour, line, shape and texture. Kristine relishes the speed of the sewing machine, which allows her stitches to dance across the fabric, freely and spontaneously. Conversely, the peace evoked by the slower hand stitch can put her into a meditative and introspective state.

Kristine works intuitively, allowing this pull between order and chaos to give each mark direction to the next.

Kristine Stattin: ‘The love of embroidery has grown on me, and so five years ago when I sold a restaurant I co-owned, I was able to give my art my full focus. I approach my work very much as a painting. The difference is that I’m using threads instead of paint.

‘Though I’ve no formal education in embroidery, my embroidery style and skills have developed over time with practice, with play – which is very important – and experimentation.’

Stitch freedom

Effervescence is one of Kristine’s purely abstract artworks, its story only coming to her as she worked on it. 

‘I don’t like to plan out what I’m going to make in advance. It’s like when you go on holiday. Some people like to have the trip all pre-booked in advance. Others, like me, prefer to just get in the car and drive. It’s the same with my work. There is a freedom and excitement in letting go and seeing where the threads will take me. Letting go of control, trying not to be attached to outcome and expectation. Being in the now with the work, stepping into the unknown. It’s an enigma that asks to be resolved.

‘I just use normal cotton and DMC threads, which I buy locally. Where I live there aren’t many opportunities to thrift threads and materials, but whenever I can get my hands on some, I grab them. When it comes to choosing what colours to work with, I bring out all my threads, and try different combinations until I’m happy with a starting point. Later in the process some get added, others discarded. I chose to work on linen for its texture.

‘In 2022 Effervescence was sent to London where an architectural firm was showing artwork from several artists to a client. The client didn’t choose my work, and then on the way back it got lost in the post. After several months of effort, I finally got it back, fortunately still in perfect condition. Effervescence then got chosen to feature in the fall issue of the literary journal The Pinch and it now lives in the US.’

Kristine Stattin was born in Stockholm, Sweden and currently lives in the Occitanie region in the south of France. She has a Bachelor’s degree in Fine Art and is a member of S.E.W (Society for Embroidered Work). She has exhibited in Sweden, Italy, Ukraine, US and France.

Artist website: kristinestattin.com

Facebook: facebook.com/KristineStattinTextiles

Instagram: @kristine_stattin

Hale Ekinci

Embroidery, quilting and crochet

Perhaps due to her Turkish heritage, perhaps given her breadth of experience as Associate Professor of Art & Design at North Central College in Chicago, or in her artist residencies, Hale Ekinci takes her inspiration from several disciplines. She explores personal history, cultural identity, gender politics and craft traditions, and her works vary from videos to embroidery paintings embellished with vibrant colours, patterns and autobiographical relics.  

Hale Ekinci: ‘Western art tradition values fine art practices such as painting, mostly done by men and on canvas. Historically, women’s work such as embroidery, quilting, and crochet have been undervalued as craft or not considered fine art. Bringing these techniques into the gallery space allows me to question the hierarchy in the western art world. I also feature other fabrics and fibre crafts beyond the canvas and paint that echo this sentiment.’

Personal textiles

Hale takes particular inspiration from old photos and the narratives that they initiate. She works with found photographs and also likes making up her own stories and thinking about a particular time and place in history as an immigrant woman. She favours found domestic textiles like handkerchiefs or patterned bed sheets, using these as her canvas because of the feelings of home and intimacy they invoke and their personal and bodily history.

‘I started working with embroidery and crochet to relax and move away from screens. Over time, they bled into my artwork replacing drawing and paper.’

For her artwork Pinky Promise Hale chose a silkscreen printed photograph stitched onto a vintage handkerchief and further embellished with glass beads, embroidery, sequins and crochet.

‘I taught a workshop at Textile Center Minneapolis to a group of women. I loved a photograph of the grandmother of one participant and asked if I could use that. I was drawn to the intimacy between the two women in it, but also the ambiguity in their relationship, especially considering that the family had this image. The handkerchief was a gift from an older woman who had so many domestic textiles that she just wanted us to take anything we could use. I loved her generosity but also appreciated the hardship of letting things go.’

Pinky Promise has been exhibited at Hale’s 2022 solo exhibition Between You and I at Comfort Station, Chicago as well as in open studios following her artist residency at Spudnik Press, Chicago.

Hale Ekinci is a multidisciplinary Chicago-based Turkish artist, designer and educator. She works as Associate Professor of Art & Design at North Central College, Chicago. In 2022 she was Artist in Residence at Spudnik Press Cooperative in Chicago, and in 2023 she is the Engaged Artist-in-Residence at Indiana University. 

Artist website: hale-ekinci.com

Instagram: @haleekinci_art

Joan Schulze

Quilt pioneer

The work of Joan Schulze proves that contemporary textile art can actually span half a century. A pioneer of the art quilt movement, this is her primary vehicle of self expression. Joan keeps her work fresh and engaging by starting each project with a new mind – or in her own words, ‘a clean slate – both actual and metaphorical’. It helps her to reinvent or re-imagine that which she already knows. 

Joan has experimented with collage, quilt making, photography and photocopy processes, painting, Xerox transfer and digital technology. Photography is key to her work and her images are often transferred onto fabric or paper. She enjoys working in textile art as it provides the greatest scope.

The subjects Joan explores are many, varied and personal, and she often writes a short poem upon completion of a quilt, as she did with her trilogy of quilts, one of which is Not So Long Ago. This artwork is inspired by a small Tang Dynasty bowl gifted to her by the museum director at her solo show in Shenzhen, China in 2016. Her intention is to immortalise the precious artefact and pay homage to the culture that it comes from.

‘It reveals its many facets as I incorporate transformed bowl images in this on-going series. The many lines interact with the bowls and quietly tell a story by me, the writer and photographer.’

Joan Schulze:

Silk, batting and backing

Joan began the project with digitally altered photographs which she printed onto silk using a photocopier. The photocopy processes and Xerox transfers that Joan uses enable her to juxtapose, overlap, duplicate, add, remove, layer, and paint the images. She combines them onto a large surface which she then layers over batting and backing, finishing with machine quilting and hand stitching. The black and white palette creates a dramatic image of the bowl from different angles, sides and in various sizes. The patterned bowl was originally wrapped in layers of Chinese-language newsprint and images from this have been taken to use in the background.

‘I use silk and sometimes paper, though not in this quilt, and I start with white silk. I am still using silk from a bolt I bought years ago.’

The other two quilts in the trilogy are A Long Time Ago and Once Upon The Unknowable Future. Joan still has the first two and the latter is in the collection of the International Quilt Museum, Lincoln, Nebraska.

Joan’s bowl continues to inspire other quilts which are part of ongoing series; the Opus series and the Bowl series.

Joan Schulze is an artist, poet and photographer who has gained international prominence as a studio artist, teacher, lecturer and juror. Her studio is in San Francisco, California and she has a home studio in Sunnyvale, California. Over the decades she has been published in many catalogues and publications, and is included in public and private collections in the US, Europe and Japan.

Artist website: joan-of-arts.com

Facebook: Joan Schulze Artist

Instagram: @myart_works13

Gurjeet Singh

Fantastical stuffed heads

Wonky eyes (maybe two, or even six of them), stuffed fabric noses and cactus-shaped ears, necklaces spilling from lips, bells for teeth, a scattering of buttons and… could that be a doll’s torso emerging from the head? Tartan, paisley, florals, plains, brocade and damask – if these recycled fabrics and findings land on Gurjeet Singh’s desk, you can be sure they’ll be fashioned into the most fantastical of giant-sized stuffed heads.

Emerging artist, Gurjeet Singh, is one to watch. Exploring the themes of love, identity, storytelling and his own experiences of growing up queer in the village of Algon Kothi, Punjab, he works with scrap fabrics and reject beads and buttons to create soft sculptures sewn entirely by hand. 

And they’re unique. For when Gurjeet sits down to develop a sculpture, it’s an organic process.

Organic, soft sculptures

Gurjeet Singh: ‘Soft sculptures have come through so naturally. I remember the first time I made a key chain for my best friend by joining two leather pieces. It was awe-inspiring and unforgettable. I enjoyed the process and each step of making it so much that it generated a desire for more. So I took some pieces of clothing from my family and developed a head form. 

‘I find the process, idea, creativity, inspiration and excitement of making these sculptures familiar and powerful. It starts with an idea that’s often about making a story into a sculpture. Seldom does the formation process itself bring up new stories and emotions.

‘Black Lips represents the story of my friend, who had always wanted to become a make-up artist but, due to family pressure, society and other circumstances beyond his control, he was unable to. In Black Lips I tried to portray those emotions. The black lips represent desires that have been repressed. The expressions reveal the unheard words and helpless heart.

‘I started with drawings related to the idea and its possibilities including shape, form and material requirements. 

‘The selection of the right material and clothing is a pivotal and basic premise of my sculpture. In Black Lips I used discarded clothes including my own trousers, plus fabrics and other leftover pieces I had.

‘I filled it with cotton to give it the desired form, and used colourful threads for embroidery, along with beautiful beads and buttons for details.’

Gurjeet Singh is a visual artist based in Chandigarh, India. His first solo exhibition This is What It’s Like To Be Fabulous was held at Chemould CoLab, Mumbai in December 2022, and in the same month he presented works in a group exhibition at Museum of Art & Photography (MAP), Bangalore.

He was commissioned to create the cover artwork for Issue 3: A Final Freedom of the Dirty Magazine, Mumbai, and his self portrait featured in the November 2022 edition of Harper’s Bazaar (@bazaarindia), The Art Issue.

Instagram: @softgurjeet

Vanessa Barragão

New life

Her distress at discovering the amount of waste created by the fashion industry was the catalyst for Vanessa Barragão’s decision to become an ecological textile artist. From then on she committed to only working with recycled or otherwise discarded yarns collected from textile factories across Portugal.

Her works employ techniques including crochet, latch hooking, weaving, knitting, felting and hand-tufting. Her passion for marine life and the complex structure of coral reefs are her inspiration to create artisanal tapestries, rugs, wall hangings and textile sculptures. Each, while aesthetically appealing, is intended to highlight the fact that the global textile industry has severely affected marine ecosystems.

Vanessa’s Afterlife collection was conceived because she often ruminated on the subject of life after death.

Vanessa Barragão: ‘I remember as a child I was very afraid of the concept of death. I often asked: ‘What comes next? Can death really be the end of everything?’. This fear made me research the subject. Reading a lot of different opinions helped me accept and live more comfortably with this inevitability.

‘In my process, I intend to show that the end is a new beginning. From waste, trash and leftovers my creativity starts growing and my artwork is born.

‘It’s my belief that the end is a new beginning. In our lives, death is probably not the end either but the mark of a new beginning.’

Carving and sculpting

In her Afterlife collection Vanessa mainly uses the techniques of latch hook, crochet and felting, as well as other fibre manipulation that allows her to better translate her ideas. Her materials are mostly leftover wastes from factories located around Portugal.

‘My creative process starts with an idea of the colours I want to use and what I would like to represent. I then outline the canvas, cut it to a shape and begin creating. Throughout the process, my idea becomes more defined, and sometimes new colours are added. I love to be free during the creative process as each piece takes some time to be done.

‘The last stage is the one that really brings it to life: the carving and sculpting. It’s an amazing feeling when the work is actually complete. That’s when I meet my creation and I realise what was going through my unconscious mind during its creation.

‘Textile-focused handcrafts are my preferred media to express my thoughts and vision. Learning new techniques and creating from fibre has always been a passion of mine. I get most of my inspiration from nature and, more specifically, the ocean. I like to be in contact with both these elements as much as I can to get ideas and to be as creative as possible.

‘Seeing these environments affected because of our human path is one of the key motivations to create my work. I believe that through my artwork, I can raise awareness and impact people and businesses to change their actions.’

Vanessa Barragão is based in Albufeira, Portugal. She has exhibited in numerous group shows and completed multiple commissions. Her Afterlife collection was presented at Art Paris 2023. It will also be shown at This Is Not A White Cube gallery in Lisbon.

Artist website: vanessabarragao.com

Instagram: @vanessabarragao_work

Facebook: facebook.com/vanessabarragaoartist

Patricia Kelly

Reductive art

Picture a small hand holding a charcoal stick, delighting in its mark-making as it moves across a drawing board, and you’ll get an idea of the uncomplicated beauty of Patricia Kelly’s work. With a simplicity reminiscent of child’s play, she allows her sewing machine needle to wend its way across a sandwich of fabrics, contrasting black on white or white on black.

Freeing herself with the simplicity of lines, circles and sometimes pure unapologetic and decadent doodling, abstract machine stitch has become the trademark of this Northern Irish textile artist.

Light, colour and texture

Patricia’s inspiration comes from the changing colour, light and texture of the rugged landscape and skies in the west of Ireland. Growing up on a farm, she was involved with the land in a very physical and tactile way, making hay and stacking turf. She attributes her earthy, textural and repetitive style to these experiences.

‘My work has become much more abstract in recent times with a greater focus on the use of the stitched line. The repetitive use of shape and mark has become increasingly important and helps to imbue a meditative and ethereal quality.’

Patricia Kelly

At Play is a small piece created in 2023. As Patricia focused increasingly on larger pieces with a measured grid arrangement, she began one with a different black stitched pattern in each square. But it looked ‘too much’ and she left it half completed. She took a photo of a detail of this piece which suggested to her the design for At Play. She went on to complete this in a smaller size and it’s been submitted to a juried exhibition.

At Play is made on a cream background of calico and hessian and is stitched in black thread. Patricia has applied a contrasting stitched fragment in the centre.

The piece proved extremely popular on Instagram and Patricia plans to create larger works, 64cm x 90cm, with the same energy.

Patricia Kelly is a textile artist based in County Fermanagh, Northern Ireland. She has a BA Honours degree in Fine Craft Design, specialising in embroidered textiles. She has had two solo exhibitions in Northern Ireland in 2022 and her work has been selected for an international textile exhibition at Amelie Maison in Paris. 

Artist website: patriciakellytextile.com

Instagram: @patriciakelly_artist

Facebook: facebook.com/patricia.kelly.textiles

Meri Sawatzky

Sensory pleasures of texture

A self taught, intuitive artist, Meri Sawatzky found her way into art through play. She creates because she enjoys it. She is curious and that guides her hand when creating her detailed embroideries.

Meri’s art evolved from being simply a means of release into a desire to express her obsession with the dream state of life and her scepticism of what’s deemed by so many to be reality. She hopes to inspire intrigue through her combination of materials – textiles often blended with plaster, gel mediums and acrylic paint. As she explores the sensory pleasures of texture, her work brings calm to the chaos and invokes a meditative state in the viewer. 

Living next to the Pacific Ocean on Vancouver Island, Canada, Meri thrifts or is gifted all her materials. She uses as many natural fibres and ingredients as possible.

Little lines of thread

Meri Sawatzky: ‘Information Landscape started as a vague mental image derived from topographical maps and vintage cartography. Once I had sat with that for a while, I started stitching and let myself forget the original impetus, allowing it to take its own shape. Only once I was about halfway done did I develop a story. 

‘To me, it looks like clouds of information going upwards, forming a canyon shape. The image happens to be taken while a crack in the paradigm flashes, a glitch, revealing one of the layers of time in the bottom right corner.

‘Both the linen and hoop were given to me by two lovely neighbours. One that loves finding fabric in thrift stores and one that owns a vintage drum shop.’

‘I stretched linen over a vintage bass drum hoop, used a bit of acrylic paint and embroidery floss. The technique is pretty straightforward. Just a whole lot of little lines of thread.’

Meri Sawatzky is a self-taught textile artist living in Vancouver Island, British Columbia, US. Information Landscape was shown in a local art show.

Artist website: paleillusions.com

Facebook: facebook.com/paleillusions

Instagram: @paleillusionsart

Key takeaways

Our featured artists have shared a range of inspiration that you can apply to your own textile art practice. Let’s take a look at some of their tips and techniques.

• There’s no need to let your lack of a textile or fine art study hold you back. Kristine, Meri and Joan learned through curiosity and play, allowing the materials, the stitches and the story to come to them as they worked. Make time for art play each week and give yourself the freedom to create whatever you want.

• Embrace your limitations. Kristine and Meri used a restricted range of stitches and still created dynamic work. Which are your favourite stitches? Can you work just using those?

• Can you, like Vanessa, Meri and Gurjeet, use thrifted or gifted materials? Consider asking upholsterers, fashion companies, seamstresses or even family, friends and neighbours for their textile waste.

• Hale gains her inspiration from old photos and Joan uses photos digitally to create her art quilts. How can you use photos in your work? Take a look at these artists who describe their processes for printing images and Wen Redmond who makes striking digital textile art.

Do you feel inspired to try any of the materials or techniques mentioned above? Let us know in the comments below.

It’s hard to think about ‘collage’ outside of its verb tense. Even a finished artwork still hums and buzzes as the different elements mesh together. The eye shifts back and forth between viewing the work as a whole and then noticing the distinct pieces. Visual magic!

The collage process is all action. Artists first sort through beloved collections and stashes of materials to choose select treasures to be featured. Then those treasures audition for their place in the composition. Ephemera of all types are layered, swapped, snipped and reshuffled to see how colours, patterns and textures dance together. Once the pieces are in position, how to keep them all in place? Sewing? Glueing? Machine stitch? Hand stitch? The possibilities are endless, and that’s what makes collage a great way to explore textile art and develop your artistic voice.

We’ve gathered six renowned collage artists who are not only sharing their work but also their best tips for starting your own collage journey. Mandy Pattullo and Barbara Shaw especially enjoy working with vintage and recycled materials, while Anne Brooke shares her love of working with various papers. Marcia Bennett-Male describes her connection with African appliqué techniques, while Cas Holmes demonstrates her use of surface design using paint and other media. Deborah Boschert brings it home by sharing her raw-edge fused appliqué technique and use of personal symbols.

Mandy Pattullo

Mandy Pattullo made scrapbooks as a child with her grandmother, and she still collects tickets, images, postcards, fabric swatches and other ephemera today. She had also been sewing and doing patchwork, so transitioning to fabric for collage made sense.

‘I think collage and patchwork share a history. Both are about arranging things and juxtaposing colour, tone and pattern. But patchwork is more prescriptive, whereas my freer approach of layering materials from many different sources is textile collage.’

Mandy carefully sources interesting fabrics, and she’s committed to only using recycled materials or what she has to hand. She also only works with hand stitch. Having run vintage fairs with a friend, Mandy’s stash includes old quilts from the north, which have become part of her visual language. She is also particularly fond of thrift quilts that are less designed, as well as scraps left over from dressmaking or tailoring.

‘Quilts are collages themselves, but as I cut them up and unpick them, I feel a connection to the previous maker. I then put my own mark on them by rearranging the pieces and decorating the surface with stitches.’

Rather than working to a theme or brief, Mandy says her projects always come out of the fabric itself and its conjunction to other pieces. She’ll start by jostling fabric pieces next to each other to discover interesting colour combinations. Sometimes a piece arises out of a need to incorporate something in particular, like a piece of old needlepoint or embroidery. Other projects are inspired by old garments begging for transformation through collage and stitch.

‘I find collage to be liberating as I arrange things to explore the juxtaposition of colour, tone and pattern. And as a collector, I am driven to use my beloved collections of materials, cutting them up and collaging them into new and resolved compositions.’

Mandy believes having interesting materials that inspire is the key to creating a successful textile collage. If you can’t source old things easily, then look to charity shops. Once you have your materials, unpick, overdye, cut or tear fabrics into different sizes and mix them up in a basket. Then using a firm foundation such as a piece of old blanket or quilt, work instinctively as you pin a selection of pieces from the basket. Once you have something that’s appealing, leave for 24 hours and then return to view the composition with fresh eyes.

Hand stitching also makes collage work more personal, so Mandy encourages artists to develop stitch samples and then only work with stitches they really love. A limited repertoire of simple stitches can be used in so many ways.

Mandy Pattullo is based in rural Northumberland, UK. In addition to exhibiting her work, she teaches textile workshops at The Hearth and throughout the UK and France. Mandy has written two books: Textile Collage (2016) and Textiles Transformed (2020).

Artist website: mandypattullo.co.uk/

Facebook: facebook.com/MandyPattulloTextileArtist

Instagram: @mandypattullo

Marcia Bennett-Male

Collage is a great technique for artists wanting to both celebrate and rage against life events. Each collage element can hold its own symbolic meaning, and then collectively, raise voice to emotions that are otherwise hard to express.

UK artist Marcia Bennett-Male uses textile collage as her ‘art therapy’. Her works examine depression, suicide, self-harm and self-hatred as she navigates the world as a Black female. Her art also depicts important historical women and goddesses of myth and legend.

‘I started my textile pieces in 2004 to aid my severe depression. I was going through therapy and on medication before I even knew what art therapy was. I just knew sewing helped. After a long hiatus, I again picked up a needle in 2019 to help me deal with perimenopause, Black Lives Matter and other world events crashing into my life. I use my doll-like figures like ventriloquists’ dummies to comment on my life and surroundings.’

A stone carver by trade, Marcia enjoys the speed and colours of her collage technique. Sculpting stone is infinitely slower and more intricate than using a needle and thread. And the colours of her beloved felts provide a rich contrast to neutral stone hues.

Marcia starts with a thumbnail sketch, working up to a final drawing. She then makes a working tracing of the drawing and then templates of the individual pieces. Cut fabric pieces are then layered sequentially like a complicated puzzle. Marcia describes her process as ‘choreography’.

‘I predominantly work with felt and an African fabric called Dutch wax fabric. It’s a distinct batik-like fabric that uses melted wax for designs. I use it as a shorthand to denote my Black heritage and background. I also use upholstery chintz to denote I was born and live in England. I like how the two fabrics bounce off each other.’

Marcia also adds treasures from her mother’s button box that she inherited for her figure’s eyes and breasts. Other unique embellishments include netting, lace, beadwork, leather, and even metal washers.

Once the collage pieces are in place, the hand stitching begins. Marcia prefers using six-stranded cotton embroidery threads, splitting them when necessary to help the colours pop, and to accommodate different fabric weights. She also deliberately uses a range of simple stitches: back, blanket, chain and couching. Despite completing ‘O’ and ‘A’ levels in embroidery at secondary school and studying theatre wardrobe at the Wimbledon School of Art, Marcia believes less is more.

‘I even studied ecclesiastical embroidery, and I did use elaborate stitches when I started. But they slowed me down. So instead, I turned to the Asafo flag makers of Ghana, Africa, for inspiration of style and execution of work.’

In terms of advice for exploring collage, Marcia recommends working with felt. It’s easy to manipulate and cut, it doesn’t fray much, and it comes in many colours. She also suggests getting comfortable with playing with composition, pattern and colour, and then start to introduce other fabrics and haberdashery for embellishment.

Marcia Bennett-Male is an artist working in both textiles and stone, and is based in London, UK. She was interviewed in Embroidery magazine (January/February 2022) and staged a solo gallery show at the Knitting & Stitching Shows in London and Harrogate in 2022. Her work sells in the UK and internationally, including to Hollywood actor Chiwetel Ejiofor, who owns two of her artworks.

Artist website: mbennettmale.co.uk

Instagram: @marciabennettmaletextile

Cas Holmes

Cas Holmes describes her work as ‘painting with cloth’, combining textiles and stitch with painting and drawing. Her processes and ideas are interconnected throughout her work, which largely uses reclaimed cloth, paper and found materials.

Driven by an innate love of textiles, painting and drawing, Cas sees her work as sitting between fine art painting and stitch craft. Her references come from the everyday world, and the visual and physical connection between her work and the landscape is essential.

‘Fabric provides one of the most versatile surfaces for manipulation. When combined with found materials and mixed media such as paint and dye, the substrate textiles allow surfaces to take up new dimensions, being reformed and transformed.’

Cas is especially interested in her immediate surroundings and exploring the processes of change. She also draws inspiration from physical experiences, situations and memory of place. Carrying a small portable art kit allows Cas to capture things of interest in her garden or while travelling. She makes quick drawings, records notes and stores images, much like a diary, marking her progress.

Most projects start with a limited number of found or gifted materials. Cas believes limiting her resources or time can lead to unexpected outcomes. She’ll then make a series of quick small test collages by pinning or glueing things together, and then she chooses the best samples to explore further. Cas also enjoys working into surfaces with brushes and mark-making tools in a freehand fashion, as well as altering cloth and paper with paint or dye.

‘The depth and tactility of textiles and their manipulation provides a whole new dimension to the surface. This is particularly useful when I’m trying to portray the shapes and forms we see in landscapes as they unfurl around us.’

When asked for advice on exploring textile collage, Cas stresses the importance of experimenting with both materials and processes. Make a list of what is important to you, such as colour, mark-making or texture, and then use that list to create multiple samples. The process does not need to be exact. Also set simple goals to explore, such as seeing how a stencil and acrylic paint work on different fabric surfaces. Then once you find a technique or material you like, you can explore it yet further.

Cas Holmes is based in Kent, UK. She exhibits her work internationally, including the Sevenoaks Kaleidoscope Gallery (2022-23, UK) and the Barony Centre –Craft Town Scotland (2023). Cas also teaches internationally, and she has written several books, including Embroidering the Everyday: Found, Stitch and Paint (2021).

Artist website: casholmes.wordpress.com

Facebook: facebook.com/casholmestextiles

Instagram: @casholmestextiles

Anne Brooke

Inspired by a love for working with paper and mixed media, and an admiration for paper collage artist Elaine Hughes, Anne Brooke began to experiment with a mix of paper, fabric and stitch. Anne initially worked wholly in paper with machine embroidery, but over time, she has incorporated printing, linocut stamps and fabrics.

Anne’s works revolve around a love of drawing, paper and observing nature’s treasures. And her inspiration comes from simply taking a step out the front door. As she wanders, she collects, draws and photographs the various ‘overlooked treasures’ found along the way.

‘Paper is an ideal place to start with collage work. You’re more likely to take risks and not worry as much about getting things wrong. It’s also helpful to look at other artists’ works and then try to put your own twist on their approaches. Find out what you are drawn to, and then be patient and stay open to incorporating new ideas.’

Anne’s sketchbooks are her first port of call for developing her ideas. She then gathers a collection of papers based on a colour theme. Wallpaper, old book papers, postcards, envelopes and other recycled ephemera help to build her collage base. She enjoys knowing the materials she uses have been on journeys of their own before landing in her collection. Maps are also often included to represent a journey, as well as vintage fabrics and lace to add a tactile quality.

After playing around with the composition, she’ll add printed and hand-drawn elements. Finally, hand stitching using hand-dyed threads and other embellishments are added to create a relief effect that brings the whole work to life.

Anne Brooke is a textile artist and tutor based in Brighouse, West Yorkshire (UK). Stitching has been a major part of Anne’s life for over a decade, and in 2020, she set herself a challenge to stitch each week. That led to her launching several online global stitching projects and challenges, including #52tagshannemade.

Artist website: annebrooke.co.uk

Facebook: facebook.com/hannemade

Instagram: @hannemadebyanne

Barbara Shaw

When viewing Barbara Shaw’s work from a distance, you’d think it was an Impressionist painting. But when you look more closely, instead of layered paints, you’ll discover hundreds of tiny fabric scraps layered atop one another to create glorious shapes and colours.

Most of Barbara’s work starts with some sort of visual inspiration: something seen or a special piece of fabric that suggests an image. She especially loves recreating buildings of all shapes and styles. Black-and-white beamed houses have held particular interest of late, but she’s equally happy interpreting bricks, wood and thatch.

Barbara’s urge to create is so strong that she avoids using a sketchbook. She instead dives straight into designing, grabbing various fabric scraps of different colours and textures from her very large collection. Then she starts cutting small pieces and pinning them together one by one on a fabric background. Much as a painter builds colour and texture, Barbara builds her composition scrap upon scrap. Once pleased with the overall composition, all the bits of fabric are hand stitched into place with a running stitch.

‘Hand stitching gives me control over how tightly or loosely I pull the thread so the different weights and textures of the fabrics I use aren’t crushed. I use a grey thread, and the knots and thread become part of the work.’

Despite not using a sketchbook, Barbara still researches her subjects, often using photographs as a guide to help measure proportions. In her mind, she carefully notes the colours and details of a subject’s shape and character. Then she turns to her incredible fabric stash, which includes printed cottons, batiks, silk, lace, chiffon, organza, beaded fabric and sparkly pieces. Many of her fabrics are recycled, and she encourages beginning artists to also use old textiles.

‘Textile collage allows you to use waste scraps to experiment, and if you don’t like the end result, it can be discarded without worry about what you spent. Start with a simple colour palette and see if you enjoy the process of layering, pinning and hand stitching. With practice, you’ll learn what works for you and develop your own artistic voice.’

Barbara also suggests when finishing a collage, artists should ask themselves: ‘Is this the best I can do, and does it say what I want it to say?’ This is one of the best ways to develop your own authentic style.

Barbara Shaw is based in Herefordshire, UK. She has been artist-in-residence at two National Trust properties (Chastleton House and Claydon House), and her work has been exhibited in several UK museums, including the Oxford Museum of Natural History. Barbara appeared in the BBC’s Junk Rescue show (2019), which led to taking part in the BBC Summer Social where she taught over 400 children to create textile collages.

Artist website: artintextiles.co.uk

Facebook: facebook.com/artintextiles

Instagram: @art_in_textiles

Deborah Boschert

The best part of the collage process for Deborah Boschert is the opportunity to explore how materials, shapes, colours and patterns interact. Her art quilts feature layers of fabric, paint and stitch that create remarkable texture and dimension. Added symbolism, including houses, leaves, ladders and bowls, allows Deborah to share her unique personal narratives.

‘My symbols serve as anchors for my work, and they come from significant personal experiences. For example, my house quilts were made during a time when my husband and I were moving around a lot. But I purposely feature symbols that are simple and spare, so viewers can create their own meanings from their own experiences. They don’t have to know what my original intent was to be able to engage with my work.’

When inspiration hits, Deborah first sets parameters for a work related to its size, colour palette or theme. She then starts sketching simple and small compositions, usually with a black pen, none of which offer specifics in terms of size or colour.

Once a design feels right, Deborah gathers a ‘fabric palette’, which includes a variety of commercial prints and fabrics she’s printed with original surface design. Those fabrics are scrunched, folded, sliced, arranged and pinned on her design wall in the general arrangement of the sketched composition.

After everything is in place, Deborah finesses each shape and fuses all the fabrics to a batting. She then takes a picture of the fabric layer and prints several copies on which she doodles and auditions various stitch designs. After stitch plans are finalised, hand embroidery happens first, and when complete, a fabric backing is fused to the quilt, and the quilt is finished with machine stitching.

Deborah teaches workshops across the globe, and her best advice to students is to explore, experiment and see what happens. Developing a unique creative voice is a process that takes intention and patience. Think about what you want to express: which visual elements, materials and techniques work for you.

Another good tip is to set parameters for a project ahead of time. Maybe limit the size, the colour palette or techniques to help you figure out your best options. Limitations can help eliminate the paralysis of choice and keep you moving forward.

Deborah Boschert is based in Dallas, TX (US). Her award-winning quilts have been exhibited in quilt shows and art galleries internationally. She has appeared on Quilting Arts TV and The Quilt Show, and she authored Art Quilt Collage: A Creative Journey in Fabric, Paint and Stitch (2016). Deborah also teaches across the globe, and she serves on the Studio Art Quilt Association (SAQA) board.

Artist website: deborahsstudio.com

Facebook: facebook.com/DeborahBoschertArtist

Instagram: @deborahboschert

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Want to explore the possibilities of working with photographs in stitch collage? Check out Gregory Wilkins’s amazing textile collages.

Textile artists have long forged their own way, but they can be especially rebellious when it comes to 3D art. In addition to amazing aesthetics, textile sculptures also feature a remarkable nod to engineering.

Very few traditional sculpting materials can compare to textiles’ unique combination of strength and lightness. Woven fabrics can be remarkably durable, yet also float upon the slightest breeze. Even a single thread weighing less than a butterfly’s wing can bring muscle to a sculpture. Textiles can also be manipulated in incredible ways through folding, pleating, tearing and more.

Yet, along with all the positives, there’s a real challenge textile sculptors face: figuring out how to help fabrics maintain intricate shapes and forms. But that’s where 3D textile art gets even more exciting, as sculptors brainstorm ingenious ways to help fabrics hold themselves upright in their manipulated splendour.

Meet five textile sculptors whose 3D works will both surprise and delight. Amanda McCavour fills a huge exhibit space with literally thousands of blue objects made entirely from thread, and Leisa Rich introduces us to her luxurious vinyl river monster. Bryony Jenning’s incredible storyland wolf is made from vintage fabrics, while Benjamin Shine uses tulle to capture the intricacies of his grandmother’s hands. Kinga Foldi concludes our 3D journey with an exquisite silk mushroom.

Amanda McCavour

Amanda McCavour’s textile installations feature a wonderful mix of art and engineering. She is fearless in imagining how to fill very large spaces with her work, yet it’s remarkable how the end results retain a sense of intimacy and wonder.

Far Away Blue Fields features over 2,500 separate pieces positioned along walking pathways that immerse viewers in the art. Fifteen people helped attach strings to each piece, and then Amanda and an assistant climbed up and down ladders to tie each thread to a ceiling grid. It took a week to install the entire artwork.

‘I see the installation as part of the making process. We mapped accessible pathways on the floor, and then I established a high and low point for the embroideries. But it’s challenging to see depth from atop a ladder, so when I’d step down, many additional adjustments were needed.’

This work represents an imagined blue world where the sky touches the earth at the horizon line. It was inspired by Rebecca Solnit’s book A Field Guide to Getting Lost in which the author describes ‘the blue of land that seems to be dissolving into the sky’.

Amanda first adapted previous works and tested different shapes using radial stitch patterns. Scale and movement were also tested by hanging pieces from her studio ceiling. She then shared sketches and photos of her tests with the Centre MATERIA gallery in Quebec City where the work would be exhibited. After much discussion, she returned to her studio to start fabricating the embroideries.

The lacy structures were created with free-motion embroidery stitched onto water-soluble stabiliser. The crossing threads create strength, so when the fabric is dissolved in water, only the thread structures remain. Once the pieces dried, Amanda used a hair straightening flat iron and manual tension to mould the shapes into 3D forms.

‘The dissolving process is both a challenge and delight. There’s an element of chance, as the work always shifts and changes as the base layer is slowly removed.

Sometimes unexpected things happen as the threads move and wiggle around. I like that because there’s a part of my making personality that can be quite controlling. It helps me let go and see its magic!’

Amanda’s love of drawing and exploration of ‘line’ in its simplest sense led her to consider working with thread. She loves thread’s fine nature and how, while it appears to be flat, it’s actually a sculptural line. She also enjoys how the transparent pieces move with even the slightest air currents in a room. 

‘I see this piece as an abstracted landscape, but I also like how the forms could reference florals, butterflies, jellyfish or simply abstract forms. I also think the work has a breath. It contracts and fits in a small space, and then when it is installed, it breathes out to expand and fill the space.’

Amanda McCavour is based in Toronto, Canada. She has created site specific works across the globe, including The Chazen Museum of Art (Madison, WI, US), Centre MATERIA (Quebec City, Canada) and the Columbia Museum of Art (South Carolina, US).

Artist website: amandamccavour.com

Facebook: facebook.com/amandamccavourart/

Instagram: @amandamccavour

Leisa Rich

When Leisa Rich visited the Disney theme park in 1965, she was five years old and newly able to hear from one ear. Leisa had been deaf since birth, so being able to both see and hear the attractions was beyond amazing. She was especially moved by the It’s a Small World ride and says she has never lost her delight in discovering its bright exotic characters and ‘tinny music’.

‘I think I became an artist because my deafness heightened all my other senses, and I still see the world in that fantasy fashion. I live my life like an adult-child existing in a perpetually fantastic, albeit crazy and depressing, world. I think that’s also why I don’t experience creative block.

I see wonder in everything, even in silverware tongs or the wrinkles on my skin.’

Great Saint Lawrence came to life when Leisa moved back to her birth country of Canada where she bought a 96-year-old farmhouse along the Saint Lawrence River in Ontario. She was amazed by the river’s ever-changing, mercurial elements that flashed silver in ways that looked like large moving shapeshifters. One day it seemed as if a monster emerged from the reflective surface and begged Leisa to recreate him.

Leisa used metallic vinyl to create the individual hanging pieces, and then she stuffed each with traditional batting. But before sewing everything together on her beloved vintage Bernina 807, Leisa grabbed a very sharp pair of dressmaker shears and sliced into the vinyl. She had planned to do so to create a feathery feeling, but she was later rewarded to discover the slits made the pieces swirl and curl as viewers walked by the sculpture.

‘This is very typical for me, as I’m always thinking about the experience people have when seeing my work. I want my art to offer both a visual and tactile interactive experience.’

Vinyl has long been one of Leisa’s favourite materials. Its rigidity and softness allow her to create works that hold their shape, the edges don’t fray and there are so many surface design options. But vinyl can be tricky, especially when it sticks to itself.

‘Even after many years of sewing, I still find myself fighting with the vinyl at times. I use free-motion machine embroidery with lowered feed dogs and a darning or embroidery foot to give me better control. Sometimes, I’ll also use tear-away fabric on the plastic side to help the machine grip the vinyl. This is especially helpful for the complex twists and curves I feature in my work.’

Leisa Rich is based in Howe Island, Ontario, Canada. Her works are featured in many permanent collections, including the Dallas Museum of Art (US), Delta Airlines, Inc., and the Kamm Foundation. Leisa holds a Master of Fine Arts (University of North Texas, US), Bachelor of Fine Arts (University of Michigan, US), and a Bachelor of Education in Art (University of Western Ontario, Canada). She is also a published author and has taught for 48 years. 

Artist website: monaleisa.com

Facebook: facebook.com/Leisa-Rich-Visual-Artist-and-Art-Educator

Instagram: @monaleisa2

Bryony Jennings

Bryony Jennings’s signature textile menagerie is filled with a variety of ‘beasties’ whose charms are irresistible. From mice to owls to rabbits and foxes, each of her figures has something to say with a wink and a nod.

‘My storylands are a cathartic means to communicate my thoughts and feelings to the world. Animals carry their own burden of human symbolism that I combine with my own ideas to suggest character and, perhaps, a little soul. My stories are non-prescriptive, and I hope viewers receive and interpret a meaning that transcends the physical object alone.’

Bryonny’s purposeful use of reclaimed textiles to create her creatures adds to their appeal. She enjoys knowing the fabrics she uses bear imprints of lives previously encountered, infusing a sense of history into each animal. Most of her materials have been handed down, bought in thrift shops or kindly donated.

‘Car boot sales were a weekly highlight of my childhood so, by nature, I’m a gatherer and collector of the worn out, unloved and discarded. I find beauty in the detritus of the everyday, including old clothes, household linens and timeworn draperies carrying the marks of time and discarded memories.’

Ulfred started from a gifted gunmetal-grey beaded table runner that spoke ‘wolf’ to Bryony. She first created a skeleton by intuitively bending and twisting wire to form a solid base. From there she added flesh by wrapping the armature with reclaimed fabric scraps, securing them with stitch, and then adding stuffing to create a very solid undressed body shape.

Bryony then brought Ulfred’s form to life by adding his features and more layers of fabric skin that gave colour and texture to his coat. Everything is held together with a needle and thread. Bryony uses an array of upholstery and darning needles, along with upholstery threads, for sculpting and construction. Then six-ply embroidery cottons are used for visible and functional stitching.

Bryony chose the name Ulfred, which means ‘wolf of peace’ in old English, to suggest he carried no malice.  

‘I aimed to make a creature with a strong physical presence whose eyes and penetrating gaze try to subvert any trepidation in a curious and unthreatening manner. He is quite an unwieldy beast, and his sheer size and weight made it quite an awkward creative process.

Balancing a wolf on his back whilst trying to stitch in between his claws is trickier than one might think! Every creature I make teaches me something new.’

Speaking of teaching, Bryony leads a variety of 3D sculptural workshops. When using textiles, she finds students’ greatest challenge is letting go of the ‘rules’ associated with textile work, especially experienced stitchers. Bryony stresses to her students one can’t be too precious with materials when working with sculpture. Experimentation and taking chances are the only ways to learn and succeed.

Bryony Jennings is based in Portsmouth, UK, where she works as both an artist and international educator. Bryony was featured on the cover of Embroidery magazine (Sept/Oct 2022), and she had a solo exhibition at the Bodleian Library Shops (Oxford, UK) in 2022 featuring eight giant library mice.

Artist website: prettyscruffy.com

Facebook: facebook.com/BryonyRoseTextileMenagerie

Instagram: @bryonyrosejennings

Benjamin Shine

The word ‘ethereal’ takes on a whole new meaning when viewing Benjamin Shine’s floating tulle sculptures. Tulle is known for its fragile and transparent look, but its overall nature can also create remarkably distinct lines and complex shading when twisted, folded and otherwise manipulated.

‘I want my work to look like smoke, and I think tulle lends itself to ideas of smoke’s impermanence. Its inherent translucency can suggest a surreal, inky effect, as if energy momentarily forms into something recognisable before dissipating into nothing.’

Benjamin’s creative process is as ethereal as his art. He intuitively directs long swaths of tulle against a canvas and then uses a basic clothes iron to fuse various folds, bends and twists. The dry iron heat warms the tulle in a way that when it cools, it becomes more rigid and sets the shape of the fold or scrunch, which further helps everything else stay fixed in place as a sculpture.

Benjamin certainly has war stories of lifting an iron away from an area worked on for hours, only to find a big hole! But practice has lessened those instances, along with his habit of triple checking the iron’s setting is on ‘synthetic.’

‘There are two stories told in my art: what I make happen and what the tulle makes happen. Prior to creating Remembrance, I had been trying to see how accurate and detailed I could be. But this work exposed an in-between approach in which I allowed the natural flow of the fabric to be more present. I guided the tulle more than forced it to capture its inherent materiality and energy.’

Remembrance was initially designed for the now-closed SCIN Gallery (London, UK). While out walking one day, a large artwork in SCIN’s window caught Benjamin’s eye. Upon entering the building, Benjamin discovered the upstairs gallery showcased interesting textiles, artworks, and objects inspired by a ‘materials library’ for architects and interior designers housed in the building’s basement.

Benjamin wanted to be a part of the gallery’s creative use of materials, and the gallery owner was excited about Benjamin’s work as well. Inspired by the gallery’s name, Benjamin sought to create a work emphasising texture, hands and touch. He researched a variety of hand poses that evoked a sense of gentleness, calm and contemplation. But he ultimately chose an image of his grandmother’s hands to conjure a sense of thought and remembrance.

‘It was created as an installation, so I didn’t have to worry about framing the work behind glass. I wanted the tulle to be exposed so viewers could enjoy the surface textures on a large scale. I enjoy viewers’ surprise when they ultimately realise the work is made from tulle. I’d rather my sculptures not be read as fabric first, but as something else more interesting and unusual.’

Benjamin Shine is based in Australia. After studying fashion design at Central Saint Martins (UK), he set up a studio to design innovative apparel, products, furniture, mixed media works and sculptures. Benjamin has exhibited internationally, including the Boccara Gallery, LA Art Show (Los Angeles, CA, US, 2019) and Barclays (Monaco, 2019).

Artist website: benjaminshine.com

Instagram: @benjaminshinestudio

Kinga Foldi

When Kinga Foldi graduated in 2006 with a degree in woven textile design, the last thing she wanted to do was work as a designer. She had always preferred making crafts, especially those with dimension, so she became a sculptural costume designer for theatres and choreographers.

‘The university years were important for learning the diversity of textile art. But even when I enjoyed making costumes, something was always missing. I couldn’t express my thoughts and feelings, and I didn’t have the courage to set aside functionality to solely concentrate on shape. Finally, after years of experimentation, I felt confident enough to create free-standing sculptures. And not surprisingly, many of the shapes I use come from my costume work.’

Kinga’s signature artistic elements are her use of silk and the pin tuck technique. Often used to decorate blouses, pin tucking features repeatedly pleated fabric to create a rhythmic striped surface. Like an accordion box, the pleats can bend, expand and stretch depending on the tension that connects them and the direction in which they are pulled.

After creating a simple sketch, Kinga chooses white or very pale cream-coloured silks. She prefers a neutral palette to allow the intricate folds and shapes to take centre stage.

Kinga covers the silk with a cornstarch mixture that produces a rigid paper-like quality when dry. She then creates hundreds of pintucks, all of which are then hand stitched together at various points. By pulling or relaxing the connecting threads, her shapes morph and twist. Once the elements start flowing together, Kinga applies a special textile glue that makes the silk softer and easier to bend. When the glue dries, the folded forms stand solid.

‘The pleated silk always shows me the way. I am impressed with how the pintucked surface ripples and its combination of softness and movement. I enjoy our ‘conversation’ and want to preserve both the silk’s dynamism and fabric-like qualities.

Often, the silk shows me something I wouldn’t have done, but the moment I see it, I know that is how it should be.’

Kinga says she ‘met’ real silk while attending Moholy-Nagy University of Art and Design (Budapest, Hungary). She was struck by silk’s unique shine and its slight sticky touch. Her favourite silks to work with are dupioni or shantung, as both are crisp and feature prominent slubs. But because silk isn’t cheap, it’s always a challenge to keep mistakes to a minimum so as not to waste the precious material.

‘In addition to silk’s qualities, I appreciate its diverse cultural and spiritual traditions. Silk has long been considered a symbol of wealth, but the silkworm and cocoon itself are also symbols of the soul on a spiritual path. Silk has also been viewed as a link between our world and the transcendental, and it’s well known for its healing powers. It’s a miraculous treasure.’

Kinga Foldi is based in Budapest, Hungary. Her works are largely informed by nature, and she strives to create ‘soul-resting’ objects that allow the luxury of slow observation in an overstimulating world.

Artist website: baharat.hu

Facebook: facebook.com/kinga.foldi

Instagram:  @kingafoldi

Key takeaways

Think you might like to experiment with textile sculptures? Go for it! Here are some tips that can help you start your journey into 3D.

• Rather than tackling one big sculpture, think about grouping several smaller sculptures, similar to Amanda McCavour’s collection of threaded hanging forms.

• Consider cutting your fabrics in ways that create movement when freely hung. Leisa Rich cut slits into her vinyl fabric to create a feathered effect that then twirls with even the slightest breeze.

• As Bryony Jennings tells her students, don’t cling to the rules of stitching when creating something in 3D. Experiment with shapes and forms, and don’t be too precious about your materials.

• Explore different weights and textures of fabrics to see how you can manipulate them. And consider adding heat to see what happens. Benjamin Shine uses a basic clothes iron on tulle to help set his folds and pleats.

• Think about dressmaking techniques you might use to create a sculpture. Kinga Foldi uses a traditional pleating technique in remarkable ways. Gathering or darts can be additional techniques for helping create form and shape.

Interested in more creative ways to create 3D textile art? Check out how Susan Beallor-Snyder works with ropes to create massive hanging sculptures.

Whether you’re drawing or stitching portraits, they can be quite a challenge to make. After all, the finished result should resemble your subject, and achieving that likeness has tested many artists.

A face can tell us more about a person than any other physical attribute – the twinkle of an eye, the curve of the mouth – the flaring of the nostrils. I once knew someone who doubled his stake in a business deal based on a twitch of his opponent’s mouth!

We asked seven artists what attracts them to stitching portraits. Is it imitating expressions, giving depth to the eyes, using contours and shading, or any other of the fascinating array of features that people present?

Our portrait artists include Ruth Miller whose highly detailed and large scale embroidery also stimulates contemplation of her subject matter, and Sue Stone, who is an expert at using stitch to create texture. Then there’s Rosie James, who picks images of people in crowds to machine stitch. Ditte Sørensen likes to deviate from the norm and work intuitively, while Andrea Cryer’s expressive machine and hand stitching invokes emotion. Julie Sarloutte’s American pop culture style features familiar celebrities, and, finally, Jane C Thom (better known as jaygel_threads on Instagram) explains how she stumbled upon portrait embroidery and found she could do that better than painting.

Using hand stitch, machine stitch and mixed media, these artists reveal how stitching portraits is personal, creative and, importantly, can be mastered with practice.

Ruth Miller

On the face of it Ruth Miller is an embroiderer. But, on further examination, there is so much more to her work than simply stitches. From the layer upon layer of colour and stitch that make her life-sized artworks incredibly realistic, you notice a depth and integrity that surpasses the stitches and the materials alone. 

The phrase ‘the whole is greater than the sum of its parts’ comes to mind, not only due to the care Ruth puts into her intricate and time-consuming slow-stitched portraits, but also because of the insights to life that she has gleaned through her stitching. But it isn’t just the subject that’s important for Ruth, it’s the narrative, too.

‘Depth of understanding is my goal. I want to know what’s real externally – hence my concern with realism – as well as internally, and my fingers help my eyes understand.’

Considered stitches

Ruth Miller: ‘Along the way I developed something I call ‘narrative vision’ – the story I’m trying to tell. I’m committed to telling stories about the joys and challenges of daily life, especially for those living in African-American communities. Either the art-gods provide inspiration or I take a photograph that unexpectedly hints at a direction to take. In the case of Teacup Fishing it was a bit of both.’ 

The intensive stitching means that Ruth’s artworks may take an average of a year or more to complete.

‘For example, in order to make the edges of an eye curve, I must use several small straight stitches. There is no such thing as a curved stitch. Every stitch is straight and may only look curved because the viewer can’t see where one stitch ends and the next begins.’ 

Ruth explores colour contrast as a way to set the mood of her designs, which are entirely hand stitched with Paternayan wool tapestry yarns, a three-stranded yarn available in a rainbow of colours.

Stitching life’s meaning

Teacup Fishing evolved over several years, partly due to the distant location of her sister Bebe, the model for the artwork, but also because of the slowly unfolding process of the design as the composition took shape. It is a large hand stitched portrait of a figure sitting in a boat on a lake, absentmindedly fishing in a teacup while reading a magazine. 

Ruth equates fishing with humanity’s search for the good things in life, and the multitude of ways in which we distract ourselves from the pain of lacking the objects, income, relationships, situations or good health that others enjoy.

‘Amidst distraction, our search is only half-hearted. We seek and accept less, thus limiting our own good fortune’.

Trial and error

After taking reference photos of Bebe, Ruth sketched preliminary drawings to explore options for colour and composition.

‘The original visual conception (a woman fishing out of a teacup) descended out of the blue while I was working on something else, so I made an initial rough sketch to aid my memory.’

Initially, she signified the abundance of life through the presence of a lake in the background, visible through the window, but while transferring the design to fabric, she chose to place Bebe outside, nearer to the water. 

Having added a wooden pier and a table for the cup, Ruth then wondered about where to seat the figure. She switched to doing some work on the face, to give her more time to make a decision. In order to complete the face, she needed a more detailed visual reference and, after more photos and drawings, Ruth was able to adjust the image to look more like Bebe.

Returning to the composition’s surroundings, Ruth decided that placing the figure on a boat would make the theme more ironic. So she adapted the design to fit the already stretched background fabric. She had to consider the details of the boat’s interior, the direction of the shadows, and how to fit the boat in with what she’d stitched so far. Her final tweak was to ditch the idea of including a table and place the teacup on the floor, which makes the depiction of ‘absentmindedly fishing’ even more effective.
Ruth admits that the work process for Teacup Fishing was a struggle, and acknowledges the importance of preparation. She says of her approach that ‘if I get out of my own way, I can attain almost anything, and Teacup Fishing speaks of that process’.

‘Embroidery is a slow way to create an image, but being prolific isn’t the hallmark of excellence. In fact, neither is wide acceptance. Remember, YOU be the judge – and be hard to please.’

Ruth Miller is based in Mississippi, US. She attended the High School of Music and Art and Cooper Union School of Art and teaches across the US, including at the Penland School of Crafts and the Ohr-O’Keefe Museum of Art. She was awarded the 2019 Mississippi Governor’s Award For Excellence in Visual Art, and her tapestries have been exhibited at the Mississippi Museum of Art, the Huntsville (AL) Museum of Art and in a solo show at the Ohr-O’Keefe Museum of Art.

Website: ruthmiller-embroidery.weebly.com

Sue Stone

Textile artist Sue Stone is best known for her figurative stitched compositions that often convey a partial narrative. 

Sue started making portraits after a 28 year gap from stitching. She developed a fascination for old photographs and scrutinising people’s facial expressions, and many became the subject of her illustrative portraits. Her mother and grandmother both died young and Sue took to stitching their likeness as a way of remembering them. 

‘The direct contact with the cloth and the slow building of the image as the face emerges is what I enjoy most, and touch is also the reason I work with textural stitch.’

Textural stitch, appliqué and paint

Sue Stone: ‘I grew up surrounded by cloth and making, and I trained in embroidery at Goldsmiths College, London, so I was making textural stitched work long before I ever made portraits. 

‘I made A Grimsby Girl’s World Tour – Copenhagen in response to the brief for the 62 Group of Textile Artists’ exhibition Essence shown at the UK Knitting and Stitching Shows in 2022. 

‘The brief was to capture the essence of the artist’s creative practice, so this portrait includes a main subject (the portrait of my mum), a narrative, hand and machine stitch, applied fabrics, surface texture and a deliberately limited stitch vocabulary and colour palette. 

‘The image depicts my mum, Muriel May Stone, as a young girl and is part of my series A Grimsby Girl’s World Tour. The series features the Grimsby Girl’s imagined journeys to Bogota, Tokyo, Japan, Copenhagen, Madrid, Brooklyn and Vancouver, and the works all combine a portrait from the past with background images from the present day.

‘My mum never had the opportunity to travel outside the UK in her lifetime so in this series I take her to places that either I, or my work, have visited and enjoyed. When, in 2021, we visited our son Sam and his wife Eliana in Copenhagen where they currently live, I knew my mum would have loved this very cultural city. Sam was born three weeks after my mum died so this is a poignant work depicting the visit of grandmother to a grandson she never met.

‘I am an avid collector of images so on my travels I take lots of photos, mostly of small details I might use in my work, so they were my starting point. 

‘I decided to include an image of The Fishwife statue by Charles Svejstrup-Madsen, which stands on the site of the old fish market in Copenhagen and gives a circular link back to my mum’s (and my) hometown. I also included a reminder, in the shape of the orangey red and yellow banners and flags, of a memorable trip to an area of Copenhagen called Christiania, and an image of a bicycle because Copenhagen is full of them.’

Capturing the essence

‘When making this portrait I didn’t primarily aim for a likeness of the child in the photograph: I aimed to capture the essence of the calm, kind and accepting nature of the woman that that child became. 

‘After deciding the content, I made a quick paper collage and reduced my images to line drawings to transfer them to fabric. I always use a layer of calico on the back of my work. I stitched the portrait first, then applied acrylic paint and further stitching as well as other materials such as yellow sari strips.’

Sue Stone studied Fashion at St Martin’s School of Art, and Embroidery at Goldsmiths College in the 1970s. She is an exhibiting member of the 62 Group of Textile Artists and an elected Fellow of the UK Society of Designer Craftsmen. Sue lives in Grimsby, UK and is a proud mum to Joe and Sam, the co-founders of textileartist.org. 

Website: womanwithafish.com & womanwithafish.wordpress.com

Facebook: facebook.com/suestone.womanwithafish

Instagram: @womanwithafish

Rosie James

Rosie Jones regards her sewing machine to be as much a tool for drawing as for stitching cloth. By combining her stitched sketches with techniques such as screen-printing and appliqué, she creates images of people that are multi-faceted. Her dangling threads are intentional too, adding a further dimension to grab our attention.

So, in 2020 when so many turned to meeting on Zoom, it was an opportunity for Rosie to focus on the individuals she saw on her screen.

Rosie James: ‘I think I am drawn to looking at people when they are out and about: I particularly love a crowd. It’s always fascinating looking at a group of strangers and wondering about who they are. While I don’t normally do portraits of individuals, I made an exception during lockdown, as there were no crowds. I was curious to see what people were up to at home. 

Stitching sketches

‘In April 2020 we were all stuck indoors and all my work had been cancelled so I was looking for something to do. I put a call out on Instagram for people to send me pictures of themselves at home and I would stitch them, just for fun really. I asked them to send photos of themselves from head to toe showing what they were up to indoors or outdoors. I didn’t want just faces, I wanted to see what they were doing.

‘As people sent me their photos I made little 20cm x 20cm (8″ x 8″) stitched drawings of them which I then posted on Instagram. The images they sent revealed a wide variety of activities, such as baking, gardening, jumping on the furniture, dressing up and working from home. There were NHS workers in PPE (personal protective equipment), children having online birthdays, and a couple getting married in the garden. I decided they would look great all sewn together in a grid formation so that the whole thing would look like a massive Zoom session. I stopped at 100, so that there were two panels of 50.

‘I stitched black edges around each square except for the one of myself which is a lime green colour to show that I was the one talking – just like on Zoom!’

Connecting threads

‘The work was made using a sewing machine to stitch the lines. I used a range of colours to stitch the figures and added coloured fabric bits using Bondaweb. The coloured threads were left long and dangling, which I like to do anyway, but in this case it meant that each person in their box had loose threads that dangled into the box below, which I thought showed a nice connection between us all.

‘After I completed it I was able to exhibit it in the windows of a gallery in Rochester near where I live in Kent. Galleries were still not opening to people so it was great that people could see it without having to go inside. After that it was shown at both The Festival of Quilts and The Knitting and Stitching Shows, which meant that a lot of people got to see it, before it was finally sold and went to a new home.’

Rosie James lives in a village in Kent, UK. She has a BA in Textiles from UCA Farnham and an MA in Fine Art Textiles from Goldsmiths College, London. Rosie is the author of the book Stitch Draw, published by Batsford (2018).

Website: www.rosiejames.com

Facebook: facebook.com/RosieJamesTextileArtist

Instagram: @rosiejamestextileartist

Ditte Sørensen

Ditte Sørensen likes to deviate from the norm and has an affinity for the less glamorous of her artworks and portraits. She likes the ones that nurture – as well as the ones that sting.

With a wide range of media and materials at her fingertips, Ditte begins from a place of curiosity, with no fixed plan. She works intuitively and that leads her to discover new techniques and ideas.

‘My creativity is normally at its best when I’m in deep water: necessity is the mother of invention.’

Stories and emotions

Ditte Sørensen: ‘I’ve always been drawn to creating portraits. A face and a posture, or just a hand or a look, can tell a thousand stories and at the same time bring up emotions, both in me when creating them and hopefully in the viewer as well. 

‘Woman with Ruff is inspired by the headscarf debate that was very intense in the fall of 2022.  My portrait is a commentary on that debate and a wish to symbolise doubt or confusion of identity. Throughout time, head and neck coverings have been used as markers of beauty, power, status, belonging, freedom – but also oppression. In my artwork, the symbols are mixed – the religious, the hope for freedom, the anxiety of losing one’s identity and the courage and despair of unravelling the marker. The inspiration for the work’s head and neck decoration is taken from early Renaissance pipe collars mixed with the design of the pipe collar that is used today by priests in the Danish church.

Just begin it

‘The portrait is made as a sewn collage of paper, books and fabric and some leftover leather from my homesewn motorcycle saddlebags.

‘As I started the piece, I didn’t know what the outcome would be. The overall idea was there – an expression of melancholy and the two types of ruff in gold that changed status through time. 

‘Nor did I have an exact plan of how to create the portrait, or what materials to use, except that the ruff should highlight the face and be in gold. I actually started making it in real 23 karat gold, but it didn’t live up to my expectations. Nevertheless, as I worked the ideas came and it took shape.

‘When I’m creating pictures, it’s never about ‘my story’ but more about telling a story, and parallel stories, based on my use of materials. Sometimes I integrate words from a book to illustrate the overall feeling of the portrait – or maybe even conflict with it. Rather than creating a recognisable impression of a person, I often prefer to build it through symbols in a playful way.’

Ditte Sørensen has a degree in textile handicraft and education. She has featured in many publications and exhibitions and teaches workshops from her studio in Copenhagen.

Artist website: www.madstitch.com

Facebook: facebook.com/madstitch.sewnart

Instagram: @madstitch

Andrea Cryer

Andrea Cryer is a textile artist who draws with thread, creating unique portraits with the appearance of pen and ink illustrations. After leaving her career as a solicitor and taking a degree in creative art, fine art and textiles, Andrea now feels most happy when stitching freely on her old Bernina sewing machine.

One of her first and favourite pieces, a large scale diptych called Kath 18 & 88, consists of two machine and hand stitched portraits of her late mother-in-law, pictured 70 years apart. The two images of Kath, hung side-by-side, truly capture her spirit and essence.

Threading in hair

The first is based on an old sepia photograph of Kath when she was 18. The second portrait is from a photo of Kath aged 88, taken when she visited Andrea for tea one afternoon.

Andrea Cryer: ‘She had that same wistful look in her eyes as she had when she was 18, so I quickly captured it in a photo. I tried to retain that connection in the two portraits. Kath was a lovely lady.

‘It wasn’t until the final year of my degree, working with etchings, that I started to explore the idea of drawing with thread using an ordinary domestic sewing machine.

‘Initially, I’d had fun creating monoprints, carborundum and drypoint portraits of Kath on fabric and paper back in the print studio, but I was still looking for something extra. I had also made paper sketches and played around with size and position, but nothing worked in the way I wanted it to.

‘I borrowed an old portable overhead projector and after experimenting with flashing the images onto my living room walls, I settled on the idea of two large individual drawings.

‘It was then a bit of a eureka moment when I thought maybe I could draw the images on fabric and ‘wouldn’t using thread’ be an interesting idea!’

‘I tackled Kath 18 first, and when that was almost complete, I began working on Kath 88. I started with the eyes which are densely machine stitched with brown threads. Each mouth has a fine machine-drawn line as part of the outline but is mostly stitched by hand using satin stitch and varying lengths of backstitch.

‘The hair began as machine stitch and was finished with differing lengths of hand stitching in black, grey and brown yarns. The younger Kath has some of my daughter’s hair stitched in with the threads.

‘Threading my daughter’s hair into Kath’s stitched hair was a very simple and personal way to achieve this. It also maintained the idea of mark-making, ensuring that the drawings were composed of lines on fabric, reflecting the use of lines in etching.

‘The older Kath contains thread from one of her skirts, which I had unpicked and reused.

Thread as ink, needle as pen

‘The two Kaths were my first real attempts to make marks using thread as my ink and needle as my pen. They were my initial inspiration. I felt a new affinity with the process, which I could work on either at university or at home.

‘I don’t stress too much about the stitched marks I make. I am not looking for perfection and positively embrace happy accidents. Having said that, though, it does take practice. I am a confident stitcher because I have been doing it for a long time!

‘I leave threads loose as part of the drawing to give an element of spontaneity and movement to the image.’

‘The two drawings are each 30″ x 50″. Their size makes an impact. They work best when displayed side by side or opposite each other. It’s then that the viewer can truly see the relationship between them. The story behind the making of Kath 18 & 88 resonates with the viewer, and displaying the portraits together invokes emotion.’

Andrea Cryer graduated from Bath Spa University with a BA (Hons) in Creative Art (Fine Art & Textiles). Her work has been exhibited globally, including the Bath Art (2018) and Windsor Contemporary Art (2017) Fairs. Andrea has twice been a finalist in the Hand & Lock International Embroidery Competition (2016).

Website: andreacryer.co.uk

Facebook: facebook.com/andreacryer

Instagram: @andreacryerartist

Julie Sarloutte

Julie Sarloutte specialises in American style pop culture portraits. Her pictures are both colourful and expressive, and the way that Julie combines paint and thread gives them the appearance of oil paintings.

Whether you’re a Game of Thrones fan or not – or are familiar with the characters of Jon Snow and Daenerys Targaryen – it’s easy to detect both their passion and disappointment from Julie’s image, I fell in love with an illusion of you. The body language, facial contours and expressions in the eyes are all captured in her embroidery.

Magnetic emotion

Julie Sarloutte: ‘It was in 2011/12 that I put down my cross-stitch and embraced the freedom of hand embroidery. I started by embroidering violent images of war and riots; they seemed so far away to me. But after the attacks in Paris, I did an about-turn and started making pop culture portraits. It was a lighter subject and I could relate to it well.

‘I chose I fell in love with an illusion of you, not only because I’m a Game of Thrones fan, but because of its magnetism. It conveys a great deal of emotion and I felt the need to pick that up and share it.

‘I make portraits representing characters from television series and films because I grew up with them and I still enjoy watching them. 

When I embroider, I often play the series or the film in the background. It’s fun to be inspired by a scene while I work.

‘I wanted to use my artwork to bring popular culture into museums, so that people who don’t usually go there can recognise some of the characters that I stitch and hopefully feel more comfortable. It’s hard to get some people to visit museums but I find it satisfying to see those from different social levels mixing together. It’s like a little win.

Embroidery as therapy

‘Embroidering is my way of feeling better, a kind of therapy, and when I stitched I fell in love with an illusion of you, I think I just needed it.

‘I painted the background first, like a watercolour, then I embroidered the characters and filled in more detail on their faces, with a focus on bringing out the emotion of the scene.

‘When I finish an embroidery, I post it on social networks to see if people like it as much as me. It’s a satisfying way of knowing whether it was worth all the work. Earlier, I used to try to exhibit them in galleries and museums, but now I have a full time job, I no longer have the time to organise that, so I keep most of my embroideries at home.

‘I fell in love with an illusion of you is on a wall at my home because it’s one of my favourites.’

Julie Sarloutte lives and works in France. She has a degree in Fine Arts from the Beaux-Art de Paris.

Website: juliesarloutte.wixsite.com

Facebook: ​​facebook.com/JulieSarloutteArt/

Instagram: @julie.sarloutte

Jane C Thom

Jane C Thom is an experienced art teacher but only stumbled upon embroidery in 2019 when she needed something to help her practise mindfulness. Her colleagues were trying the Stitch a Day challenge and she decided to join in. From the very first stitch she was hooked.

Fascinating, characterful faces

Jane C Thom: ‘Almost immediately one stitch was not enough. I stitched an eye first. Then a portrait of a very old lady. I was following several portrait embroiderers on Instagram and wondered if I could embroider someone people would recognise. 

‘My first famous face was Danny Trejo as Machete and he was stitched with crewel yarn. I was then gifted a huge amount of embroidery thread. Siouxsie Sue was my first more refined piece. I see embroidering portraits as a challenge. I have never been able to paint portraits accurately.

‘I was just playing at embroidery when I thought I’d try a famous face. It turns out I was quite good at it.’

‘My portrait of Joaquin Phoenix in his role as the Joker came about before the film was released. I like to choose faces I find fascinating or characterful and this image struck me as both. The background fabric is an upholstery sample and he is entirely stitched with DMC and Anchor stranded embroidery thread.

Graduated shading

‘The process is always the same: I draw on a self-adhesive stabiliser and shade in the directions the stitches will travel. This is stuck on a background fabric and tacked down for extra security. The original drawing is forever encased within the final portrait. 

‘Long and short stitch is my go-to filler. I rarely have just one colour of thread in the needle: two very similar tones help to create the graduated shading. The more the drawing is ‘disappeared’, the more therapeutic and satisfying I find the process. I use a variety of hoops depending on the size of the piece. The Joker took approximately 40 hours over the course of a month to complete. 

‘In early 2023 I was part of a joint exhibition in my home town with two other local artists. It was very exciting as it was delayed for two years due to Covid. This was a prize for placing in the top three of the Kettering Open Exhibition in 2019.  

‘As this is my hobby, not my job, when I have made pieces for others, they have been gifts. My family and friends are incredibly supportive and many of my pieces have been made with them in mind. I have always been creative and am regularly inspired by my students who have helped me choose some of my subjects.

‘Embroidery was, at first, an easily accessible pastime. Now it’s my passion.’

Jane C Thom lives in Northamptonshire, UK. She trained as an industrial ceramicist and has been a full time art teacher for 30 years, specialising in 3D art and design. She is a member of the Society for Embroidered Work.

Instagram: @jaygel_threads

Key takeaways

Some of our artists began embroidering portraits quite casually, while others were experienced stitchers. They’ve shared their inspiration – can these inspire you?

• Narrative is the starting point for Ruth Miller’s work – she either allows inspiration to come, or looks for it in her photographs. Andrea Cryer also uses photographs, highlighting the expression and emotion in the faces.

• Sue Stone uses old photographs as a source for her work. Maybe you have your own stash or you could ask family members, visit antique shops or online sources.

• In contrast, Rosie James likes to pick out the faces of strangers in crowds, as she finds those fascinating. British law states that you can take photographs of people as long as you’re on public property. Check your own country’s law if you’re intending on doing this.

• Ditte Sørensen works intuitively with a range of mixed media materials, allowing the ideas and design to flow in the moment. 

• Julie Sarloutte derives her inspiration from characters from TV and films, while Jane C Thom also decided to stitch famous faces that she found fascinating and characterful. Maybe you have a favourite celebrity you could try stitching.

In our article on self-portraits we feature four textile artists’ work, and in this article we explore Sorrell Kerrison’s exuberant and colourful work in more depth.

Which of our featured artists’ work did you enjoy? Let us know in the comments below

Textile artists who incorporate hand printing into their work know even their best laid plans can waver. Everything involved with printed surface design is up for grabs, including the physical pressure applied to a stamp or screen, room humidity, the type and strength of print materials, and base fabrics. Each printed pull or stamp is different from the rest.

We’re excited to introduce you to five artists who embrace and celebrate the inherent serendipity of printed surface design. While each artist has unique mark making techniques, they all agree the ‘anything can happen’ creative process is exciting. Every print is an experiment of sorts, and their hits and misses are equally gorgeous.

We start with Amarjeet Nandhra, who taps into her Indian heritage by using phulkaris to illustrate the devastation of displacement. Sue Hotchkis then showcases the impact of climate change through her printed and layered textile ‘fragments’. Bobbi Baugh explores the notion of ‘home’ across three heavily printed and stitched panels, followed by Leah Higgins, whose breakdown printing technique captures the ruins of the UK’s industrial mills. Finally, Ross Belton takes us to Africa and Japan through his traditional Ukhamba vessels.

Amarjeet Nandhra

India’s 1947 partition caused one of history’s largest forced migrations. As Pakistan and India gained independence from Britain, a bloody upheaval displaced between 10 and 12 million people, including Amarjeet Nandhra’s ancestors. Communities were fractured, and many cultural arts were lost.

In light of that loss, Amarjeet wanted to reconnect to textiles from her Indian heritage, especially exploring the traditional patterns and symbols featured in phulkaris. These different styles of embroidered shawls originally from the Punjab region became her palette for sharing her own migration story.

‘My research revealed phulkaris have historically been viewed through a rather superficial lens. They’re often seen as simple colourful handicrafts or hobbies. That reductive view prevents a deeper understanding of the ways in which phulkaris mapped and documented the daily lives and social relationships of the makers.’

Amarjeet also discovered the earliest sample of phulkari dated in the 15^th century was embroidered by the sister of the first guru of Sikhism. As a Sikh herself, that discovery further fueled her work.

Amarjeet’s creative process started with a rough draft showing how to build the layers of print. She then sampled ways to portray the layered figures using both a photographic and paper stencil. While the photographic stencil felt too clean and crisp, it allowed Amarjeet to experiment with different tonal values to create shadow figures. Ultimately, she hand painted directly on a screen using drawing fluid and screen block to create a softer, fractured quality.

Two layers of muslin were used in this work. The first layer features strong silhouettes, but it’s also somewhat transparent, creating a sense of something else going on in the background with the paler silhouettes showing through. After all the figures were printed in varying shades of grey and black, Amarjeet screen printed a traditional phulkari pattern in yellow using a hand cut freezer paper stencil. That layer also acted as her stitching guide.

‘I wanted the stitching to depict the fractious and destructive nature of forced migration. So, at the beginning of the piece, the repeating phulkari patterns are stitched in completely. However, the stitching unravels ever more across the rest of the piece to emphasise the damage and destruction of displacement.’

Amarjeet says print has always played a big part in her art since her first job at a print cooperative which produced banners for trade unions and many social causes. She was struck by the bold designs and repetition of images that could carry a message and communicate a story.

‘I love the physicality of printing, the smell of the inks and the sound of ink being spread out using a roller. Building up layers is the foundation of my practice. There is something magical about revealing the print and discovering the unexpected.’

Amarjeet Nandhra is based in northwest London, UK. In addition to being an artist, Amarjeet is also an educator at an independent textile school where she runs international teaching holidays and short courses. Amarjeet gained First Class Honours in creative art, and she is a member of The Textile Study Group.

Artist website: amarjeetnandhra.com

Facebook: facebook.com/amarjeetnandhra

Instagram: @amarjeetknandhra

Sue Hotchkis

The UK’s epic heatwave in 2022 led to fires, water shortages and thousands of deaths. Sue Hotchkis experienced it firsthand, and she described it as the planet’s way of screaming for help. The heatwave also intensified her existing anger at the government for its lack of concern for climate change, and both the heat and emotions collided to create Drought of Honesty.

‘The repercussions of climate change and concerns caused by humans’ destructive impact on the physical environment persist on a global level. Rising sea levels and increasing temperatures affect our everyday lives. Have we disconnected from the earth’s warnings? Are we being told the truth?’

This work started from a photograph Sue had taken at a rooftop café in New York. She had glanced over a wall meant to hide an air conditioning system and saw a pattern on the ground that looked as if something had been spilt or leaked. She grabbed her ever-ready camera and started taking close-up photos from all angles.

‘It looked like the cracked earth one sees from a drought. The substance had dried and cracked in the sun, and the pattern created an amazing image.’

It’s important to note that Sue’s artistic approach celebrates all things that are falling apart. She relishes decay in urban and rural environments, including peeling paint, rusted metal, cracked sidewalks, or a rotting log. She’ll take hundreds of pictures to capture the rich colours and textures that inform her ‘fragmented’ works of art.

For this work, Sue first used Photoshop to create images suitable for making thermofax screens (like a silk screen) for printing. She then hand dyed and printed on top of cotton fabric using Procion dye and discharge paste. Next, she created a design on her computerised sewing machine to stitch on top of the printed fabric. Strips of voile were then appliquéd using free-motion stitching. Other fabrics were then added and removed to form the overall shape. Finally, the printed and stitched fabric was laid over wadding and a backing fabric and quilted together. The right-hand side falls forward intentionally to create a 3D effect.

‘I’m inspired by erosion and decay. I aim to capture and convey the unconscious beauty of the way materials slowly break down over time by creating abstract fragments that hover between object and image. Shape and structure is integral to my practice, along with surface and texture.’

Sue says her work is also strongly influenced by the Japanese aesthetic of wabisabi that accepts transience and imperfection. It celebrates the effects of the passage of time, and this work in particular alludes to the rhythm and flow in nature using patterns formed by a drought.

Sue Hotchkis is based on the Black Isle in the Highlands of Scotland. She has participated in numerous group and solo exhibitions, most recently a solo show Alchemy at the Timeless Textiles Gallery, Australia (2019). She was the silver medal winner at the Scythia 12^th International Biennial of Contemporary Textile Art, Ukraine (2018) and winner of Studio Art Quilt Association’s ‘Golden Hour’ fabric design competition (2017). Sue is also a member of Quilt Art.

Artist website: suehotchkis.com

Facebook: facebook.com/SueHotchkisTextiles

Instagram: @suehotchkis

Bobbi Baugh

They say home is where the heart is, and in Bobbi Baugh’s world, that heart is comprised of complex layers. The concept of ‘home’ has long been a favourite theme, and Bobbi’s earlier works depicted physical houses and a young girl on a journey. But this work captures the sense of movement in a home’s interior without creating a literal space.

‘I’m most interested in what is not immediately visible. And I am especially intrigued with seeing internal and external events in layers and depicting the two in composition together.’

This work’s external elements of a tree, gate, door and interwoven twigs are all photo transfers. Gel medium was used to transfer laser colour copies of original photos onto the fabric. To create the internal spaces, Bobbi used monoprinting and stitching to create patterned and textured window openings that invite the viewer to wonder ‘what’s in there?’. She also juxtaposed recognisable objects with ambiguous shapes and patterns to create a sense of dreaming.

Lastly, a path is suggested across all three panels to create a sense of journey. Birds on the first panel draw the viewer through the gate over to the door in the second panel. Viewers’ eyes then travel across the second panel through the window into the third panel, possibly landing in the bundle of intricate twigs. Birds serve as messengers and guides along the way.

‘Many ideas are sewn into this work. Home is a complex place where memories are intertwined with fragile lives. Leaving and finding home involves a journey. Dreams, memories and reality overlap. I hope viewers bring their own ideas and history to find meaning in the work.’

Bobbi says her 35-year commercial printing career cultivated an understanding of the rhythm of printing: ink the plate, create an image on that plate, press the fabric against it, pull the image, repeat. But ink is now replaced with acrylic paint, and plates are now made of gelatin or other low-tech relief techniques. Still, the results are striking, and it’s especially remarkable knowing this entire work started with white sheer polyesters and unbleached cotton muslin.

Printed fabrics are then gathered and stitching begins. Paint and collaged fabrics can be quite stiff, so Bobbi uses her sewing machines to stitch and quilt. Because they are small, narrow-throat portables, Bobbi stitches and quilts in sections, and then the sections are attached to the backing.

‘Construction of this work was an experiment for me, especially figuring out how to have multiple panels speak to each other. But I was invigorated by the ongoing energy of the composition as it emerged across the panels.’

Bobbi Baugh is based in Florida, US. She has extensively exhibited her work in group and solo shows across the US. She earned second place in the Nature Conservancy’s ‘Nature Inspires Art’ show in Kissimmee, Florida (2021) and first place in d’Art Center’s ‘Material II: National Exhibition of Fiber Artwork’ in Norfolk, VA (2020). She also wrote It was there I believed: a collection of visual artwork and poetry (2021).

Artist website: bobbibaughstudio.com/

Facebook: facebook.com/bobbibaughart

Instagram: @bobbibaughart

Leah Higgins

Leah Higgins admits she’s a control freak by nature, so creating random and abstract marks in her textile art was a challenge. She knew how to dye her own fabric, and she had learned several screen printing techniques. But it wasn’t until she discovered breakdown printing (also called deconstructed printing in the US) that she truly found her creative voice.

‘I experimented and experimented until I had a set of techniques that created the patterns and marks I wanted. The process was quite wasteful at first, but it ultimately helped me express so much more.’

Breakdown printing is a form of screen printing in which thickened dye acts as a form of temporary resist when applied directly to the back of a screen. The screen is left to dry before being pulled with either print paste or more thickened dye. The dried dye blocks the new dye or paste from passing through the mesh onto the fabric. As additional media is applied, the dried dye starts breaking down, resulting in unique marks and patterns for every pulled print.

‘I love the serendipity of breakdown printing and the fact I’m not 100 per cent in control. There is something wonderful about starting with a piece of white fabric and adding colour and mark.’

Ruins 9; Cottonopolis Revisited is part of an abstract series exploring what happens to unused buildings and industrial structures. In the 19^th century, Manchester (UK) was nicknamed ‘Cottonopolis’ for its cotton industry which spanned 100-plus mills and nearly half a million employees. As the industry declined, mills were abandoned, demolished and repurposed. Still more were left to decay and erode, inspiring this work and others in her Ruins series.

Instead of using sketchbooks, Leah prefers to let ideas evolve and mature in her head. Because she works in series, she wants to be sure her subject is interesting enough to inspire multiple works. It can be a lengthy process, but once she starts creating a series, ideas flow quickly from one piece to the next.

For this work, Leah first used breakdown printing to create a collection of fabrics in her preferred colour palette. She then cut the fabrics into ‘bricks’ that were randomly arranged and pieced onto felt. The first layer of stitch was added using a sewing machine that could handle the dense marks. Leah used appliqué and more stitch to add chimneys. Finally, the entire work was backed with hand-dyed cotton fabric.

‘Although printing is the most important part of my process, I am still a patchwork and quilter at heart. Quilting makes a significant difference in my work’s appearance, helping obscure the fact my art is made from many individual pieces. Stitch also allows me to add additional elements such as ghost-like buildings. For me, there is also a quiet joy in adding stitches.’

Leah Higgins is a textile artist, author and teacher based in Manchester, UK. Her art quilts have been exhibited widely in solo, group and curated exhibitions. She won the Art category at The Festival of Quilts twice and won Best in Show at Quilt=Art=Quilt in 2018. Leah also authored Breakdown Your Palette and Colour Your Palette.

Artist website: leahhiggins.co.uk

Facebook: facebook.com/LeahHigginsArtist

Instagram: @leahhigginsartist

Ross Belton

Ross Belton spent many childhood holidays along Africa’s KwaZulu-Natal coast. When not at the beach, his family explored rural areas and many roadside markets. Ross marvelled at the residents’ ingenious use of found materials to create art, and now that same repurposing informs his own textile art.

‘The craftspeople worked with whatever they had to hand. They recycled everything from tin cans, bottle tops, cable wire and cloth fibres. I always coveted their wire cars with wheels made from shoe polish tin lids. My textile art similarly explores and embraces the flaws and hidden beauty often missed in everyday things.’

As an adult, Ross collected traditional African fabrics, including mud cloth and woven raffia Kuba cloths. Then after seeing a Japanese boro exhibition, Ross was again blown away by boro’s purposeful use of recycled materials. He took an indigo/shibori workshop run in conjunction with the exhibition and was hooked. His work now blends African and Japanese traditions with print and dye in a sustainable fashion.

This work is one of several ‘Ukhamba’ bowls Ross has created that mimic traditional Zulu rimless clay beer pots. The pots were used in ceremonial drinking of beer to remember and appease ancestors. The pot would traditionally be passed among males from the eldest to the youngest.

Ross especially sought to explore the ‘tannin iron complex’ in dyeing his bowls by using only natural coloured dyes that are modified by iron (rust). For this bowl, gauze was wrapped around blacksmithing tools, and then the bundles were left outside to be naturally wetted by rain, creating unpredictable rust marks reminiscent of the clay beer pots. Once the rust process was complete, Ross dyed the bundles with logwood, knowing the dye would darken the cloth and further enhance the rusted metal marks. He describes the end result as ‘textile alchemy’.

‘My biggest challenge was getting the fabric to hold its shape. I used plaster of Paris in my early experiments, but it dried very hard and made stitching difficult. After much experimentation, I now use a combination of PVA glue and starch which varies depending upon the size of the bowl.’

Boro stitching is then used to keep the fabric in place for the dyeing process, as well as to embellish the bowl. Linen thread is used for foundation stitching due to its strength and ability to absorb dye which helps it blend into the background. White cotton crochet and sashiko threads are then used for decorative stitchwork.

‘Much like the vintage metal tools I collect, I use secondhand or vintage threads. In our throwaway society, youngsters tend to toss “old junk” when clearing a relative’s home. So, I often buy old sewing baskets that house an endless variety of useful tools and threads.’

Ross Belton is based in London, UK. He has exhibited his work extensively in Europe, most recently at the Lloyd’s Register Foundation ‘Safer World Conference 2022’ and the Embassy of Japan, Piccadilly London (2020). Russ also established a Nomadic Dye Garden and offered outdoor community activities at St. Saviours (London) in association with the Florence Trust (2020-21).

Artist website:  moderneccentrics.wordpress.com

Facebook: facebook.com/people/Ross-Belton

Instagram: @spottedhyenas

Key takeaways

You’ve been introduced to a variety of ways textile artists use printing to add extra dimension to their work. Consider these ideas to do the same in your own art:

• Think about using cultural and historical motifs when printing. Amarjeet Nandhra prints traditional symbols from Indian phulkaris on her fabric.

• Consider creating textile art with unusual overall shapes. Sue Hotchkis’s ‘fragments’ have uneven edges that create interesting shadows when displayed.

• You don’t need fancy inks to print on fabric. Bobbi Baugh uses acrylic paint with vibrant results. What paints do you have to hand?

• Try printing a variety of marks on fabric, and then cut up the printed cloth and realign the pieces in interesting ways. Leah Higgins uses a similar process to create the ‘bricks’ for her buildings.

• Think about using printed fabric to make a 3D vessel and, like Ross Belton, experiment using stitch and white glue to help the fabric keep its shape.

Interested in other traditional forms of printing? Learn how Sarah Desmarais uses the Japanese ‘katazome’ printing method for her incredible abstract designs.

Seed stitch, couching, back stitch, cross stitch, or straight stitch – do you have a go-to stitch? Textile artists often favour simple stitches, but use them to push boundaries, create expression, and communicate potent messages.

Caren Garfen’s embroidered texts demonstrate back stitch as a strong and powerful stitch. But it’s also a supremely effective drawing and mark marking tool, as seen in Sue Stone’s expressive and textural figurative work.

Straight stitches are incredibly versatile. In the work of Archana Pathak and Claire Wellesley-Smith, they prove to be elegant, uncomplicated and calm. For these artists, the power of straight stitch is in its meditative nature. Seed stitch, another repetitive stitch, is the preference of artists Claire Mort and Richard McVetis, who both like to revel in the slow process of making. 

In Melissa Zexter’s stitched photographs, straight stitches are grouped to form energetic, swirling layers. And in Yuka Hoshino’s embroidery, long stitches are interwoven to highlight connections and relationships. 

Cross stitch is a technique many stitchers might start off with, but Sharon Peoples takes it to another level. She builds layer upon layer of random cross stitches, adding great depth and a painterly feel to her pocket-sized portraits.

Couching is known for its ability to add texture and dimension. Hanny Newton uses it to explore line quality in her glittering contemporary goldwork compositions. Diane Butcher uses couching in a completely different way, to create delicate drawn lines of floral imagery.

Read on to discover the power of simple hand stitches, and be inspired.

Caren Garfen

The Weight of the World was created by Caren Garfen when she became aware of an upsurge in antisemitism globally. It’s a powerful work, created using back stitch. 

‘The size of the stitch really appeals to me. I like the control required when sewing tiny stitches despite the unbelievable amount of time it takes, but it can be challenging when a deadline comes into play!’

Hand stitched text, of antisemitic incidents recorded in 2020 and 2021, creates lines on the fabric. These represent the traditional Jewish prayer shawl, a tallis. At a distance, the pattern appears as bands of black. It is only when the viewer draws in closer that they can see that stripes transform into text. 

But this tallis loses its ritual function and is not to be worn, symbolising that Jewish people should not have to carry the burden of antisemitism on their shoulders.

Caren Garfen is an artist specialising in textiles, meticulous hand stitching, and intensive research, creating artworks relating to societal issues. She is based in London, UK. The Weight of the World was shortlisted for the Fine Art Textile Award in 2022. Her work has also been selected for 7th International Riga Triennial of Textiles in Latvia, 2023, and for awards at Art Textiles Biennale, Australia, 2021 and Internationale d’Art Miniature, Canada, 2021.

Artist website: carengarfen.com

Facebook: facebook.com/carengarfenartist

Instagram: @carengarfen

Sue Stone

Sue Stone very rarely uses back stitch in its traditional form, where it is used to make a straightforward, solid line. Although her stitches might be created in the same way, the results are more akin to a drawn line.

In Self Portrait, Number 67, part of an ongoing project, Sue Stone used back stitches to create the hair, face, arrow outlines and dress.

‘What I enjoy about back stitch is the versatility of being able to use it as a mark making tool.’

Back stitches using a very fine sewing thread (such as her favourite Superior Masterpiece thread) can make a delicately nuanced line on a face. Or a single strand of DMC stranded cotton can be used to create an outline drawing or a sketchy, broken line.

Sue also makes the most of six stranded embroidery threads, using anything up to six strands of DMC embroidery thread to create patterns. With back stitch the thread wraps around both the back and front of the fabric. This makes it become slightly raised up on the front of the cloth, giving some amazing surface texture when using the full six strands. Sue tells us that no other stitch is more useful for her work than back stitch.

Sue Stone is based in the UK, and is a member of the 62 Group of Textile Artists, and a Fellow of the Society of Designer Craftsmen. Her work has been exhibited worldwide, including at her solo show Shifts and Allusions, at The Hub, Sleaford in 2023, at the 12th From Lausanne to Beijing International Fibre Art Biennial Exhibition (2022), and as part of the 62 Group’s exhibition at the Knitting & Stitching Show (2022).

Artist website: womanwithafish.com/

Facebook: facebook.com/suestone.womanwithafish

Instagram: @womanwithafish

Archana Pathak

In her series Reimagined Landscapes, Archana Pathak creates orderly rows of straight stitches, arranged into landscapes using subtle blocks of colour. 

Archana often works with found memory artefacts. In this series, by using old maps, she is able to consider the evolving nature of boundaries, both physical and psychological, and the identities being reshaped. And when she transforms the maps into landscapes, her artworks become harmonious representations of co-existence and connectedness. 

First, a collection of old maps are printed onto fabric – recording lost, found or longed-for places. From these, she cuts very fine laces, using them to slowly render the landscape’s contours. 

She began making Reimagined Landscapes in mid-2021, at a time near to the end of the lockdowns in the UK.

‘I was experiencing a sense of calm in using just straight stitches in my work. The nature of simple repetition was a gift and natural progression, for me to heal, to make sense and to start again.’

Drawn to simplicity and essentialism, Archana’s work carries questions, insights and hope – her art explores her identity and is influenced by the many things she’s trying to make sense of.

Archana Pathak is a fine art textile artist based in London, who draws inspiration from her British and Indian heritage. Archana exhibited in a solo show at The Textile Galleries, The Knitting & Stitching Show, 2022. She was The Needlemakers Company Award winner at Cockpit Arts, 2022, and was shortlisted for the Brookfield Properties Crafts Council Collection Award, 2021.  

Artist website: archanapathak.com

Instagram: @archanapathakartist

Claire Wellesley-Smith

Claire Wellesley-Smith’s meditative running stitch work Shift uses a colour palette determined by the plants on her urban allotment plot – she dyes the silk thread in small batches using plants she’s grown herself. The dye colours shift through the year as different plants come into season, which include indigo, madder, dyer’s chamomile, cosmos and onion skins. 

Using stitch to explore the connections between green spaces and wellbeing on her own health and that of others, her work is an exercise in rhythm and observation.

‘Over the years I have come to understand the rhythm of my running stitches, the stitch length and patterns that I fall into when I spend time with this repetitive action.’

Stitching offers Claire a space for reflection on her working life, the dye processes she uses and her affinity with the allotment. The creation of Shift marks the 10th anniversary of her growing food and textile dyes at her allotment, while also celebrating her daily Stitch Journal, which she has worked on since 2013.

Claire Wellesley-Smith is an artist, writer and researcher based in Bradford, West Yorkshire, UK. Her work is informed by the ability of textiles to transform and connect over time, and her projects embrace the arts, heritage and community wellbeing sectors. Claire is the author of Slow Stitch: Mindful and Contemplative Textile Art (2015), and Resilient Stitch: Wellbeing and Connection in Textile Art (2021), both published by Batsford.

Website: clairewellesleysmith.co.uk/

Instagram: @cwellesleysmith

Yuka Hoshino

Long straight stitches create a strong graphical element in Space as Time, by Yuka Hoshino.

This work contemplates the role of the stars and planets as intergenerational links, important navigational tools and markers of time. The positions of constellations and heavenly bodies were of central importance to ancient societies. And with advancements in space exploration and the resurgence of astrology in pop culture, the human relationship with the night sky persists. 

After seeing the work of Nicolas Moufarrege, Yuka began to experiment with long straight stitches.

‘A bit of play quickly led me to change the direction of the stitches so that they might be interwoven. I love the often unpredictable subtleties of colour and texture that result from this slow manual weaving.’

Yuka represents the invisible bonds between women of successive generations by interweaving the stitches where the silhouettes overlap. She also notes that the woven stitches can signify those times where two people might seem to be at crossed purposes, or be ‘perpendicular’ to one another, but when this incongruity often results in a stronger, dynamic relationship.

In contrast with the long, colourful stitches, the central section of the work will be completed with a moon motif, stitched separately. This is rendered in a single running stitch forming a continuous loop, representing the infinite interconnectedness of all things.

Yuka Hoshino is a paper embroidery artist based in Sonoma County, California, with a background in environmental archaeology. Her work often explores the themes of place, identity and botany, which were also central to her previous work as an archaeobotanist on excavations throughout Central Asia and the Middle East. 

Artist website: mayukafiberart.com

Instagram: @mayuka.fiberart

Melissa Zexter

Melissa Zexter chooses a strong photographic image, often of a woman or a girl, and stitches it, while working from the reverse and from the front simultaneously. 

In Girl and Tree, straight stitches create a dynamic swirling pattern on the back, and small areas of running stitches have been added to the front. This process results in a loose, textured and multi-layered effect that’s full of energy

‘Sewing from the reverse creates a more three-dimensional look. The thread has a life of its own. When I am sewing without seeing the front of the image and then I turn it over, the results are often a surprise.’

This abstract process of stitching encourages further reflection upon the combination of the two mediums. Melissa can explore the material status of the photograph as a three-dimensional, hand-crafted object, while also examining issues of identity, memory, and technology.

Melissa Zexter is a photographer and textile artist based in Brooklyn, New York, USA. She has been combining these two very different art forms for over 20 years. She exhibits her work regularly throughout the USA and in Europe. 

Artist website: melissazexter.com/

Facebook: facebook.com/MelissaZexterPhotography

Instagram: @melissazexter

Claire Mort

In Claire Mort’s bold-coloured seed stitch portrait, Tracey Emin – Olympia, the subject sports a strong and defiant glare. Tracey Emin’s work featured in the The Sensation Exhibition in 1997 and changed Claire’s life forever – for this was the moment Claire knew she was meant to be an artist. And so, as a huge fan, Claire was keen to stitch Tracey’s portrait. 

Claire’s favourite technique is seed stitch and she reminds us that, as Constance Howard once said, you don’t have to know lots of stitches, you just have to use the ones you do know, well. She enjoys the labour-intensive side of seed stitch, feeling a real affinity with this detailed way of working. 

‘There are lots of stitches I could have used to make my work quicker, but I love the time it takes to create a piece of work using tiny stitches. Most of my pieces take over 200 hours. For me it’s all about the slow process.’

The portrait explores multi-layered meanings for women everywhere, from judgement, to shaming, and everything in-between. Pictured with a confrontational stare, similar to Manet’s Olympia, Tracey is depicted staring down the art world, and being true to herself.

Claire Mort is a British textile artist, based in Dorset, UK. She was featured on BBC Two’s Royal Academy Summer Exhibition Show in 2022. She is a member of Prism Textiles and the Society for Embroidered Work.

Artist website: clairemortartist.com/

Instagram: @clairemortartist

Richard McVetis

Meditation on Process by is work driven by stitch and time. Tiny seed stitches nestle into the soft wool flannel ground fabric that Richard McVetis loves to stitch. 

Richard’s ideas are often developed in response to a moment. Stitch is used to transform time or a place into a tactile and tangible object. Through his process he can visualise, consider and occupy a space, measuring and marking time.

His embroidery work is a truly meditative process. It deeply embodies his presence. He becomes immersed in the experience of making, firmly rooted in the physical act of repetitive stitching. 

For Richard, the appeal of seed stitch has always been about drawing – the similarities between pen on paper, and thread on fabric – and the immediacy and directness of mark-making.

‘The richness of seed stitch is in its simplicity, versatility and potential to come together in infinitely different configurations to express and describe the world around me.’

Using the density of the stitches to understand a space or subject matter, Richard has gained a deep connection with this simple stitch, that he has come to know so intimately. It offers him more than just a mark on fabric, but an insight into how to be.

Richard McVetis is an artist based in London, UK. He is a member of the 62 Group of Textile Artists and a visiting lecturer in Textiles at the Royal College of Art, London. He exhibited at The British Textile Biennial (2021), RENEW at Kettle’s Yard (2019) and his solo show Shaped by Time, opened at the Craft Study Centre in Farnham (2022). 

Artist website: richardmcvetis.co.uk

Facebook: facebook.com/richardmcvetisart

Instagram: @richardmcvetis

Sharon Peoples

Random cross stitch is a technique Sharon Peoples often uses in her hand embroidered storytelling work, as seen in Portrait of Oscar. Although she had very little information on her ‘secret sitter’, she wanted to add depth to the story she was creating, so she decided that layered stitching was the perfect approach to take.

‘I chose random cross stitch as it allows me to work in a painterly way, even on a very small scale. Placing the work in a jewellery box signifies the preciousness of people and their lives.’

The work was created for the Secret Sitter exhibition in 2022, where artists were invited to make portraits of other artists. Sharon portrayed Oscar, his treasured copper light fitting and the place he loved to hang out most – a light-filled loft. It was a challenging prospect, but when Sharon found a light blue jewellery case at a thrift shop, things began to fall into place.

Sharon Peoples is a textile artist based in Canberra, Australia. She explores plants and gardens, as well as people and their inner ‘secret gardens’. Sharon was a finalist in the Seed Stitch Contemporary Art Award 2022 at the Australian Design Centre, Sydney, NSW.

Artist website: sharon-peoples.com/

Facebook: facebook.com/sharon.peoples.12

Instagram: @sharonpeoplesstudio

Diane Butcher

Couching becomes the focus and not just the outline stitch in Diane Butcher’s elegant work, Dahlias. She created this work as a ‘thank you’, giving a nod to the importance of nature and our suburban back gardens.

Dahlias have a special significance to Diane. After she moved back home from Devon, to help her mum look after her dad, when his dementia moved on suddenly, she sowed far too many Dahlia seeds. But this became a positive when things were difficult – something to care for, bring joy, and a reason to have a ten minute break. 

Diane has always enjoyed using couching to create sinuous lines, and decided to create this work mainly with couching. Her work usually includes lots of detail and intricate layers of thread, which she describes as absorbing, but sometimes restricting.

‘I went back to my first love, line, for this piece. Couching feels like drawing with thread and it was the perfect way to describe the sculptural forms of the Dahlias and convey a simple message.’

The outcome is an exquisite, delicate work that focuses on the details, the beauty of the Dahlias themselves, and their visiting insects.

Diane Butcher is an artist based in south-east London. Her hand embroidery works are based on details and observations of the natural world.

Artist website: dianebutcherhandembroidery.com

Instagram: @dianebutcher.embroidery

Hanny Newton

Couching is also a favourite technique of Hanny Newton. She loves its beautiful simplicity. One thread is laid on the fabric, then it’s secured by stitching another thread over it. For Hanny, this simple technique opens up a world of potential. Small changes, in colour, material, or scale, can provide many possibilities for experimentation.

‘I am interested in the way couching can become a drawing tool, to explore line quality. For me, it’s all about having a few techniques that I know really well – that way I can go deep.’

Hanny chooses to explore couching in great depth, rather than jumping from stitch to stitch, which wouldn’t allow her to question, delve and push boundaries in the same way.

In her series exploring complexity, Hanny uses couching to ‘grow’ designs that are more than the sum of their individual parts. The key ingredient is the imperfection of the moment. When the work evolves in its own way, she finds that the outcomes are more interesting. The threads layer up, creating flow, depth and movement that she could never plan.

Hanny Newton is an embroiderer specialising in contemporary metal thread embroidery. She is based on the Shropshire/Powys border, UK and works with interior designers and art consultants on projects worldwide. Hanny also teaches in the UK and internationally, including at the British Museum, and West Dean College. 

Artist website: hannynewton.co.uk

Facebook: facebook.com/hannyembroidery

Instagram: @hannynewton

Key takeaways

Here are some top tips on how to use simple stitches to great effect:

• If you want expressive figures or detailed stitched text in your work, then back stitch is your friend. Check out the artworks of Sue Stone and Caren Garfen for ideas on creating illustrative outlines or embroidered words using this versatile stitch.

• Choose a stitch – your favourite stitch – and make it the focus of your work, like Diane Butcher did with her couched line-drawn Dahlias. 

• Are you keen to transform stitch into a powerful form of meditation? Then use running stitches to create simple repeating lines or shapes, as shown in Claire Wellesley Smith’s daily stitching. 

• If you’re interested in the process of stitching itself, choose slow and deliberate seed stitching, like Richard McVetis, and use it to mark and visualise time. 

• Dive deep with a particular stitch, and explore its full potential, like Hanny Newton does with couching stitch.

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What’s your favourite simple hand stitch, and why? Let us know in the comments below.

Are you looking to work more sustainably, perhaps using recycled or discarded materials? Or might you be interested in incorporating historical fabrics and their stories into your art? Maybe you want to raise awareness about environmental concerns through your work?

Textile artists are increasingly focusing on environmental issues and the need for sustainable practices when creating their art. They’re intent upon using repurposed and pre-loved materials that have been discarded or found. And the more unconventional, the better.

We’d like to introduce you to five amazing artists who literally turn trash into treasure in remarkable ways. From vintage fabrics to industrial waste, all these artists create with love and respect for their unusually sourced materials.

Zwia Lipkin is drawn to upcycled home décor textiles, while Ruth Singer has a passion for vintage fabrics. Elnaz Yazdani is inspired by industrial materials and even has a close relationship with a car parts dealer. Vanessa Barragão transforms waste from the Portuguese textile industry, and Julie Peppito has a unique approach when it comes to old toys, litter and other found items.

Find out what drives and inspires these artists, and gain some great ideas and tips for recycling materials in your own artwork along the way!.

Zwia Lipkin

Upcycled upholstery

Zwia Lipkin has always been drawn to old and weathered surfaces and items that have a past story. In high school, she created assemblages with found objects and wrote her senior thesis about the use of trash in modern art. As a historian, she sought to give voice to the underclasses and people discarded by society. So, when Zwia returned to making art, it was only natural to pick up where she left off by using upcycled materials.

Zwia lives near an amazing non-profit organisation in California called FabMo, which saves upholstery showroom samples and makes them available to the public. She fell in love with these home décor textiles and soon started working with them. The more she learned about the textile industry and the general waste problem facing our planet, the more committed she became to using only upcycled fabrics in her work.

Zwia takes her inspiration from nature, travel and world events. The rescued home décor textiles she uses are luscious and tactile, so sometimes the fabrics themselves dictate the outcome. At other times, an idea comes first and then she selects suitable fabrics. She enjoys making abstract work, but also incorporates figurative elements.

The relationship between different colours and textures is an important part of Zwia’s work. Her textiles are thick, so she raw-edge appliqués them directly onto batting using her sewing machine. She then combines this with touches of hand stitching in a Sashiko style.

Her materials mostly come from FabMo, but she has also amassed a large stash of fabrics from her relatives. Some of her most personally meaningful work was made using family materials. Every now and then, friends and neighbours also give Zwia textiles they no longer want, allowing her to exclusively use upcycled fabrics. Her bulging scrap boxes are an endless source of inspiration.

Zwia is committed to using recycled materials in her work, and she hopes to not only use them as a statement, but to also touch upon environmental issues directly.

‘I encourage other people to reduce their consumption and upcycle. Every little effort counts! Our planet currently faces great challenges, mostly because of human short-sightedness and an insatiable greed for things and resources. The problems of waste and plastic pollution are significant and contribute to the existential issue of global warming.’

Zwia’s advice for exploring recycling is to find gorgeous pre-loved fabrics that excite you. Look for used textiles that inspire you in ways that new materials can’t. Perhaps they bear a print no longer available. Or they show interesting visible signs of wear that can add texture to your work.

Search for organisations that collect used and unwanted textiles. You can also sort through your own old clothes, or ask family and friends for their unwanted textiles. Thrift and charity shops are also good resources.

Anything you can make out of new fabric can also be made with recycled cloth, and the possibilities are endless! The best inspiration often comes from playing around with scraps.

California-based artist Zwia Lipkin grew up in Israel where she attended a high school for the arts and received a BA in Art History and East Asian Studies. She then took a long break from art to pursue a PhD at Stanford and then to raise a family. When she finally returned to art practice, she chose textiles as her main medium. She’s taken a handful of quilting classes, but she mostly teaches herself through experimentation and practice.

Website: www.anytexture.com

Instagram: @anytexture

Facebook: facebook.com/ANYTexture

Ruth Singer

Vintage viewpoint

Ruth Singer’s affinity for old textiles started when she was child. And her first career working in museums gave her an enduring passion for historic textiles. So, when she began to develop her own work, Ruth turned to vintage fabrics and eco textiles to make repeatable products. From there, she moved to making one-off pieces using old textiles whose marks, darns, stains and tears became part of her art’s narrative.

Ruth conducts extensive research to create textile art that tells stories with complex meanings. So, it can take a while to match up a concept she wants to explore with the cloth in her stash. Her studio is full of old textiles, some of which she refuses to cut up because they’re so old and precious.

Ruth uses a lot of 1930s linens from her grandparents, as well as damaged and decaying Victorian clothing, quilts and church textiles. She also hunts out supplies from specialist antique textile dealers, buying things that catch her eye, even though she might not find a use for it until much later.

‘My work is usually very subtle and delicate, with little interventions into the cloth itself, so it can sometimes be mistaken for a museum piece. This kind of fragile cloth is integral to my work, and although I use other materials for certain projects, old cloth will always be my first choice. I have a lot to use up!’

Ruth believes using old textiles is the best way to bring instant meaning and depth to your work. It’s also a great way to be more sustainable in your use of materials. Old quilts make a wonderful base for appliqué and embroidery. Old tea towels and dusters are also soft and easy to stitch upon. And vintage family fabrics can be especially meaningful and powerful. But if they’re too precious to use, beautiful old textiles can be sourced on eBay and at antique fairs.

Ruth Singer is based in Leicester, UK. She has exhibited her work far and wide, most recently at Llantarman Grange in Cwmbran (2022). Ruth has also authored many books, including Fabric Manipulation, and she regularly runs online workshops. Ruth also works on community projects, residencies and commissions, and she is the Chairperson of the Leicester Society of Artists.

Website: ruthsinger.com

Instagram: @ruthsingertextiles

Facebook: facebook.com/RuthSingertextiles

Elnaz Yazdani

Alchemy in stitch

Elnaz Yazdani first began using found objects and unusual materials during her degree course. She was given a brief called ‘the alchemy of cloth’ which led to her fascination with alchemists and the transformation of materials. She became obsessed with turning ‘the mundane’ into ‘the magnificent’ through stitching. She often finds inspiration and beauty in a range of unconventional materials, and she loves using them in her embroidery projects.

Whether working on large-scale works or pieces of contemporary jewellery, Elnaz likes to incorporate stitch in her work. She spends a large amount of time developing embroidery teaching samples for her costume, fashion and textile students.

The common theme throughout her work is her use of unconventional materials. Each project stems from the materials she chooses to collect. Their colours and shapes influence the outcome and creative process.

Elnaz collects materials from a wide range of places and is always looking for new and alternative supplies. She especially sources waste cutoffs from local factories and manufacturing companies. And she’s developed a good relationship with a car parts supplier, who offers her waste items too small for them to use and otherwise destined for landfill. Her local scrap store is also a favourite source of materials.

‘My visits to the scrap store are inspiring. I let my imagination run wild with all the unusual materials and repurposed items they have for sale. Sometimes, I find it helpful to take a sketchbook along to record my inspirations.’

Use of alternative materials often finds Elnaz having to rethink how she teaches traditional embroidery skills. This is especially true when teaching goldwork embroidery. Her classes on alternative and contemporary goldwork are hugely popular, as she turns traditional techniques on their head by introducing obscure or unconventional materials.

Elnaz also likes to encourage her students to challenge their notions of a bead in embroidery. She invites them to reflect upon the nature of beads and where they can be sourced. Then she asks if they could make their own beads. What materials would they use? Would they choose something hollow, cut something up, or break something down?

Making your own beads is a great way to start working with unconventional materials. It will help you see the potential of unusual objects. Then once you have something to work with, grab some fabric, a hoop, needle and thread, and have a go at some alternative embroidery!

During pandemic lockdowns, Elnaz’s obsession with found and unusual materials grew. Of course, she had more time to explore ideas and sort through items collected over time. But the lockdowns also encouraged her to look around her own home and repurpose household waste materials, such as old stationary, game parts or broken wires.

Elnaz also uses her work as a form of escapism, which benefits her mental health. By creating captivating embroidered worlds of repurposed materials, she can lose herself in stitch after a long day of online teaching.

Elnaz Yazdani is an artist and educator based in Yorkshire, UK. She has exhibited her work most recently at the Fashion & Embroidery Show, NEC, Birmingham (2022) and the Bankside Gallery, London (2022). Elnaz was also commended in The Embroiderers’ Guild Beryl Dean Award for Teaching Excellence in Embroidery and Design (2020).

Website: elnazyazdani.com 

Instagram: @elnazyazdani

Facebook: facebook.com/elnazyazdanii

Vanessa Barragão

Refashion passion

While at university studying fashion design, Vanessa Barragão learned about the huge amounts of trash produced by the textile industry and its harmful effects on the environment. That’s when she decided to start recycling and repurposing textiles. She worked hard to establish agreements with local Portuguese textile factories, which allow her to collect most of their waste. And she’s always on the lookout for new factories that might also share their waste materials.

‘We have a saying in Portugal: what is trash for some is luxury for others. As creatives, that’s where we need to direct ourselves.’

Vanessa’s techniques are based on traditional artisanal textile practices including latch hook, crochet, felt, weaving, embroidery and macramé. She especially enjoys experimenting with unusual materials, and figuring out new techniques for incorporating them into her work. Each new material poses its own challenge and aesthetic. For example, her tapestry Nostalgia used strips of esparto grass braided into several branches. The grass is traditionally used for basketry, but Vanessa figured out ways to work it into her tapestry. Remarkable!

Once the textiles arrive at Vanessa’s workshop, she washes her chosen materials. She then sorts and catalogues them by colour. Vanessa admits it’s a long process, and the materials do take up a lot of space in her studio. But she finds it rewarding to know all those materials will be repurposed when they would otherwise be thrown away.

Vanessa’s best recycling tip is to take time to determine what is really ‘trash’ and what can be repurposed into something new. Keep an open mind and experiment to see what’s possible.

Vanessa Barragão is based in Albufeira, Portugal. She has exhibited in many group shows and completed multiple commissions. Her Botanical Tapestry was unveiled at Heathrow Airport, London, UK in 2019. She is fully committed to only working with waste materials to create magnificent botanical and coral-inspired works.

Website: www.vanessabarragao.com

Instagram: @vanessabarragao_work

Facebook: facebook.com/vanessabarragaoartist

Julie Peppito

Thrifting activist

Julie Peppito shopped at the Salvation Army and other thrift stores as a teen, both out of necessity and because it was fashionable at the time. Poring over aisles of discarded toys, clothes and furniture, she wondered what made something ‘valuable’ and what made it ‘out of fashion?’ Why are clothes thrown away if they only have a hole or stain?

While she still shops at thrift shops, Julie’s neighbours and friends also like to contribute to her collection. She has also discovered great objects and textiles on the street.

Julie has been experimenting with ways to make herself and others look at old things with new appreciation. She celebrates every object’s history and loves to smash and sew them all together. Their narratives of place, time and use are woven together as she considers who made them and how they were used. Julie’s hybrid forms serve as metaphors for the way we connect to ourselves, to each other and to the planet.

Julie’s creative process is quite unique. Often, she just sweeps up piles of trash off the floor and glues it onto a canvas. She then embellishes the work with any and all materials, including embroidered imagery, sewn-together toy cars, cutlery, hand-painted patterns and life drawings. Julie starts with bins of objects containing items loosely organised by size and kind, although over time they’ve become mixed up. She then flips the bins’ items onto the floor.

‘In a random John Cage ‘philosophy of chance’ kind of a way, I dump the bins out and challenge myself to use what’s there. I love to combine brute force and energy with fine decorative details.’

Sometimes, Julie sews objects to old carpets or canvases. Other times, she wraps them all together with yard, wire or old electrical cords. To work out a composition, she pins items next to one another to see if the story feels right. She then stitches everything together, and then adds more!

One of Julie’s top tips for artists wanting to use recycled materials is to look through your materials and see if you can replace any of your store-bought materials with recycled materials. Start by viewing old things in terms of their colour, shape and form. How much stuff have you bought that you don’t need? What are the things that no one else would ever want?

Once you have a collection of items to recycle, challenge yourself to explore and use those materials in your work. Your goal is to make them desirable once again.

Julie is based in Brooklyn, New York (US). Her work has been featured at The Long Island Children’s Museum, Kentler International Drawing Space, Ethan Cohen Gallery and many other venues. She has received a New York Foundation for the Arts Fellowship in Sculpture and has made art for four New York City Park’s Department playgrounds.

Website: juliepeppito.com

Instagram: @juliepeppito

Facebook: facebook.com/Julie-Peppito

Elnaz Yazdani says rethinking beads is a great first step to explore recycled art. If you’re up for the challenge, check out Jessica Grady’s remarkable upcycled bead creations for more inspiration.

Tapestry has been practised across the globe for thousands of years. Ancient Egyptians and Incas used tapestries as burial shrouds, while the Greeks and Romans used them as wall coverings in public buildings. The Chinese preferred to use them to decorate clothing or wrapping gifts.

But what exactly is a tapestry? Looking at these five artists, you’ll be hard-pressed to say.

While each of them uses traditional techniques, they’ve added their own approaches to subjects and materials in ways you wouldn’t expect.

Frances Crowe creates tapestries representing significant battles, but they’re not the types of scenes you’d expect. Fiona Hutchison works with plastic and other unusual materials, while Wendy Carpenter embeds surprising found objects in her work. Jeni Ross weaves modern abstract designs with colours and shapes that pop. And Molly Elkind brings tapestry work down to size by creating small, but mighty, weavings.

If you’ve not explored tapestry work before, now’s the time.

Frances Crowe

Tapestry activism

As a grandmother, Frances Crowe was appalled by TV news images of children being taken from their parents and put into cages after crossing the Mexican border into America. Around the same time, the story of the ‘Tuam Babies’ broke in Ireland. It was discovered hundreds of babies had been buried in a mass unmarked grave near a home in Tuam, County Galway.

Frances decided to channel her outrage into creating Torn Apart to explore the human experience of intersectionality, inequality and social justice through family separation. 

‘I used a media image of a family walking together as my starting point. I imagined them being separated and the little boy losing his shoes. I sought to create characters that could represent any race at any time in history. And for the boy’s shoes, I decided to feature the most popular branded and expensive sneakers available at the time.’ 

After sketching the family unit, in an unexpected move, Frances ripped the drawing in half. The torn edges were striking, so she decided to weave the tapestry in two parts and leave the horizontal warp threads exposed to represent the fragile threads that bind families.

Frances used her homemade scaffold frame loom, and the cotton warp was wound 10 ends per inch instead of creating a shed. One section was woven on the front of the loom and the other on the back using the same warp.

‘I use handwoven tapestry to share narratives of global issues because of the time spent with the warp and the weft. One large tapestry can take months, or even years, to weave. Being still during moments of creation allows me to process an issue at hand, be it migration, global warming or other crisis that bothers me.’

Frances discovered the weaving department at Dublin’s National College of Art and Design during her teaching practice year where she studied with Evelyn Lindsey. And for the past 40 years, tapestry has been Frances’ ‘friend and companion’ supporting her in good and not-so-good times.

‘I have woven almost every day all these years. It’s the most immersive and mindful way to live my life. I also believe handwoven tapestry supports my message because cloth is something everyone can relate to. Even though an image may be disturbing, it can prompt important conversations.’

Frances Crowe is based in County Roscommon, Ireland. Her tapestries have been selected for a variety of fibre art exhibitions in Ireland, England, China and Canada. She has also received many awards, most recently An Agility Award from the Arts Council of Ireland. She has also been selected by The Michelangelo Foundation for inclusion in the Homo Faber guide for Master Artisans.  

Artist website: francescrowe.com

Facebook: facebook.com/fcrowetapestry

Instagram: @crowefrances

Fiona Hutchison

Weaving with plastic

Fiona’s passion for the sea is immediately apparent in her work. But she also has a mission to expose global water challenges by incorporating the very materials that threaten their health.

‘I don’t want to create a representation of the seas and oceans. I want to make something that’s experienced and fosters a deep personal connection. I want to create a dialogue among the subject, materials and the viewer.’

Years back, Fiona experimented incorporating plastic baling straps into her weaving but the results weren’t satisfying. But later, when Covid lockdowns forced her to work with what she had to hand, Fiona again explored ways to weave with the left-over plastic straps. Each attempt was hung next to the other along her studio wall.

One day, Fiona started drawing the hanging weavings, and the idea to create a wall of water came to life. The project would also qualify for submission to the 2021 Cordis Prize for Tapestry that required large-scale works taking an innovative approach to traditional tapestry (she won a spot on the short list).

Using the drawings only as a guide, 15 narrow strips were woven using the traditional Gobelin tapestry technique on a hand-dyed cotton warp, and the weft was mostly cotton and linen in which split baling strapping was inserted. Fiona developed techniques to pull and manipulate the warp and weft, and by leaving warps exposed and unfinished, the tapestry became a 3D woven drawing of the sea.

‘My biggest mistake was trying to make the plastic do what I wanted instead of exploring its unique qualities. Playing with the materials and asking “what if” was the most exciting and fruitful way to construct the plastic weaving.’

Hanging her sculpture posed another challenge. It was important the work had lightness, movement and appeared to float off the wall. So, each strip is hung at the end of a long screw, creating depth and interesting shadows. It also allows the work to be hung in a myriad of ways and ‘recycled’ for different venues.

Although trained as a traditional tapestry weaver, Fiona’s practice has expanded to explore a wider range of materials and techniques. She especially continues to experiment with discarded materials.

‘They all speak their own language and require careful handling. Some I love, while others I find challenging. I hope combining these undervalued materials with traditional techniques will help us reconsider the value of what we use and throw away.’

Fiona Hutchison is based in Edinburgh, Scotland. She has exhibited her work internationally and taught at university level and in-studio workshops. Fiona is a founding member of the European Tapestry Forum and STAR* (Scottish Tapestry Artists Regrouped) and shortlisted for  The Cordis Prize for Tapestry (2021).

Artist website: fionahutchison.co.uk

Facebook: facebook.com/tapestrystudio114

Instagram: @fionahutchisontapestry

Wendy Carpenter

Found object designs

There’s something magical about found objects embedded in textile art, especially when they’re surprising elements. Wait, look! That’s rusted metal!

Wendy Carpenter is a master at incorporating random ephemera  in her tapestry in ways that seamlessly support her stories. She especially enjoys using natural items, such as a uniquely twisted branch or colourful log. But for this piece, she’s incorporated a rusted tractor piece to illustrate the history of American farming.

‘When I’m out and about, I’m always looking for materials to incorporate into my artwork. The tractor blade was scrap metal found on a farm, and the barrel rims I found on my deck one day. Neighbours and friends know I’m a collector, so they share their random finds.’

The size of Wendy’s works is also remarkable. Most of her woven art towers over her when displayed, and this work is no exception. Wendy says working on a large scale is ‘the nature of the beast’ when it comes to her weaving. Working with sculptural forms and abstract tapestry design necessarily pushes her work into large formats.

Chenille on the Farm features six-inch-wide panels made from a chenille bedspread, which were all handwoven on a floor loom with an inlay threading. Each panel is nearly nine feet long. Wendy dyed the chenille bedspread with a rust pigment to incorporate the fabric with the rusted tractor blade. A lower metal rim repeats the tractor blade material.

‘When introducing found objects from nature or manufacture, it’s necessary to repeat the new design element through colour, form or texture to blend the soft and hard materials. I focus on the overall form, tapestry composition, texture and colour when incorporating repurposed materials.’

Because weaving is a time-consuming medium, Wendy always starts with a sketch for a perspective on the size, proportion, balance and overall design. Although she refers to the sketch for measurements, she will quickly start designing directly on-loom. From there, the artwork takes on its own unique character.Wendy also prefers to work in series. Chenille on the Farm is one of several works in her Preserving Americana series. The collection conceptualises America’s ancestral farming culture during the early 1900s.

‘Working in a series allows me to tell a story through images. Each piece seems to get better as I continue to explore the realm of possibilities to express a visual concept. It also takes time to prepare the weft material and dress the loom, so it’s practical to weave in a series.’

Wendy Carpenter is based in Door County, Wisconsin (US) where she operates her InterFibers gallery. She has exhibited her work at the Miller Art Museum, Sturgeon Bay, Wisconsin (US), the Hardy Gallery in Ephraim, Wisconsin (US), and the La Antigua Galleria in Antigua, Guatemala. She has a fine arts degree from Evergreen State College in Washington (US).

Artist website: interfibers.com

Jeni Ross

An abstract approach

Time is the essence when it comes to Jeni Ross’s tapestry work. Her abstract and colourful tapestries showcase the passage of time through shape, form and brilliant use of colour. Her designs incorporate layers, contrasts and cycles to represent movement from day to night, earth to air, and negative to positive moments.

As with all art forms, Jeni’s abstract designs reflect how tapestry subject matter and techniques have changed over time. She agrees with master weaver Archie Brennan that a tapestry can be anything an artist wants it to be. And she points out the fact that tapestries have the advantage of softening a space and absorbing sound in ways that enrich both homes and public buildings.

‘A woven tapestry does have a different aesthetic to a painting, but it can have just as much presence in a gallery and draw an appreciative crowd. I enjoy many forms of tapestry, from 3D objects to a painterly approach that freezes gestural movement forever. But I’m particularly attracted to work that makes a simpler statement in terms of colour, and perhaps, a more hard edge approach.’

Linden Tapestry was commissioned for a London home and woven during lockdown. It’s a wonderful example of how Jeni continues the theme of time and its responses to the landscape.

‘The family loves the Suffolk countryside, so I sought to depict the interconnectedness of the sky, water and land. The client says the red flash in the centre mirrors the exhilaration of stepping out of the sea after a swim.’

Jeni starts her creative process by painting large sheets of watercolour paper with gouache to make a colour field. A sheet of coloured paper is then cut to the proportions of the finished piece as a ground. Additional cut and torn paper shapes are layered and moved about until an initial arrangement begins to work.

When it’s time to weave, Jeni largely uses traditional tapestry weaving techniques. And to help colours stand alone, she uses a kilim carpet weaving approach to create clear shapes with slits between the colours.

‘I love the richness and depth of colour that can be achieved through yarns. So, it’s always important to see how each colour works with or against its neighbour, as well as the overall plan. Sometimes a piece will go in an unexpected direction that may not work as a textile, but I’m always thinking of how an image can work within the constraints of tapestry weaving.’

Jeni Ross is based in Farnham, Surrey, UK. Her work is exhibited across the UK in hospitals, theatres, museums and government buildings. Her largest commission featuring a suite of six tapestries is installed in the Founder’s Library in New College, Oxford. She also created a series of tufted artworks for the Belfast HSS Trust Childrens’ Treatment Centres and Shannon Clinic in Belfast.

Artist website: jeniross.co.uk

Instagram: @iamnotapixel

Molly Elkind

Small, but powerful

The word ‘tapestry’ often evokes images of grandiose wall hangings featuring pastoral scenes or intricate repeated designs. But when master weaver Archie Brennan designed a tabletop copper-pipe loom in the 90s, the weaving world took notice. ‘Weaving small’ became a big thing.

Molly Elkind has been weaving small for the past 13 years, and her petite works have as much impact as any wall-sized tapestry. There’s a research aspect to her small weavings, as she likes seeing quicker results that may inform other works. But Molly also believes small weavings can make grand impressions in their own right because of their smaller imprint.

‘I think of small tapestries as lyrical poems rather than epic narratives. My spontaneous experimental weavings are often looser, freer, and just better than larger, meticulously planned pieces. Small tapestries draw viewers into intimate one-on-one conversations in which the materials and textures can be appreciated upon closer examination.’

Since moving to New Mexico (US), Molly has been enthralled with the high desert environment, and specifically, its beautiful native grasses. Her goal is to move from weaving pictures of local plant life to weaving with the plant life.

Woven Grass Study was Molly’s first experiment weaving with grass. It was woven on a simple frame loom with nails, using three colours of linen for warp and weft. The open balanced weaving technique was inspired by a workshop led by Jennifer Sargent. The grasses are Rhodes grass, side oats grama, Chinese silverbeard and needle-and-thread grass.

‘I treated each stalk of grass as a separate strand of weft, inserting it from one selvedge edge to the other, allowing the top to stick out to one side. I had to take care not to brush the grass with my arm and shatter the seed head as I continued to weave.’

One of Molly’s greatest challenges is preserving grasses in ways that don’t change their appearance. Hair spray, even the ‘extra hold’ variety, didn’t work. Her best success to date is a clear spray enamel, but she continues to research. Molly harvests the grasses as they dry and become brittle in the fields. If further drying is necessary, she hangs grass bundles upside down in a dark garage for a week or two.

‘I have been interested in collage for a long time. I love the effect of juxtaposing different materials to see what sparks fly. It challenges viewers to create their own stories about how the disparate elements relate.’

Molly is based in Santa Fe, New Mexico (US). She has exhibited internationally, including a solo show at Southeast Fiber Arts Alliance (SEFAA) in Chamblee, GA, US (2019) and as a finalist for the Kate Derum Award for Small Tapestries, South Melbourne, Australia (2021). Molly also teaches online and in person with a particular focus on design principles and processes.

Artist website: mollyelkind.com

Facebook: facebook.com/mpelkind

Instagram: @mollyelkind

Key takeaways

• Consider creating something that focuses on an issue that’s important to you. And then, like Frances Crowe, use your creative time to sort out your feelings. This can be a therapeutic exercise in which the process means as much, or more, than the final work.

• Like Fiona Hutchinson, dare to work with unusual materials, and let them lead the way as you experiment. Remove any preconceived notions and allow the materials to reveal what’s possible.

• Keep in mind what Wendy Carpenter suggested when including found objects in your work: repeat the found object’s colour, form or texture throughout your design to help create a cohesive work.

• Before committing to a colour palette, take Jeni Ross’s suggestion to audition colours by laying them side by side to see how they relate. Take time to see how colours interact individually and together as a whole.

• Think about stepping outside and gathering some botanical materials to include in your work. Molly Elkind experimented with local grasses. What’s available in your backyard?

If you were intrigued by Frances Crowe’s ‘split’ panel tapestry, check out Kate Park’s weavings that feature remarkable visible thread connections.

There’s something about woollen felt that appeals to the senses. Is it the warmth, the colours, the texture, or something else?

Felting has a long history of practical and decorative applications. Offering a textural and tactile appearance that can stimulate the desire to touch, it can be meditative to create, satisfying to embellish and an exciting and versatile material with which to sculpt.

Using a combination of friction, soap and water to felt together wool fibres, a new fabric is formed that can be moulded into whatever you desire.

From wall hangings to novel multi-eyed sculptures, we found artists from around the world – Latvia, Ukraine, Canada, Scotland and England – and discovered the unique ways in which they create alchemy from wool. Their two and three-dimensional artworks encompass all the attractions of textile art – colour, texture and embellishment.

From drifts of felted fibre Jackie Cardy creates flowers and leaves with machine and hand stitch. Moy Mackay’s affection for the crofts and bothies of Scotland are similarly brought to life with carefully stitched lines. We learn about Dagmar Binder’s passion for sculpture and Diana Nagorna’s skill in creating  sequined and beaded garments. Ksenia Shinkovskaya’s life changing experiences gave birth to a whole new range of boggle-eyed creatures and Fiona Duthie’s swathes of hot colour made her viewers examine their own carbon footprint.

Whether you want to make or simply admire felt, whether your interest is in the process or the story behind their works, these artists offer something for every textile art devotee.

Jackie Cardy

Jackie Cardy likes to work with her hands, her head and her heart – and that’s what makes her a true artist. 

It’s easy to be captivated when gazing at Jackie’s work. She has an innate ability to unite colours in blended wool and then, through stitch, form images, often inspired by flowers and leaves. Her mark-making on felt brings the softness and textures of the wool alive and there is a striking contrast as they meet bursts of colour, appliquéed with silk velvet, creating interest and drawing the eye. 

Ancient traditions and marks in the landscape ‘swish about’ in Jackie’s head with some ‘falling out’ onto the fabric. She values the fact that felt can be cut to shape without fraying, which helps when making her smaller pieces like brooches.

‘I use my sewing machine needle like a pen and have stitched many hundreds of miles over silk, wool, and velvet. I have no elves, each piece is stitched by me.’

A spring garden

Primavera uses the colours of lime, rust and blue to form floral and leaf motifs, with both machine and hand stitch meandering between the shapes.

It was created after Jackie had received a request to make a larger than normal piece. She turned it down, but later wondered just how big a piece she could make. After creating pre-felted motifs and positioning these onto a larger background with added wisps of wool, she felted them all together. The piece left plenty of room for free motion stitching on her machine, using variegated, shiny, threads to emphasise and define certain shapes and areas.

‘The most enjoyable part is finishing with hand embroidery. I use very intuitive and informal mark making with thread, rather than classic embroidery stitches.’

‘Most of my pieces feature abstract organic shapes, and Primavera is very much in the same vein, but this time these elements were more considered before being combined. Much of my work starts with an inkling of an idea which I then develop intuitively. Sometimes that’s dictated by the accidents of felt and the way the colours blend to give unexpected shapes and depth, which go on to inspire stitch.

‘I made this in spring and called it Primavera. I like the vibrancy of the lime, rust and blue colours and the fizziness of the separate elements. It gives me the feeling of seeing a spring garden bursting out of the ground.’

In addition to wool roving and hand dyed velvet, Jackie sometimes adds dyed scrim, muslin and a variety of other fibres for texture. In addition to her felt wall-hangings based on nature and landscapes, she has stitched some of her artwork onto backgrounds of silk paper, and made a range of brooches that include birds and sheep as well as more abstract shapes.

Jackie Cardy is based in a village in the West Pennine Moors, Lancashire.

After excelling in her City and Guilds in Embroidery in her 40s, she taught workshops and exhibited with various textile groups. She is a member of Fellside Felters in Chorley, Lancashire.

Website: jackiecardytextiles.com

Facebook: jackiecardytextiles

Instagram: @cardyjackie

Diana Nagorna

Diana Nagorna is a Ukrainian artist and textile designer specialising in the finest felt couture. 

Her wearable art is exquisite, both in the finishing and fit of the felted base and in the beaded and textile adornments that lift it to a completely new level, though Diana has also made functional and comfortable clothes for everyday wear.

Using only natural wool, silk and fibres with wet felting, hot felting and nuno-felting techniques, her creations are recognised as sustainable fashion.

Since 2008, following her search for a material that would allow her to express her creative self fully, she has been making and selling her clothing, shoes, bags and accessories, as well as online tutorials on how to make them.

‘I enjoy all stages of creativity from conception to implementation in the material. It is a magical process. In felting I can embody my most diverse creative ideas.’

Felt’s many qualities

Dune Queen is a dress within Diana’s Felt Fluid collection, aimed at showing the multiple facets of felt: a warm material that is both lightweight and delicate yet offers sculptural properties. To create this particular costume Diana was inspired by images of the Burning Man festival. The costume was worn at the festival in 2022, something she had often dreamed of.

‘I like all stages of creation, especially when I’m not limited by any framework. This is pure creativity and improvisation. For an artist, this is priceless. My most favourite part of the work is the fantasy, volumetric embroidery in a free style.’

Diana plans to delve even deeper into felt as an art, and since 2021 she has been creating a variety of costumes in small thematic series as creative statements. Her dream is to make costumes for movies and shows.

Diana Nagorna was born and raised in a small town in eastern Ukraine and now lives in Kharkiv with her family. She studied at a children’s art school, then at Donetsk State Art College and graduated from the Kharkiv State Academy of Design and Arts. She works as an artist and textile designer and teaches online to students around the world.

Website: diananagorna.com

Facebook: nagornafelt

Instagram: @diananagorna_feltcouture

Moy Mackay

Moy Mackay’s felt paintings are a pioneering development in the ancient craft of felting.

Upon completing her art studies and noticing the divide between what was regarded as fine art and what was not, Moy felt compelled to develop an art form that united both. Taking advantage of the broad palette available in wool roving, and the array of exquisite complementary fibres such as silk and merino, Moy channelled her great passion and belief in what she was doing, to convince gallery owners to take her work.

Her felted paintings have helped to open up a whole new world in terms of texture and depth of colour, making headway for textile art to gain recognition in the art world.

Crofts and bothies

Moy’s atmospheric piece The Green Hut was envisioned as she travelled to a remote cottage by the sea in the far north of Scotland to concentrate on her artwork. As she entered the majestic and rugged scenery of the Highlands, Moy began to feel inspired. Fond of including landscapes and buildings in her work, her attention was drawn to the derelict old crofts and farm sheds along the way. She was so enthralled by one, a beautiful green tin hut, that, a few days later, Moy went back to sketch it and take photos.

‘I was somehow enchanted by it. Its colour, structure and placement within its surroundings. I loved every aspect of it, I could visualise how it could be translated in fibre and stitch and was super excited to start.’

Moy was fascinated by the surfaces and patterns in the hut and saw an opportunity to explore new ways of expression in felt, adding marks and lines with free motion stitching. 

As she worked on the piece, she used a variety of fibres alongside the merino wool to depict the vertical lines of the corrugated tin and the unusual placements of colour she noticed in the weathering of the metal. The colour palette of green and rust was also a variation from her often favoured choices of blues and pinks. 

‘Buildings feature strongly in my works at the moment. I am passionate about landscapes, but often an old croft or bothy will find its way in there. Maybe I’m trying to convey a sanctuary within my work. A place that creates a feel good factor where the onlooker can create their own story within. 

‘My purpose in making art is essentially to bring comfort and touch the senses in a positive way. Colour and art is a great therapy for our well being. If my creations can stir a positive emotion then my job is done.’

Moy Mackay graduated from Glasgow School of Art in 1990 and now lives In the beautiful Tweed Valley in the Scottish Borders. She has published three books: Art in Felt and Stitch, Flowers in Felt and Stitch and The Art of Moy Mackay. In 2016 Moy was shortlisted in the Sky Arts ‘Landscape Artist of the Year’ and in 2013 gained a silver award in the textile category of the Craft & Design Selected Awards.

Website: www.moymackay.com

Facebook: Moy Mackay Artist

Instagram: @moymackay

Dagmar Binder

Dagmar Binder is fascinated by wool as a sculptural material. Following her art studies she experimented intensely with the medium and was so enthralled that in 1999 she left her teaching career to open her fibre art studio, Textillabor, in Berlin.

Dagmar is inspired by natural forms, often using these in her works in an abstract way.

‘With felting I am mostly interested in seamless, three-dimensional creations. This is the special potential of felt and can’t be done with other textiles in the same way.’

Lively and unconventional

In her artwork Gathering, she picked just one element and assembled many similar pieces into a new composition. 

Gathering was conceived while Dagmar was considering the functional aspects of wearable artwork. She had been working on the scale-like shapes in a collar and selected this single element, playing and experimenting with its form. While  photographing the intermediate stages, she observed the dynamics of different versions, finally deciding upon one, and leaving others to serve as a starting point for future works.  

The pre-felted scales took many weeks to make, their bases left unfelted so that they could be seamlessly joined to the base rug at the end. As she worked intuitively, she decided on a dense structure, using resists to keep the raised parts separate from the base felt. After the wet felting process she unfolded the scales to give the three-dimensional view. Dagmar saw that combining many scales together would create a dynamic linear pattern, and decided to let the scales, fins and lamellae reach out over the edge of the base rug, avoiding the use of a frame and letting the object grow into space.

‘The transformation of the fibres during the felting process is irreversible and not completely predictable. I closely observe the reactions of this lively and unconventional material and respond to unforeseen changes, either by removing or accepting, supporting and even underlining them as an individual feature of this work. In the very end, there will be a considerable change in expression when the so-far flat and wet felt is being shaped three- dimensionally and dried.

‘Gathering catches the eye and leads us round and round in endless circles, with scales interlaced and running under and over each other, some at crosspoints. While one person might be reminded of a labyrinth or animal skin, it makes me think of a collective dance or celebration. I can hear voices singing together and feet stomping in a ritual.

‘I love to explore all kind of possibilities with this soft sculptural material, try out new techniques and push the boundaries of traditional feltmaking.’

‘Felt as a soft, natural material seems very interesting to me for multiples or repetitive structures. Even starting from exactly the same shape and dimensions, each single reproduction would end up slightly different and in a subtle way express the individual within a family or crowd of same elements.’

Dagmar Binder is a Berlin based felt artist and feltmaking tutor. She studied at Berlin University of the Arts (1995) and has worked as artist in residence in Brazil, Peru and Bolivia. She teaches workshops in person and online, and has exhibited in numerous fibre art exhibitions and design fairs. Her practice spans felt art objects, stage costumes and fashion accessories and recently she has focused on sculptural collars, scarves and wall hangings.

Website: www.textillabor.de

Instagram: @textillabor

Ksenia Shinkovskaya

Ksenia Shinkovskaya lives in Daugavpils in Latvia, between the powerful Daugava river and a beautiful lake, surrounded by forests, both of which provide inspiration for her felted artworks.

She started felting as a hobby in 2000, becoming a freelance artist a few years later. Sales of her small needle-felted creatures went smoothly until she experienced a difficult childbirth during which she briefly died. Her son grew to be happy and healthy but with delayed speech development. 

Her natural concern was compounded by the fact that her contacts and markets were shrinking and her felting practice simply no longer flowed – no matter what she tried, it felt somehow forced. She defines this as the point at which her career as a designer ended and her life as an artist began.

An inside job

All was not lost as from within came new inspiration to create a range of strange and magical figures with mirrors instead of faces – a range that became very popular with buyers and curators.

Since then many of her works, including Lakhudra, hint at what is contained within a person: the state of the soul, the psyche and the emotions. She expresses this in her felted sculptures without using human form.

The word lakhudra refers to the state of a woman’s hair when she has just woken up and it’s unbrushed. At the same time, it can reflect a dishevelled, unbalanced mental mood, when a person is worried but does not even know why. 

‘When I made this sculpture, I wanted to explore this unbalanced mood and embody it in physical form.’

Many of Ksenia’s dolls and sculptures are fitted with batteries that allow the eyes or interiors to glow. For her, it represents a metaphor for the victory of light over darkness.

She began making the eyes herself 20 years ago using her husband’s stained glass equipment, when the choice of ready-made factory eyes didn’t suit her desire for incredible, fantasy eyes. It has become a business with an enormous range, and now she is known as ‘the eye fairy’.

‘When my Lakhudra sculpture was ready, I decided to photograph it on the lake, where the fishermen stand. Imagine their surprise when I came in and sat Lakhudra on a chair. It was very funny! I made her with glowing eyes. In the dark you just see 20 burning eyes. It’s fascinating to sit next to her and feel her gaze.’

Ksenia’s range of felt artworks include dolls, brooches, sculptures, jewellery, postcards, sculptures and bags. Many of the dolls have mirror faces, cyclops-style faces or have multiple eyes.

Ksenia Shinkovskaya lives in Daugavpils (Latvia). She is a member of the Daugavpils Association of Artists and her sculptures have been exhibited all over the world. In 2022 she participated in two biennials Material Thinking in China and the 10th International Biennale of Textile Art in Spain.

Website: wool-bulb.com

Instagram: @wool_bulb

Fiona Duthie

Fiona Duthie’s felted work is bold in colour, contrast and form. An artist and maker for over 30 years, Fiona has focused on the intensive and dynamic use of surface design and textures in felt. 

She has explored new material combinations including ceramics, paper and burnt wood, also making natural inks and using these in combination with wool fibres. It is these she combined in her large scale installation Chromatic Navigation, which in 2022 was exhibited at Mahon Hall in her hometown of Salt Spring Island, British Columbia, Canada.

Challenging processes

The 200 felt wall tiles created a full spectrum of colour of over nine metres (29.5 feet) across the exhibition space. Fiona felt compelled to create the installation based on the global temperature map on 29 June 2021. It was the day that an all-time high of 49.6 degrees Celsius was recorded in Lytton, BC, Canada, a town that the next day burned to the ground as a result of forest fire. 

‘Chromatic Navigation explores individuality and community and how we each can influence thinking, circumstances and events through small changes and interactions. I’ve held a long fascination with weather maps – the beauty of the colours and constantly changing patterns. The forest fires and record setting temperatures of 2021 are reflected in these maps – the juxtaposition of beauty and destruction are so strong.

‘I wanted to create a large installation that could bring this contrast forward into people’s consciousness.

‘All of the materials I used are transformed through processes that challenge them – the physical agitation of wool fibres in feltmaking, the breaking down of the paper through wetting and manipulating in the felting process, the extreme temperatures involved in ceramic work and burning wood. Natural inks were made from the charred wood of the forest fire burnt trees themselves. Every material used becomes stronger, through these processes. 

‘Each material has its own language and personality. When working with wool, clay and wood, all together, they take on a hierarchy in the order of making. The clay ends up being the most hard with the least flexibility to form to the others. Wood is second, being able to be carved and shaped to mould to the clay, and then wool felt has the greatest flexibility. Even when firmly felted, it can be cut, shaped, sculpted and finished to meet the restrictions of the other two material forms. It takes time while making to understand these relationships, and also see how they can add to the messages in the artworks.

‘As the viewers were encouraged to turn and switch the Chromatic Navigation tiles around to transform the overall pattern, and moved their bodies to physically engage with the pieces, it reminded me of why I’ve enjoyed creating wearable art collections. When the theme is right, a garment becomes a moving sculpture on a body, also changing how the wearer feels and moves depending on the design and structure of the piece. 

‘It was wonderful to watch people interact with the artwork and talk to them about the small changes they made to the piece as a metaphor for the small changes they could make in their lifestyles to lessen their carbon footprint and environmental impact. 

‘Chromatic Navigation explored a whole new, even larger scale of work for me, and a deeper connection formed between our environment and our actions, and between myself as an artist and my audience.’

Fiona Duthie started her first business designing natural fibre clothing when she was 18 and has been a textile artist and tutor for over 30 years. She is based on Salt Spring Island in British Columbia, Canada where she has a full time practice. She specialises in felt making and exhibits and teaches internationally.

Website: fionaduthie.com

Facebook: FionaDuthieFineFelt

Instagram: @fiona.duthie

Key takeaways

Each textile artist has used wool fibres to create felt in a different way. Whether you make felt or other textile artwork, you might like to try some of their techniques.

• Like Jackie Cardy, try embellishing the felted surface with hand or machine stitch.

• Moy Mackay added various fibres alongside her merino base to create texture. You could try adding silks, cottons, scrim or cheesecloth, threads, lace, wool yarn (not superwash) or even animal fur to your work.

• Dagmar Binder selected just one element and duplicated this to create a repeated three-dimensional pattern. Like Dagmar, you can look to nature for inspiration selecting shapes, motifs or patterns you’re drawn to.

• Ksenia Shinkovskaya’s inspiration came from her life experiences and emotions. What can you call upon to inspire your artwork?

• Diana Nagorna creates exquisite wearable art and accessories – a practical way to put felting skills to use.

• Fiona Duthie experimented with materials including Kozo paper, charred wood and clay alongside wool fibres. Make small samples to experiment with materials that are new to you.

We’ve also interviewed felt and stitch artist, Jeanette Appleton, who is inspired by protection of the environment in her work. If you enjoyed this article, why not share it on social media?