Stitch21 'Legacy' exhibition

 As part of the Creative Stitch Graduate Show 2022 new exhibiting group Stitch 21 (made up of students who completed the Advanced Stitched Textiles course in 2021 - hence the name) had a small exhibition with the theme of 'Legacy'

My 'Legacy' pieces are inspired by the weaving industry. 

I was born in the Scottish Borders in the heart of the wool weaving industry. Each one of my 'Legacy' pieces includes a piece of wool blanket woven in Hawick and given to my parents as a wedding present in 1962

The wool blankets were used for many years on beds to keep my family warm during the very cold Northumbrian winters until the arrival of duvets in the 1980s. 

The blanket, liberated from my mothers' airing cupboard, has been dyed using natural dyes. Logwood, Madder and Weld.

Each piece also contains a piece of silk woven in Sudbury where I have lived for the last twenty years.  

'Logwood Legacy' shown here was first made for the STARS Challenge in 2021

'Madder legacy' was made in the same way using a variety of dyed wools, cottons and silk fabrics which are embellished to the blanket base.

With the very hard water in East Anglia it if difficult to get a natural madder dye to be truly red - mine have an orangey tone. You can see how the different wool, cotton and silk fabrics take up the dye differently with the silk viscose velvet being the richest colour

Hand stitching and beading is added for additional texture - I really enjoy this part of the process

'Weld Legacy' is my least favourite of the three. Weld gathered from the  hedgerows near my home dyes the most vibrant yellow. This was combined with another piece of Sudbury woven silk but needed the addition of another colour to make it work - hence the blue indigo dyed fabrics. 

These 'Legacy' pieces will form part of a large exhibition on work on the theme of Wool - Cotton - Silk at my solo exhibition at Snape Maltings in October 2022