This spring we're looking forward to welcoming embroiderer Linda Miller to the InStitches studio. Her densely stitched pictures have held a fascination for me for a log while and I can't wait to have a go myself!
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As you can see from the picture, Harry and Betty have already decided that they'll make fine subjects for my embroidered picture!

So, who/what would you choose to stitch, bossy cats notwithstanding?   If you'd like to join us, and we hope you do, hop over to our web page to find out more details.

Hazel & Terry

Hot on the heels of Lin Kerr's workshops, this week we had the pleasure of a two-day workshop with Arleen Wild. For those of you who aren't familiar with her work, Arleen is a mixed media artist, and her work is an energetic mix of painting, free motion stitch and fabric.  She produces stunning landscapes, seascapes and flowers some of which are huge! You can see more of her work on her website.

Don't you agree that all the work looks amazing? Some aren't quite finished yet but all are well on the way.

You will have spotted that there are scones and home-made jam with clotted cream in the picture. Well we couldn't let all these lovely people work so hard without some kind of reward, so over the two days there were raspberry muffins, banana and pecan loaf and chocolate oat biscuits and the aforementioned scones. Recipes will follow!

If you have been inspired by the work shown, and fancy a creative day out with friends (and cake!) why not check out our Textile Adventures workshops.  There are three left this year and we will soon be adding next year's programme.

That's all for now - thanks for reading! ​

Hazel & Terry

Both Terry and I love text: in books, on quilts, in letters, as fonts, in stitch and as marks made by pen and brush.  So we were delighted to welcome artist and calligrapher Lin Kerr to run a Guest Tutor workshop for InStitches the other week.  

This was no ordinary calligraphy class though because after a brief introduction to letter shapes and forms Lin had us busy learning how to use a round tipped Brause ornamental nib.   We then prepared a piece of watercolour paper with a watercolour wash background before setting out our chosen text and committing nib to paper!

Unfortunatly I didn't take a note of who did what...but I think we all really well especially as none of us had used this nib before.

But here's Becs with her cycling inspired quote!

Lin will be back with us later this week when we shall be exploring writing in the style of David Jones, can't wait!  If you would like to see more of Lin's work then visit her web site:  www.linkerrdesign.co.uk

We do like homemade cake and the one served on this workshop was a new recipe - to help use up the glut of beetroot from Hazel's allotment!  Apologies for the lack of photograph, I wasn't quick enough and there were few crumbs left!

This recipe is from Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstalls book Veg every day!  The original recipe was for a pumkin and raisin loaf but he suggested using beetroot instead – it gives the most amazing purple/pink colour!  The loaf itself is rich and sweet but also light as it doesn’t contain any butter or oil.

Preparation time: 30 mins
Cooking time: 1 hour

Ingredients
200g light muscovado sugar
4 large eggs, separated
200g finely grated beetroot
finely grated zest and juice of 1 lemon
100g raisins
100g ground almonds
200g self-raising flour
a pinch of fine sea salt
1 tsp ground cinnamon
A generous grating of nutmeg

Method
Preheat the oven to 170°C/Gas mark 3.  Lightly grease a loaf tin, about 20 x 10 cm, and line with baking parchment.  Using an electric whisk, beat the sugar and egg yolks together for 2-3 minutes until pale and creamy.  Lightly stir in the grated beetroot, lemon zest and juice, raisins and ground almonds.  Sift the flour, salt and spices together over the mixture and then fold them in, using a metal spoon.  In a large clean bowl, beat the egg whites until they hold soft peaks.  Stir in a heaped tablespoon of the egg white into the cake mixture to loosen it a little, then fold in the rest as lightly as you can.  Tip the mixture into the prepared loaf tin and gently level the surface.  Bake for about one hour, or until a skewer inserted into the centre comes out clean.  Leave to cool in the tin for 10 minutes, then transfer to a wire rack to cool completely before slicing.

Here's the final instalment of photos from the galleries at the Festival of Quilts this year (from me at least - Hazel may have more when she is back from Scotland!).

First today is Contemporary Quilt's Elements gallery. Each year this special interest group of the Quilters' Guild has a juried challenge open to all members, with a theme and a set format. The interpretations of the Elements theme were wide ranging, and really illustrate the breadth of contemporary quilting, as you will see from the pictures. 

Unfortunately I didn't note the makers of the quilts in my general views above - if you know who they were do leave a comment. You can read more about the setting up of this gallery on Claire Passmore's blog. Below are some close-ups of some of the quilts (click to get the whole image). There will be a book available later in the year from Contemporary Quilt's website.

And finally the Fine Art Quilt Masters gallery. An international juried competition open to all, celebrating 'those quilts that transcend craft and achieve art status', the gallery showed the seventeen shortlisted quilts. The winner was announced at the awards ceremony and as usual attracted comment and controversy (well it wouldn't be a worthwhile competition without controversy would it?!). Here are some that attracted my attention. Do leave a comment to let us know what you thought if you saw the quilts (or if you didn't).

Susie Koren's winning quilt was striking in its simplicity. The maker used monoprinting with soya milk and raw pigment and minimal stitch to illustrate the repetitive force of the sea. It was inspired by Newton's explanation that the ocean tides result from the gravitational attraction of the sun and moon on the earth.

Karina Thompson's The Leper's Skull is one of a series of pieces made after spending time with the collection at the Biological Anthropological Research Centre in Bradford, where there were artefacts from a mediaeval lepers cemetery in Cirencester.

The next three quilts appealed to me because of their colour, the techniques used and the subject matter. I love the effect of breakdown printing (where a silk screen with dried procion dye on it is printed with wet medium resulting in a serendipitous, never-to-be-repeated, gradually changing pattern of marks. The skill is in how these fabrics are then used in composition. Leah Higgins employs a beautiful colour range and machine quilted detail in this stunning quilt inspired by what we leave behind.

Using the same technique, this time combined with discharge printed fabrics and dense machine and hand stitching and a subtle colour palette, Audrey Critchley's piece was inspired by a challenge to dye a palette of pale fabrics.

And Cherry Vernon-Harcourt's hand-drawn and painted piece was inspired by the landscape of North Norfolk.  I love the spareness of line in this - and the subject matter of course!

The final two quilts on our tour of the gallery contain another of our favourite elements: text. Claudia Helmer has used laminated paper screen-printed text to convey her feelings about the empty words spoken by politicians and the corporate world. The central panel was cut out and hangs in front of the main body of the quilt. Simple, dense machine quilting completes the work. 

Sara Impey takes machine quilting to another level with her meticulously free motion stitched words, this time on 'tapes' which were woven together. A former journalist, what she writes is as interesting as the way she writes it, and makes for fascinating reading. This piece explores the meaning of the concept of the stitch.

Well that is the last of my photos. We hope you have enjoyed our perspective on the Festival of Quilts for 2015. If you have, please leave us a comment.

Bye for now

Terry & Hazel

Continuing our round-up of all that was good at this year's Festival of Quilts, first comes a mention for the Quilters' Guild In the Spotlight gallery. This gallery appears biennially and aims to celebrate talented quilters form the regions and specialist groups of the Guild who are not (yet) well known. Makers are asked to follow a theme: this year it was Adventures in Wonderland to celebrate the 150th anniversary of Lewis Carroll's book Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. Submissions ranged from depictions of scenes from the book to much wider interpretations. Here are three of the more unusual ones. The first is Jane Varrall's Down, Down, Down, Would the Fall Ever Come to an End? which uses Jane's own silk painting together with digitally printed fabric from Fingerprint. Jane writes:

On the subject of the Tenniel illustrations, we were captivated by Hilary Drake's collection of miniatures. Appropriately styled as bookmarks, she managed to reproduce the drawings by sewing machine (hand-done, feed dogs up, not programmed) in black thread and minute stitches, complemented by her favourite Liberty fabrics; and they were stunning. 

She says: "I looked through the book for inspiration. What immediately caught my eye were the original black and white drawings dome by John Tenniel. The line sketches reminded me of small stitches so I decided to make these the centre of my work."
Click on the images for a close-up.

Very different to the others and intriguing with it (although very difficult to photograph) was the piece by Christine Chester. Entitled The Dark at the End of the Tunnel it was a comment on the link between the conscious and the unconscious mind and 'stream of consciousness' writing. Building on the thought that Lewis Carroll used his own experiences as a migraine sufferer as inspiration for parts of his book, it was constructed from three (possibly four) machine stitched sheer layers hanging off the wall to achieve a 3d effect. Christine writes: "My hanging suggests the links between the conscious and the unconscious mind and the development of writing from a stream of thoughts and experiences. Words link the layers of consciousness together, creating a tunnel of unconscious creativity."

One gallery I wish I hadn't missed was that by Linda Barlow: Searching for the Invisible Woman. Her work is based on research with women in 'middle age' and explores the sense of invisibility felt by many in this group. This gallery has provoked a raft of extreme reaction on the web by those much more eloquent than me, some angry that (they feel) she has chosen to depict this aspect of (some) women's lives, rather than a positive, empowering one (see Helen Conway's blog) and others in agreement that the sentiments expressed are real. I must admit that my initial reaction on reading about the exhibition (as newly part of that age-group) was 'who says?' and 'why are they not doing something about it?' but I have also to admit that I have thankfully not had that experience so am not qualified to comment. By making her thought-provoking art and starting the dialogue I suspect Linda has achieved what she set out to achieve. If you missed it too, why not visit her website to see more of her work. Her blog post from March 2014 explains the thinking behind the exhibition, and reveals that her aim was also to explore the positive opportunities seized by many women as they reach this stage in their lives. You may not agree with all the sentiments, but I guarantee it will set you thinking about the issue (image below borrowed from Linda's blog).

Well since this has turned into a longer post than I'd planned, there will be more galleries later in the week

thanks for reading

Terry