Corinne Young: A Stitched Garden

 This afternoon we had Corinne Young visit us (click on the link for her website) to give us a talk about her textile journey and what fascinating journey it has been. There are lots of interesting articles on her website from various magazines and some fabulous pictures, but here's a quick summary of our afternoon.

Corinne started with studies at the RHS Lindley library and the Economic Botany collection at Kew producing work based on seed heads and botanical specimens using flax fibre to make paper for a background.

Following an exhibition at the Society of Designer Craftsmen she was approached by one of the producers of the Lord of the Rings theatre production and was commissioned to make sixteen panels. These were first exhibited in Toronto and then moved to the Royal Courts of Justice in London.

Photo from Corinne's website

A commission for Burton Constable Hall was based on the theme of the passage of time where art work was displayed amongst existing antique pieces.

Photo from Corinne's website

Corinne now works on 3D pieces - machine embroidered flat, cut out and stiffened to turn onto amazingly realistic flowers and plants. 

Photo from Corinne's website

Corinne has exhibited at the Chelsea Flower Show numerous times and I'm sure people must think her plants are real!

We had a lovely afternoon looking at Corinne's work and listening to her journey in stitch.

I snapped some photos of the work she brought but I'm afraid they don't do it justice.

We had a stitch morning before Corinne's talk and as usual there was a lot of lovely varied work by our members. We were particularly taken with Clare's pasty - a needle case in fact, which was a really clever idea.

Not a Cornish pasty

Cute!

Bee-utiful (apologies!)

Can you spot Serena's hidden message?

Casalguidi

 Jill led a workshop this month focusing on Casalguidi Stitch and embellishments with beads and sequins. It was an enjoyable day making wiggles!

There was of course some other stitching going on too. 

November Meeting and Textilia III

It was great to see everyone yesterday and we welcomed some new members too!

Several of our members belong to Textilia III and we were joined today by Catherine Slater another Textilia member. Textilia III is a Yorkshire based textile group formed in 1995 following founder members' participation in City & Guilds. What was really interesting to hear about was their 'Group Critique'. We all get stuck sometimes and having a critical friend can really help. It sounds a bit daunting but as it was explained to us what emerged was a supportive commentary that members received.

Textilia have had project running over lockdown, similar to our 4" squares but a little more challenging than a monthly colour theme. They had 3 jars, one with a selection of techniques on slips of paper, 

one with colours and one with
prompts/themes. A random slip is taken from each jar and that becomes the prompt. Some were a little easier to make than others but they were all lovely. It's a great idea!

Members have all been busy, not least Jackie who has produced yet another lovely book.