Blog

Why not promote and hone the skills you need to self-critique and in doing so, become a more complete and well-rounded artist in the process?

In this episode of the Stitch Safari Podcast, I want to make people think and have an understanding of what our expectations are for the workshops we book into.  Is it to take work in a particular direction, or is it to have fun, relax and enjoy creating with other...

To move forward with our work we need to exercise all the areas of artistic life that many don’t think about and even more, don’t or won’t acknowledge. But these reliable, dependable, and all-so-necessary areas are there, because if we don’t work with them, we...

Can I encourage embroidery and textile artists to at least think about starting a blog?  Let’s see. The worlds of embroidery and textiles must be two of the most exotic, artistic, expressive and creative genres known to man - imagine all that amazing history, colour,...

A website can become an extension of the artist and creator.

The idea of using either paper or metal in embroidery work is to add to the offering of infinite creative options available to the modern embroiderer. Metal thread embroidery has a close attachment to the symbolic significance of gold, representing the magical power...

Constance Howard, the British embroiderer, often best remembered for her green hair, had a colossal influence on contemporary embroidery at a time when it was deemed to be a comparatively minor craft, setting a pathway that's probably helped lead to the expansion of...

Tie-on pockets made use of recycled fabrics, were used as teaching tools, and were transmitters of design while reinforcing the familial and friendship networks between women, connecting women’s inner and outer worlds – a world of politics and protest to that of a humble worker making a living.

Welcome to the stunningly beautiful, elegantly innovative, seductively alluring world of French Haute Couture and the dynastic family of Lesage. The House of Lesage became the doyen of French Haute Couture embroidery collaborating with the world's elite designers...

This is one time where embroidery defines the textile – not the cloth, not the weave, and not the dyes used, but the actual process of hand stitching the brightly coloured designs into complex and lively textiles that have become a major source of fascination and income.

So are the beetle wings ethically harvested?  The beetles used for beetle wing embroidery have a very short lifespan of 3-4 weeks in their adult stage, so to avoid killing the beetles, only those that die naturally are collected.

Close your eyes and imagine the sound a cascading silk garment makes in movement. Imagine the feel of exquisite embroidery - the silken smoothness of the long, colourful threads and the unmistakable texture of couched gold and silver, pearls, and other rich...

East Asian Silk embroidery is a stunningly beautiful art form emerging from China - the ancient masters of sericulture - migrating to Korea, Vietnam, and Japan, with each adding their own cultural and stylistic design stamp to form this unmistakable aesthetic. Silk...