January meeting:

The weather was kind to us and a dozen of us made it to spent time looking at what we might "do" with our cloth from last month.

In addition some worked on ongoing projects while they gave a bit more thought to their newly created cloth.

Here are some photos from the day.

We shall look forward to seeing all the pieces completed in the months to come.

Time was also spent planning what the group wants to do this year.

February meeting (13th):

Pam kindly offered to share a technique she’s recently learned using old photos.    Please bring along

old photos (pre-digital)

paper - cartridge or similar

scratching tools such as bodkin, bradawl

oil pastels

emulsion paints (tester pots)

white fabric - just small amount needed

glue

bondaweb

March meeting (13th):

Yvonne kindly offered to share an intriguing folding technique - requirements list to follow nearer the time.

Future activity:

We talked about tutors we’d like to approach to come and spend a day with us    Olive is going to get in touch with Amanda Hislop, Cas Holmes and Alice Fox to see what their availability is and what teaching they could offer.   Preference to focus on design and concepts rather than pure technique.

We discussed exhibitions.   Two options to consider:

ICHF Sewing For Pleasure (probably 2018 or 2019).   Jill will sound out.  Anyone visiting the NEC show in March could take the opportunity to recce the gallery spaces.

The Big Textile Show, Leicester, dates not confirmed at the moment but likely Oct 2017.

Possible theme - Calke Abbey.  This NT property will reopen for visitors in March if anyone fancies making a visit to seek inspiration; alternately Google images would be a good research tool.

Further discussion and decisions to be taken at the April meeting.

January

Our January meeting is on Monday 9th January 10am to 3pm.

This month we plan to begin to work on a textile piece based on the fabric we created with Ann Marie Cadman last month.

We will also need to plan what the group,wants to be doing this year.

Don't forget to bring your lunch!

December

Our December meeting was our annual master class and Ann Marie Cadman led us in a fabulously creative and challenging day. 

We were treated to a closeup look at Ann Marie's work and were wowed by multi layered abstract art textiles.

We enjoyed a demonstration of the techniques we could use and the order in which they were likely to be most effective before we were let loose to be creative.

Some of us worked on a small sample to start with just to get the idea of what we could do.

Here are three stages in my first sample. Proof that it's not an easy way to create a fabric surface and that a great deal of practice is needed!

We had the shortest stop for lunch ever, as we were all keen to get to most out of the day as we could. Ann Marie was a very generous tutor, full of suggestions to keep us on track and with ideas for coping with mistakes too.

These are some images of what we were working on towards the end of the day.

Check out Ann Marie' website http://annemariecadman.co.uk/ to see her amazing work.