One of the many beautiful views from Foredown Tower  So . . .  onto part 2.   A New Starting Point includes making faux chenille with newspaper. The group layered eight sheets of A4 newspaper with polyester organza. Using contrasting colours of paper and organza can create some very colourful samples. The layers of newspaper need to have some support otherwise your work will fall apart. Adding a sew-in interfacing such as classic pelmet Vilene (S80/239) or the 'pelmet Vilene light' to the back of your work - Vilene interfacings will re enforce your work. Once you have stacked your layers up you then machine stitch 'tramlines' across the whole sample, your 'channels' need to be at least 1/2 inch apart. If the 'channels' are too close together you wont be able get your scissors down the 'channels' to cut them.   Another tip when stitching newspaper faux chenille is to use a long stitch, the longest your machine will do - usually no ...

Layers of torn newspaper and painted Bondaweb. Regular readers of this blog will know how much I love teaching at Foredown Tower - high up on the Sussex Downs you can see for miles. It is also home to a wonderful camera obscura. The tower is open to the public on Tuesdays and Thursdays with camera shows at 11am, 12pm, 1pm and 2pm. On a clear day you really can see forever . . .  . Foredown Tower A New Starting Point is my newspaper based workshop. It is easily my most popular workshop I have ever written. Once the group get the hang of the 'background' and 'pretty' rotation, they are off and away, having great fun throwing glitter and gilding flake around with great abandon. I think that because the workshop is process driven and the samples aren't supposed to 'look like' something, the students can just relax and enjoy making their samples. Colour washed newspaper printed in a similar colour with a wooden printing block. Once the sa...

    Ann's first try out of 'flipping out'! As many of you will know, The Festival of Quilts is always a very busy show. You bump into all kinds of friends, ex students and colleagues. . . and not just on your stand. I met Ann Piker when we were both queueing for the loo!!! We started chatting and Ann told me how helpful she had found this simple exercise she had seen on this blog. Whilst I always hope that someone out there is reading this - you never really know. You can analyse statistics, but it is always better to hear these things first hand. I asked Ann to send me some images - and here they are in all their glory. This exercise is taken from a book my tutor Maeve Edwards gave me when she retired from teaching. I worked through two stitch based diplomas with Maeve and it was she that sent me firmly down the experimental route of textiles, for which I will be forever grateful. The book is Creative Paper Craft by Ernst Rottger. It was first published in 1961 ...

  Fabulous painted newspaper and painted Bondaweb.  This is going to be a hit and run post - don't have much time as I am about to leave for Shropshire. So lots of photos and not many words. A five day summer school at Foredown Tower - New Layered Textiles. And it was definitely summer - pheeWWWWeee, very hot. We coped womanfully!!! There were ten lovely students which is the maximum for that teaching studio. We covered painted Bondweb on fabric and paper, Tyvek, newspaper faux chenille and cutting CS500 and 800 with a soldering iron and applying it to different back grounds. These images are a small selection of what we got up to -  Painted Bondaweb on fabric and newspaper and book covers              ] Newspaper faux chenille -     Painted Vilene Spunbond CS500 and 800 backed with unpainted Bondaweb, cut with a soldering iron and then applied either to fabric of more CS800.   ...