A selection of beautiful beaded bowls by Sue Redhead, Jane Wolfe & Gina Dean I find it amusing that a workshop I created based on bowls and bangles I have been making all my life - has become very popular in the The Experimental Textiles Video Library & Membership. I have never taught this workshop as it is something I have always just - done. Making strange and unusual pieces with random beads has always given me great pleasure - I hadn't realised that it might intrigue others too.  I decided to film the workshop and see if any of the membership wanted to play with the techniques. My goodness they have been having fun. It just goes to show - you never know!   One of Gina's larger vessels Students on the video library go through waves of working, there will be a flurry of work and samples on one workshop, then others will start on another. As the member is for 12 months, you can create your work when it suits you. What I love is how they all chat to each other, showing...

  My first 4 books . .    Welcome to my new blog subscribers.  I have 2 mailing lists one for this blog, and one for my newsletter. This blog tends to be a long read, it can contain all kinds of things, my life here in Ireland, my dogs, my travel, whatever takes my fancy, I can ramble, I like to talk to you all. There is a search engine in the top right hand corner, I have been writing this blog for 10 years or so, so if you want to find out what I have written about Lutradur or Tyvek or New Zealand, anything really . . just pop it into the search engine My newsletter is more of a short read, what is happening with my teaching, news of shows and new travel tours. That kind of thing.         I don't know if you can hear it from where you are, but my brain is whirring with new ideas and techniques. While I am filming and updating my 12 most popular workshops, I am developing new ideas to share with you. My 'what happens if . . ' head is definitel...

A sample beaded vessel for the Baubles, Bangles and Beads workshop Looking inside I love working with different sizes of beads   It's nearly here - The Festival of Quilts 2023. www.thefestivalofquilts.co.uk/exhibitors/kim-thittichai/  The last show I did was Festival of Quilts in 2019. Then the world ground to halt! It seems to have taken ages to prepare for this show. Just the admin takes a lot of time, and then there are the decisions on how to dress the stand. What do I want to promote and how do I want to promote it? What will I sell? Various heat distressed effects on painted and layered Tyvek Well the decisions are all made and I am halfway through loading the car ready for the drive over to the UK on Monday. I will be promoting the Experimental Textiles Video Library & Membership with a special show discount and selling various packs of Hot Spots and Tyvek along with 2 special packs of transfer foils. I will be demonstrating on the stand every day. I will be in th...

  Tyvek layers zapped with a heat gun      If you love texture, colour and exploring new processes - you may be interested in this - I keep my newsletter and blog subscribers separate and you may have missed this important information, I didn't want you to miss out on this opportunity. The NEW Experimental Textiles Video Library & Membership will launch at The Festival of Quilts at the NEC, Birmingham in August 2023 for the full annual subscription price of €350. Subscribers to my newsletter will be offered a special one-off €100 early bird discount of €250 from May 4th to May 11th. The early bird members will be able to view the 12 videos as I upload them between now and August, which means they will have a 15 month subscription. 2 of the 12 workshop videos will be launched into the video library on May 4th. The rest will be uploaded regularly in the months up to August 2023. Early bird members will have access to each of the private groups (hosted on my website...

An amazing sunrise yesterday   Some days just start really well.  We have been enjoying torrential rain, hail and strong winds over the past day or so here on the west coast of Ireland. It was so good to wake up to the most magnificent sunrise. Because the land is reasonably flat on three sides of my house, the colourful light wraps around us. It's like light bathing. It was wonderful to see the colour reflected in the bay. The really deep light only lasted for about three minutes, you have to be quick, then it starts to fade. As we move into the shorter days, it is a great chance to enjoy the sunsets at a more 'civilised' time!   The wonderful light surrounds the house and reflects in the windows.     Time for my bus pass . . I am coming up to a biggish birthday - I am going to become a pensioner next month! I have started to think about just how much teaching I would like to do going forward. It would be good to slow down a bit and concentrate on my own work....

A section across 3 'Journeys' one of the design exercises on Experimental Textiles.   I have finally finished wrestling with the NEW online 10 month Experimental Textiles course which will start on September 21st 2022. It was very helpful to have all the replies from the surveys that I sent out to my mailing list. The replies guided me as I worked through all my ideas to create something that would fit both my ideas and what appears to be needed. The NEW 10 month online course    A history of Experimental Textiles . . I have taught my course Experimental Textiles since 1999!! It was originally written as a one year course and eventually ended up as a 4 year course . .  because my students wouldn't leave!! I taught the 4 year course across 2 colleges for 12 years. As you can imagine, it was pretty full on. But also amazing, and I learned so much and made some great friends a long the way.  After the 12 years I swore I wouldn't teach the course again, I was worn o...

A rather splendid sample of textured Tyvek. Happy Easter!! It's a wild and wet here in Ireland. A good day to catch up with my newsletter and this blog. I hope you are all enjoying a day with family or friends and eating way too much chocolate . .  My recent online Zoom workshop Tinkering with Tyvek yielded some fabulous work. I do have wonderful students. Just look at this Tyvek dress made by Arley Berryhill. Small scale Tyvek dress by Arley Berryhill Arley is from Albuquerque, New Mexico, has worked with me on a few workshops. He is a fantastic doll maker and costume designer and maker. Do look at his website - https://www.arleyberryhill.com/ It is not often I see anything resembling gold work on my workshops!! Arley created this great sample by stitching Tyvek to gold lamé and then texturing it with a heat gun. Beautiful faux gold work, just fabulous       I love the way Arley has added beads to accentuate the edge of the Tyvek shapes. This workshop was quite inte...

An amazing pinky blue sky as the light faded on the 13th December 2021             Well here we are - cantering towards THAT time of year. How are you all getting on? Do love Christmas, or do you dread it? I have had a busy few weeks with the exhibition and then a craft fair over 2 weekends at a local restaurant. I feel as though I have come into land now, and can take stock and start to look at next year.  You might have heard that Ireland suffered a pretty big storm last weekend. Luckily, only my big storage shed suffered, losing part of the roof. I am getting used to the regular storms that we enjoy on the west coast, but storm Bara was much more powerful than normal. I suspect the storms will be getting more powerful as the years go on. But onto happier and more colourful things. December can be strange weather wise here on the west coast of Ireland. We had temperatures of 13 degrees a couple of days ago. quite balmy. But today is pretty chilly. Th...

 A fabulous contrast between light and dark       The clocks have changed - it is getting darker earlier. It's the time of year when  you want to start snuggling in, getting cosy. There is a definitely nip in the air. Time to get out the thick jumpers. The light is changing, getting more dramatic as the days are getting shorter. Because we have so much rain in Ireland, and of course on Loop Head where I live, we have the most wonderful displays of light and colour. The day can be dark with glowering grey clouds, then the clouds part and a shaft of sunlight hits the green fields, Wow!! I love it. 'The Last One' - Mixed media and collage This is one of my latest canvases interpreting the local cows ambling up the low incline on the way to milking. It is one of my favourite sights. I find the rhythm of rural life here very comforting. Another great sky And my interpretation in painted fusible web and newspaper The huge skies and ever changing light will be inspirin...