A lovely little bowl that is a work in progress . . . .  I had forgotten how much I enjoy incorporating metal into textiles - so much so I will be teaching a new four day Metal Works? workshop at The Old Needle Works next Easter. Of course it helps to have students that have enquiring minds and enjoy experimenting. We worked with metal shims, knitted copper and metal mesh, mostly copper and brass. We tried embossing and punching out shapes as well as heat distressing to change the colour. We used a heat gun for this. My heat guns are 350 watt and are hot enough to colour copper. Anyone who has been on any of my workshops will know that I don't advocate using a naked flame.  I have had a selection of alcohol inks in a box for a about three years waiting for 'when I have a minute'!!! This was a great chance to use them to colour the metals. I also demonstrated transferring transfer painted papers on to the metal but that really needs to be saved til our next session w

Well it's nearly here, the biggest show of the year for me - Fashion, Embroidery & Stitch/Sewing for Pleasure/Hobbycrafts. 3 shows in 1 - you will need 2 days to get around it! I will be part of Fashion, Embroidery & Stitch along with many fantastic textiles artists and tutors and some superb exhibitions. The fashion shows will be even more exciting this year with some stunning work from students across the country - you won't believe your eyes! I will be on stand L18 opposite FibreFusion and hope to be on my stand for most of the day demonstrating and showing you how to heat and colour metal with a heat gun and layer it up with Vilene Spunbond. I am also organising the Vilene Workshop on stand Y02. I am very pleased to have some of the top textile tutors offering free short workshops everyday of the show.   my new heat gun is powerful enough to colour metal- FANTASTIC!    I will have plenty of the 7 colour packs of Vilene Spunbond CS500  last year I ran out of S