A small selection of work from our exhibition on the Friday night   Welcome to the 4th blog post this week. If you have missed any of the first 3, you can catch up here - https://hot-textiles.blogspot.com/2023/10/geelong-fibre-forum-part-first.html It always amazes me, when you look around the class room the first morning of the first day of a workshop and there is nothing on the tables apart from the students bags and stuff. And then . . the magic happens. This group was particularly special, they worked through everything I asked of them with good humour and trust. And boy were we rewarded. From The Journey and making blocks, through the 'backgrounds and prettys' technique to experimenting with the S133, Decovil 1 and Decovil 1 light. The heavier iron on interfacings. Sally created the first of 2 3D forms that nested together very quickly   The second of Sally's structures   I have been experimenting recently with forming these interfacings with heat. Whilst they are not

Simone and Kath cutting the S133 - the big boy!!!   So - we have worked through The Journey design exercise , we have made printing blocks from the isolated designs. Then we created some fabulous torn paper and painted Bondaweb surfaces using my 'Background & Pretty' technique.   Decovil 1 and Decovil 1 light, cut and rolled ready for the group to use   And then, I brought out the the heavy interfacings!!  Decovil 1 and Decovil light are leather-like interfacings for making bags, but we can do so much more with them. They are great for making book covers and small boxes and vessels. The S133 interfacing is my favourite. It is very stiff, like cardboard and fabulous for making tall vessels.  All 3 interfacings have fusible web on one side, so you can iron fabric onto them, or more importantly for me - the torn paper pieces the group had been creating. Vlieseline Australia and New Zealand kindly sponsored my workshop with these wonderful interfacings. It made a massive di

Gorgeousness by Wilma And then this happened . . . It is very satisfying when you have developed a process and your students really run with it. A New Starting Point is a workshop I developed in 2012 when I was playing with old papers and scraps of painted Bondaweb - and of course, a bit of sparkle. The process became a great 1 - 2 day workshop that can be slotted into a 5 day workshop quite nicely. The great thing is your work doesn't have to look like anything, there is no pressure. The torn and layered process creates a great background to print onto. And then you can iron your work onto a heavy interfacing to create boxes, book covers . . more of that tomorrow. Layers of torn paper, card, transfer foil and Hot Spots The group working happily away The 'backgrounds and prettys' process creates luscious layers with lovely torn edges. I think it is my favourite process out all the techniques and processes I use. I start the students with my way of creating layers, then they

Nicola Brown and me in the sunshine in Geelong         The Geelong Fibre Forum 2023 was fabulous. Yes, Australia was a long way to go, but it was worth it. There are few opportunities to teach a live 5 day workshop. They can be a challenge, but so rewarding when everything you have planned works out. It is a good test to check you are still capable of developing and delivering quality teaching. Whilst I am a very experienced tutor, you can never take anything for granted. You are only as good as your previous workshop or course. It was also a great opportunity to catch up with my good friend Nicola Brown (who also lives in Ireland and was also teaching) and tutors Mary Hettmansperger (America) and Pam De Groot (Australia) who I hadn't seen for several years. It was so very, very good to see them again. Plus I finally got to actually meet Dawn Edwards, who I have been friends with on FB for several years. There will be at least 3 blog posts about the work my group created. The work