I chose to base my project on woodland mosses and lichen on oak trees in a nearby wood.  It is north facing and really damp and fairly undisturbed.  I spent a few happy hours drawing and stick painting and using my finger in the mud.  Fab fun.

I did quite a bit of artwork but as usual one image tends to work its way into my head and my designs more than the others.  This is the one.  I loved the chalky greens with the bark showing through and the bright mosses on top.

I ordered some gorgeous yarns from Rennies in Scotland.  Cheviot.  But then had big concerns about how fine they were.  In my last project, I vowed never to do any fine work again.  Ah well. 

Sampling went pretty well.  I wanted to explore the idea of Estate Tweeds -they take the colours from the landscape for camoflaging the estate workers in scotland.  One traditional weave structure for this (amongst many checks) is herringbone.  I thought the diagonal lines in this reminded me of the fronds of moss.    The best samples were the ones that I felted in the machine.  I have used boucle and linens in some.  I am pretty pleased so far.  The samples are hard to photograph – the colours are a bit muted but they look ok in real life.

I plan to make bags, with some leather in.  I have found the right brown leather and some perfect lining.  I have warped up my table loom for as wide as it will weave and am about to weave my first batch of material. Really exciting. Then comes the stressful bit – the sewing of the leather.  But I am on target time-wise.  I decided against using the floor loom this time. I haven’t got time to sort out problems with it at the moment.  So all in all, things are going pretty well – 8 weeks to final show!

I finished my project on Morecambe Bay.  I produced a linen cushion with rippling effect.  I used some felting wool at intervals in the weft and when washed at 40 degrees in the washer, it gathered up nicely.  The only problem was, that because it gathers, it meant that I had to weave a very wide piece of fabric.  I had to use my floor loom which was new and wasn’t set up perfectly.  I didn’t have time to sort it so I just ploughed on with it.  I was really happy with the end result

It will always remind me of the coast where I grew up and it’s great to have a souvenir of the Bradford Course

After the caterpillar project, I wanted something  I really could connect with.  There is also a fab campsite just next to the coast where we went for a lovely weekend away in September.  Thus the scene is set for my next project.

and her inspirational use of materials seems largely to drive her projects. This is a photo of her famous Love Seat – made by stuffing woollen tubes (made on a sock machine).  Surely this was a material-driven project ??

  A different way of working…. I need to think about this some more.  How does anyone else work ?  I’d be interested in hearing any views.

I presented my 3 samples that I had worked on using my Estuary theme, and got some very helpful advice (and time to try out) ideas on how to achieve texture in samples without resorting to novelty yarn.  Not that there is anything wrong with novelty yarn, but distorted weaving seems to have more energy.  More on my estuary work in next post.

 I will try to update you on my next constantly evolving project soon.  How do designers design with something in mind.  My samples don’t look like I intend.  Is it called experience ?

Well………  3 hours of work later…. it did not look at all caterpillar like.  I can hardly bear to post a photo of it.  Should I ? 

Even my husband was lost for words (and that doesn’t often happen).  I don’t think I have ever woven anything un inspiring before.

I didn’t give up. A lot of time and energy had gone into getting the PVC, I couldn’t just give up on it.  I tried warping up on my 8 shaft table loom.  I used polypropolene garden string as warp.  It comes in lots of different colours and isn’t slipperly, knots well.  I chose yellow and blue and warped it in stripes. 

It wasn’t as bad a disaster.  It was colourful.  It was PVC.  It looked a bit like plastic deck chair covers.  I persevered for a while.  Honeycomb weave didn’t work particularly well – I think I would need more shafts to make it look 3D with PVC.  Basket weave looked OK. 

I looked at it critically.  Did I want to spend 4 more months trying to make something look OK, when it was only looking fairly mediocre at the moment (with rose-tinted glasses on).?  Did I want to be a PVC Recycling Hero ?  No.  Why not do something that straight away looks quite good and with some more work and inspiration could look fab.  Well, I tried…….. Do I get environmental brownie points for trying ?

But not to worry….. I have inspiration for a new project……..

Later this developed into my caterpillar period of art.  I got a bit caterpillar-obsessed.  Potato prints, collage,  lino cut ….they all crawled off my sketchbook. 

After a  while,  I explored other species of caterpillar.  The black spikes of my first caterpillar were too dominant.  (I also had a lot of blue toddler paddling pool, as you would imagine ).  I found a caterpillar to match.  I think this would be called a Materials-led project.

Right then,  the next logical step is to take all the art work over to the loom and see whether I can create anything caterpillary out of recycled PVC.

Next installment….  (you already know the ending, don’t you)…….

Making pvc yarn from paddling pool

A long time since I last blogged. I think (in hindsight) that this was because I wasn’t too happy with what I was working on, so wasn’t too keen to share. But Now I Have Ditched It (well I think i have – is this post a therapy session to come to terms with this, I ask myself?)

Lets start at the begining….. Our next project is supposed to be about recycling (or at least a nod in the direction of environmentalism). I tried weaving strips of plastic bags and thought they could be a useful garden-type textile. I have tried plastic bag weaving before and not been very enthrawled, so not sure why I grasped this idea. Anyway, I grasped at this straw very strongly and went off running with it. Plastic bags are in short supply at our house (being environmentally minded and having one child still in night-time nappies- OK not disposable) Perhaps using strips of toddlers paddling pools, PVC would be better.
I sourced several punctured paddling pools from all over sheffield – lots of colours. Feeling proud of myself, I was.
Now….. on with artwork. What would make good use of all these bright shiny colours.mmmm. Caterpillars… they are a bit comical, bright and colourful and garden-y.
More on caterpillar art in my next post.  I think I need to get all this out of my system before I can pick the subject for my next project and time is running out…!

I decided not to use display boards for my samples this time.  As I had based my design on a pinecone, it seemed a good idea to use a fir tree (aka xmas tree) to hang the samples on.  I was working on the assumption that we are aiming to present our product in show or similar.

I was happy with it.  Tutor seemed a little bemused but agreed that it was a good idea.  I was a bit rushed this project so it suited me – it was much quicker to do this than attach samples onto boards and do all the artwork.    Tutor thought samples were fairly good – some more than others.  Reminded me that double cloth should be pleasing to look at from both sides.  As I had used double weave in some samples as ‘structural’, the back of some samples weren’t very interesting.  My mood board worked well.  I had used paintshop pro to design a background (blurred a photo of autumn leaves) and overlaid it with other photos suggesting autumn, crisp, outdoorsy.  I got it printed at Staples onto A2.  Not cheap but I was in a rush for this project.  I could well do this again for my final show (apparantly I can use Bradford College print facilities if I get my act together).  It’s a bit expensive to do it for every project.  I also need to ensure that if I am designing Mens scarfs, that all my samples are for men.  Some of mine were a bit feminine.  Everyone liked this sample best. - the most feminine.  As most of the students are female, perhaps that is predictable.

The tutor liked this one – and this is the one that nearly didn’t make it to the final cut – only selected because my husband liked it.  I find after a bit of weaving, tiredness creeps in and I feel the urge to do a really wacky mad sample.  Like  a personal joke.  It’s amazing how often these samples are picked out by other people as good ones. 

The funny thing about the process of producing samples, presenting your work (visually and verbally) and getting feedback  is… by the time you are at the presenting stage, you have mentally moved onto the next project.  Or I have.  My brain works faster than the time I have.   I’m sure I’m not alone.

The next project is on recycling.   I suppose it should have a new heading.  Or should I talk about Ireland next. 

Hmmmm   I’ll sleep on it.

There were 10 of us doing it – mainly from our year of the HNC.  We’d asked whether it would be possible to run this day for us especially, it wasn’t anything to do with our Weave/knit course.  However, now I know more, I would love to incorporate print into my textile design.  It’s really exciting – a whole new world.

We started with Monoprints – using Procion Dyes to draw on the screens.  Faced with having to do some spontaneous art, I kept it simple. 

I also did a second pass of the squeegee with the binder on and got a softer faded image.

Then we used the images we had brought to put onto screens.   This gave screens that could be reused time and time again with different techniques.  Light sensitive paint was scraped over a screen and then the image put over the screen when it was hardened under UV light.  The non-hardened paint could be washed off, leaving a reverse image of my photo.

  Pigment Ink paints were then squeegeed through the screen.  They only reached the fabric below the screen if the screen design allowed it.