Workshops ahoy!!

Stitching at the WI Fair 2015

I had a great time running a workshop at the WI Fair in Harrogate over the weekend.  The workshop was only for an hour but in this time all 15 participants learned how to stitch and came some way along to finishing their very own brooch.

This time we all started with the same colour (insipid yellow!) to create the grid pattern.  It's a bit of a leap of faith when starting out with a colour that no one really likes but the results were all so very different. By looking at colour is a small space you really get to understand how it resonates with some of the examples looking almost like watercolour painting whilst others popped out in 3 dimensions!

Stitched brooch size eamaples - WI Fair

It is great to see peoples colour choices coming through and also how neat everyone seemed to be in this session!

Stitched brooch examples WI Fair

It was a really busy fair and so as soon as the time was up people had to leave pretty quickly to continue on with their visit to other parts of the show.  A short while later however when I was on my way back from Harrogate I received an email that included a picture of a finished brooch, which had been completed on the journey home!

Thanks Stephanie this really made my day!

Image courtesy Stephanie Wilkinson

The Fair was really interesting for me because I have only ever really taken part in shows that centre on making but at this Fair there were many facets.  I enjoyed my time in the Lifestyle area and spent a happy time speaking to the Discover Dudley team, crazy to make local connections so far from home! Gardening, travel, cooking, paper craft, sewing were all there as well some fantastic Craft stands with makers from near and far. Much of the work that the WI do was on display from campaigns, their history, The Huxley Cup, bookshop and finally craft. Whilst all WI craft on display was fantastic I have to give a special mention to NFWI - Wales for their Centenary Panels, such a great idea with so much skill, humour and thought having gone into each panel.  A real feast!

Onward now to Knitting and Stitching Show at Alexandra Palace where I will be exhibiting and selling my wares along with many other skilled makers and designers in the Textile Gallery.  Hope to see you there but until them I'll leave it to Wales to sign off as this is exactly how I felt when I left the WI Centenary Fair!

Centenary panel!

Happy Stitching!

Tina

Centenary spying!

Tina Francis Tapestry - copyright

Well the year is flying by I've had a great year so far organising open studios in Birmingham and setting up stitch groups at Spring Hill Library alongside mentoring others.  It seems that my own work has taken a back seat but with the Autumn fast approaching it's time for me to start thinking about the upcoming shows.

I love a celebration and so I am really pleased to have been invited to speak at the WI Fair in Harrogate and also to a run a workshop there.  I am there on Sunday 6th September but before then I will be sure to visit many of the stands that will be setting up at this fair to celebrate 100 years of the WI.  It is a wide ranging show and reflects the fact that members have many interests, I think everyone will be catered for!  AS well as seeing what the fair has to offer I will be visiting some old friends who will be there on stands. 

First off I will be feasting my eyes on the ceramics of Margaret Glackin on stand B111, all her glazes have a story to tell as well as the pieces themselves.  Her ever popular yarn bowls will be making an appearance and I am looking forward to seeing some examples of her new body of work which investigates the politics of womens aging. 

After a catch up I will be heading to see some fantastic faux taxidermy by Louise Walker of Sincerely Louise stand number A139.  I first met Louise at The Knitting and Stitching Show at Alexandra Palace, alongside her knitting patterns for dinosaurs (!) I will be spying her new range of animal scarf patterns they sound like fun! Over on stand A191 I will be catching up with the African Fabric Shop. Much more than fabric this stand is wealth of information about traditional African crafts and I expect to see many a person swinging along with one of their baskets before the day is out!

Still with textiles from around the globe I will be visiting Ananuca on Stand B83 to bring back fond memories of holidays a few years ago in Chile.  Like African Fabric Shop they work directly with the artisans who create their fabrics and spin their yearns.I cherish my Chilean weave fabric and so hope to see a lot more of it on this stand.

Whilst still in the throes of wanderlust I will take myself to the Bradt Travel Guides stand (C41) to look at their fantastic guide books.  The UK's only independently owned guide book publishers I love their well written style and fantastic images.  I am approaching the busiest time for year for me and so a coupke of their guide books will have to quench my travel bug for the next few months as Knitting and Stitching Show at Alexandra Palace is calling I will be launching my Tartan patterns (after many, many requests!).

I am really looking forward to being part of this show and hope to see some of you there on the Brooch making Workshop or in the audience for my talk on how I got into this business in the first place and how we can use stitch to create heirlooms.

Thinking of how I got here and the help I have had along the way I would like to dedicate this blog to Gilda Baron who died recently. She was an inspiration, a fantastic embroiderer, a supplier of biscuits and a beautiful person on the inside and out - I will miss you Gilda.

image courtesy http://www.ahandmadecottage.com/

Happy Stitching!

Tina

Learning together!

Over the past few months I have been running a stitching group in Spring Hill Library in Birmingham.  It is my local library and a real centre of community and learning.  Many of the people who have learned to stitch have found it to have been quite therapeutic but at the same time challenging.  Trying something new has really been great for us all and I am looking forward to what we do next. Here is some of the work that has been completed so far using secondhand wool and my Use Your Stash patterns.

So far it has been an adult only group but on 6th August as part of this summers "Summer Reading Challenge" activities I ran a workshop at the library where we all learnt how to thread a needle and stitch to our hearts content.  There were 12 kids of various ages from 4 up to 12 and the results as you will have seen at the top of this blog were great! Here are some more. 

I think you will agree they are fantastic.  Hopefully I will be doing more stitching for younger people in the future at the library so I will keep you up to date.

Thinking about learning has reminded me as usual about my good friend and tutor Kim Thittichai who as you will know got me into this world in the first place.  She is currently at the NEC here in Birmingham for Festival of Quilts, this is a great show and is well worth a visit even if quilts are not your thing!  There is always so much inspiration to be found at a show like this from the colours to the textures.  So many quilts are on display it really does take your breath away. 

Having been an art school student with Cannon Hill Art School it feels like this summer has been all about learning for me too!  My work is on display at The Mac in Birmingham along with 68 other students it was a great project to be involved with and I will be stitching at the MAC all day 20th August so if you want come along and learn just drop in!

My next large show is the WI Fair in Harrogate in September which celebrates 100 years of the WI in which time a whole lot of learning and passing on of skills will have happened.  I will be running a brooch making workshop and also talking about my work and how to use your stash. More about this next time.

Happy Stitching!

Tina

Its in the paper it must be true!

Where has the year gone?  Since my last post I have been in London for London Craft Week, run an Open Studios event at The Custard Factory in Birmingham, helped run a workshop for the Glass Biennale and oh yes am now part of a pop up Art School.  Life has been busy and I am a little tired out so have had to rest (Dr's orders).

So where to start the month of May has been designated Craft and Design Month for a few years now with many makers opening their studios and inviting people in to see the process and also the resulting products.  This year saw the first London Craft Week and it was a great success, all across London there were talks, demonstrations and a huge celebration of Craft.  Now don't get me wrong we are not experiencing a renaissance in making, that has still being happening I think it is more that we are experiencing and renaissance in interest. I was exhibiting and demonstrating at Craft Central, it is always a great place to catch up with old friends and also to check out what is new.  Cockpit Arts were also open and I cannot wait to get in touch with Beat Woven and see whether there is room for patterns made from music to cross over into stitch. Looking forward to next year when I hope to be taking part again.

Custard Factory in Birmingham is a hive of activity, full of makers, artists, illustrators, digital businesses not to mention the fantastic ground floor retailers.  Having run Open Studio events before I decided to rally the troops this year and run an event on a Saturday (we have previously opened on Friday nights).  A fantastic set of Artists opened their doors, the Custard Factory is large and a bit maze like so we had to run guided tours which whilst not ideal gave people a taster of all that we do.  In the winter we will be running another event and hoping that people can come and go as they please - our thinking caps are on!  Take a look at the great artists and makers that were part of the event here Custard Factory.

Phew!  On to Cannon Hill Art School, which is just one of the best projects I have been involved in for a very long time.  I am a student going to Art School, I've got a lanyard and everything. Taking it's lead from Black Mountain College, Trevor Pitt from A3 Projects has somehow created an Art School run out of the MAC in Birmingham that has embraced all comers and will ultimately lead to an exhibi.tion in the MAC.  Our tutors are all practicing artists at the top of their game mine is Philip Duckworth of Juneau Projects check them out - brilliant. We have had lectures from Cornelia Parker, Gavin Wade and Peter Jenkinson.  We have seen behind the world of a contemporary art exhibtion by hearing from Kathrin Bohm and we will get to be involved in our own show at the Mac in July. I have met some great people and am really looking forward to staying in touch with them and putting on shows real soon.

One of the people I have met at Art School is Robyn Smith her work in glass is astounding and as part of the Glass Biennale she was exhibiting her work in St Johns Church in Stourbridge. Robyn was running upcyling workshops as part of the exhibition, I rolled my sleeves up and got stuck in! 

So busy, busy, busy!  The Christmas designs are coming on but before that I will be inviting you to come to the first every Jewellery Quarter Festival here in Birmingham! There will be Open Studios aplenty (including me!) where you will be able to see sandblasting, corset making, stone cutting, glass fusing, 3d printing and so much more!

Hope to see you soon but in the meantime check out the lovely article that Sew magazine published in their July issue!

Happy Stitching!

Stitching the night away!

Tina Francis - Hexagon - Photo courtesy Martin Christie

So March flew past in a haze of shows and stitching! I have been exhibiting for the last two weekends at Fashion, Embroidery and Stitch at the NEC and EXCEL.  Both shows were fantastic and as I was on an education stand I got to talk about stitch from morn til night!

At the NEC I was opposite Stephanie Redfern who had a really large space this year exhibiting work specifically made for the show.  Stephs work is really colourful and the composition is something that can only be learned after years working at your practice.  It was good to be opposite her because she exhibits reguarly at RBSA and I had admired her exhibition called Found last year, I had sent her an email but it was great to tell her face to face how much I enjoyed it.  Do take some time to read her delightful blog, so interesting and a great way to spend some time with a cuppa and a cake.

Next door to me at NEC was Sally Holman who specialises in quilting and is the author of many books, her landscapes are very popular and her step by step instructions make her a must see at any show. Birmingham Silk Painters did a roaring trade in silk scenes showing people how to paint onto silk, they had some fantastic work on display.  It's amazing how quiet people become when they are painting on to silk, it really is a joy to watch.

Every day I ran a mono printing workshop on the Vilene education stand, we made some great samples using the smallest amount of water based acrylic, by combining bondaweb and pelmet vilene we started to form the beginnings of some really textured designs.  My workshop was straight after Fran Holmes an artist whose work is beautiful and ethereal, her stand was black and white which really highlighted the work on show it's amazing how an all white exhibit can make you think of colour and movement but that is exactly what she achieved.

Onto Excel the following week it seemed a bit groundhog day-ish but there were many different exhibitors as well as the those from NEC. The Excel show is relatively new and so it's great to see so many people coming along wanting to learn about stitch and textiles.  The fantastic Brenda Kiligrew had made the journey south from Redditch and the fashion show was a great hit with everyone, it is fantastic to see designers of the future! My stand was next to the ever chipper Val Hughes a trailblazer of felt construction her teaching manner was something I could not get enough of and hope to put a little bit of the knowledge I gained into my workshops.  She has a book out very soon and it is fantastic, step by step instructions written in her approachable style, fantastic images and a great story running through it. 

As ever my dear friend and mentor Kim Thittichai was on hand at both shows to chivvy me along, it's great to be invited to run workshops under her guidance but even better just to have a good old laugh together!  Kim gave lectures each day (along with a workshop - no stopping her!) about KK Glue and Hot Spots, KK Glue is a very exciting product as it is a washable powder glue.  A little goes a long way and I love the muted blended edges it gives to a design.

So a good time was had by all, I'd like to thank my helpers who came and looked after the stand whilst I was running the workshops I really appreciated it!

So what next!!!??? Well from Friday 3rd until Monday 6th I am in an exhibition at Custard Factory which is being run by The Cobalt Blue, it's called Rational Grid and features geometric artists in a wide range of mediums.  It's going to be a great exhibition and on Friday evening will be part of the regular Digbeth First Friday happening, so why not come along and see the exhibition as well as what else happens in Digbeth every first Friday.  One of my favourite parts of First Friday is Digbeth Dining club which takes place every Friday and sometimes Saturday in Spotlight. A whole range of street food waiting for you to try, I am also looking forward to visiting Centrala for their "I Bring you Flowers" exhibit. After the weekend I will be working on some new designs, sending out orders and generally stitching until May, Craft and Design Month but more of that next time!

Happy Stitching!

The year is flying by!

So the year is cracking on!  I don't seem to have stopped except for last week when I went on a 5 day holiday (phew the luxury!). I went to Toulouse and enjoyed a little syringe of sunshine! But now back to it with two of the best shows of the season.

I am at Fashion, Embroidery and Stitch at the NEC from 19th March until 22nd March.  This is a great show as it is really 3 shows in one!  Sewing for Pleasure is where you will find everything you need for sewing, pacthworking and quilting.  There are some great free workshops which I would love to do if only I didn't have to be on my stand!!  Try and get to take part in a Vilene Sewing Club Workshop run by the multi talented author and craft inspirer extraordinaire Laura Strutt of Made Peachy, some great ideas my favourite (as you know I like to Use Stash!) is Fabric Key Fob where you will make the most of your scraps to create a fantastic key fob.  Also in the Sewing for Pleasure area there are on stand workshops, I like West End Embroidery who will be demonstrating new stitches for canvas work.

The next area in the show is dedicated to HobbyCrafts from cake decorating to fine art to papercraft to felting it's all here.  I particuarly like wandering down the art aisles and watch people paint and draw quite relaxing in such a busy show. House of Zandra is a great stand if you love papercraft and I see that they are demonstrating felt kits too for all you owl lovers! 

Finally Fashion, Embroidery and Stitch is where you come to learn and take part in everything in textile design and beyond.  A highlight for me is always the Fashion Show run by Brenda Killigrew and students of the IDC Academy of Fashion and Textiles it's an opportunity to spot designers of the future and marvel in the creativity.  This area also has many exhibition stands dedicated to textile artists I am looking forward to "Dressed to Quilt" by Ineke Berlyn which will show quilts designed on a shift dress pattern, I will be interested to see how a shape can determine the design. There are so many great textile artists in one area that you could spend the whole day here, taking in (of course) workshops on the Vilene Education Stand where you can book onto a workshop run by Kim Thittichai entitled Sparkle and Twinkle, if you know Kims work you will no doubt be familiar with her use of Bondaweb but if you can get onto her workshop you will find out that there is so much knowledge behind the processes and designs, I've heard that Geckos are going to be available and also Hot Spots!!! After a workshop stay a while in this area and feast on textile art from around the world.  After being inspired by all you have seen why not take the plunge and start a new Craft?  Top of my list as usual (apart from Tapestry Needlepoint of course!) is weaving, take a look at the small kits and inspiration by my good friends Juko Designs it really is amazing what can be achieved with very little wool and texture.

So I hope to see you at the three shows in one show, what was that oh yes my stand is K20 do pop on by and see some secondhand wool stitch work!

If you can't get to Birmingham it all happens again but this time with cake(!) at Excel the following weekend.

What a lot of links! Happy Stitching!

Tina

Weaving on!

Pink Weave by Janet Elstob, Copyright Janet Elstob 2015

It's great when you receive a note from a satisfied customer and this week seems to have been my week!  My Weave design kits are counted kits and come in many different colourways, they can seem a challenge to get started but once you are into the swing they are really enjoyable to get on with.  Each kit comes with a separate chart for each colour and you follow them in order to get a fantastic weave result. It's amazing how so few colours can make such a pleasing result.  The above image came in from Janet who when we met at Knitting and Stitching Show described how she wanted a special cushion for a rattan chair in a light place.  Well here is the result using my Pink Weave Kit.  The stitching on this is just perfect and I love how the basket weave of the chair is echoed in the finished piece.
This kit uses Appletons Wools and can be provided as a bespoke item in your own favourite colourways (prices from £70 to £90), you receive a bespoke set of colourblock charts and before I make up the kit you get to see a mock up of the finished colourway, I can even send you some wool colours.  As you know I am always encouraging people to Use Your Stash and so this design is available as a colour chart only which enables you to use the wool you have got rather than me providing it in the kit.
Continuing with all this weave and Stash I spent a really great day with Solihull Embroiderers Guild on Tuesday talking about my favourite subject, me! Ha ha not completely I talked about how I got into this tapestry needlepoint world and also showed examples of my work where I had used other peoples stash to create unique weave pieces.

Photo courtesy Martin Christie

What I find amazing about talking to Guild members is not just how interested they are in quality work but also how a simple idea like my weave design can spark a whole list of possibilities and discussion.  We roamed from stitch control, to emotional control, to maths, to physics, to memories of their moms pattern boxes.  It was a fantastic day and I have definitely come away with more ideas than I went in with!

The trade and stitch shows are nearly with us, I am exhibiting at Craft, Hobby and Stitch International next weekend and then on to Fashion, Embroidery and Stitch in March where I will be exhibiting a lot of my weave pieces and also demonstrating the processes.

I'm off now to look create another bespoke weave chart ready to send out after the weekend!

Until next time, happy stitching!

Tina