Sarah Appleton - Textile Artist Blog

With the new year in full swing I am now trying to focus more on refining my 'brand'; my style and the direction I would like to take my work in. I usually refer to myself as a 'Textile Artist' because I like that this is an ambiguous title which is difficult to define. My work to date often blurs boundaries between illustration, textiles, fine art, craft, costume and fashion, so it's kind of easier to sum that up by calling it 'Textile Art'. The first piece I created for this 'polishing' is what I'm calling the 'Little Bird' embroidery (imaginative, I know): This is only 3" in diameter, so he truly is little; a fun and quick little piece to start the new year with. The bird itself was inspired by a carved wooden mantelpiece I saw at a museum in North Wales recently: Little Bird is in the middle there; I changed him slightly from the original to make him mine and not just a copy. I also really like the plant and clock and have...

Like everyone else, I rarely have time to work on projects that are all for myself these days, but over the holidays I made time for a quick project I'd been planning for a while. I had a plain faux suede turquoise shift dress (apologies for the following terrible two photos): From meh... That I wanted to embellish and make more exciting, like so: ...to yeh! With just a little bit of embroidery around the neckline and pockets I think it looks much more interesting. Here's some better photos with detail: The yellowy greeny thread is your regular DMC / Anchor type but the blue thread is a vintage 1960s Swedish silk that I picked up from  Linladen  at the Festival of Quilts last August. This is a really good quality thread that I'll be saving for the most special projects! I chose the pocket pattern from Constance Howard's book 'Inspiration for Embroidery' and the herringbone stitch is one that I've been using in various projects for a while...

As Christmas is officially over, it seems like a good time to belatedly tell you all about the various crafty thingys I made for the festive period! First I started off with simpleish embroidered fabric decorations: [And a few paper ones...] These were inspired by classic retro shapes and designs and for the more complex embroideries I took inspiration from Constance Howard's book 'Inspiration for Embroidery'. Most of the fabric, paper and ribbon was salvaged / upcycled. Next I made cards in a similar retro theme: Photo by  LunarApple These featured an Intergalactic Space Reindeer with antennae so that he doesn't miss out on all his important Christmas telly [e.g. James Bond]. I also made cards with Christmas trees on but these seem to have eluded all photography. However, I did manage to knock up a quick reindeer gift bag too:  Here's a bonus picture of my marvellous cat looking splendid under our tree: That's it! Until next time!

This week I have bad news and good news. The bad news is that this might be my last 'Volunteering at Walford Mill' post because I won't be a volunteer any more. The good news is that that's because I'm going to be a proper paid member of the team really soon! Yippee! This is great news for me since I've spent the last three years working on my degree in order to get a foot in the creative world's door; and following graduation I didn't have much luck with job applications which made me feel very lost indeed. I knew I didn't want to work in London, or for some big fatcat corporation, so finding a small, local gallery focussed on craft and education was perfect for me. Education is really important to me; as a mature student who's enrolled on many a part-time short course over the last ten years I am a huge advocate of learning. It's all part of growing and 'bettering' oneself after all! In my new Mill job I'll be helping with the e...

Not much to report this week; most of the day was spent doing officey type things; sending emails and looking after the social media of the Mill, which is one of the jobs I am assigned to do quite a bit. I also helped out in the gallery shop and with the Creative Academy (kid's craft). This week they were creating hand drawn bauble pictures like this one: Baubs by Jeannie By cutting templates and drawing around them and filling in the space: And then rubbing out the pencil line to leave a shape with pattern but no outline. Phew! This was an exercise in neatness and patience for everyone involved! That;s it really! Until next time!

Christmas is now all set up at the Mill and looking fabulous! Here's a few pictures: Looking pretty splendid indeed! Most of the hard work and graft was down to Krishula, Christine and Mel, although I wrapped most of the presents under the tree, and helped with decorating the smaller christmas tree and shop displays that can be seen in the last two pictures! I haven't ever really been involved in creating retail displays to this standard before, so I'm learning a lot as I go along and the staff have been very encouraging and helpful, which is lovely. I've been working in the gallery shop a more the past couple of weeks and have come to terms with the till and general day to day happenings now. I think! This week I was helping  Debby  with jewellery creating again; using her beautiful hand painted papers to make unique pieces which will be finished with resin. Here are a few that I was working on this week: In the foreground and left you can se...

Now that my nephew has had his first birthday I can finally write about what I made him; Karma the Chameleon [ pattern by Janine Holmes]. This is the most complicated thing I've crocheted to date, although I have been crocheting for a few years now (mostly squares for a never ending blanket). I actually found it a lot less complicated than I thought I would and enjoyed making it which leads me to believe that I should be doing more crocheting than I currently am! Here it is not camouflaging particularly well with its surroundings: I made a change to the pattern in the sense that I used a self-striping kind of wool instead of using remnants to create my own stripes (mainly because I have no excess yarn stash). Although it's not as colourful as the original  I like the way it turned out. The yarn I used is Euro Baby Maypole  in Sapphire Blue. Ooooh! The original pattern [as I mentioned] is by Janine Holmes of Moji Moji Design, and her website is well worth a look as ...