About Me / Contact

I learnt to stitch before I learnt to read and write.  My grandmother taught me embroidery stitches, my aunt showed me how to make clothes and toys, my mother, how to mend.  For most of my life stitching has been pragmatic, earning a living, stretching a budget, mending and making do, product creation.  But after years of design and making, forays into illustration and digital art, I have returned, finding the needle the best way to express what I need to say. 

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The great challenge has been to use stitch and cloth to say something about me and the world around me, not about my skills with a needle.  I have abandoned traditional decorative embroidery, often limiting myself to just one or two types of stitches.  I have  broken the long-ago learnt embroidery rules, and learnt to make the ugly as well as the beautiful, the meaningful as well as decorative.  My Gran is still in my head admonishing me for my messy finishing-offs, for not using the right tools and materials, but I’ve quietly defied her and the stereotypes of embroidery to give voice to the things I want to say.  I'm long passed needing her approval, but think she may have liked what I do.

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