About Me

After many years of part-time textile working, I became a full time textile designer/maker in 1997, when I started the company Creative Textiles. This has built upon the work I had previously done in the areas of teaching, community work and alternative education.

An important part of my work is innovation and design, and I spend a lot of time experimenting with materials. I am very inspired by the natural environment. Designs arise from playing with ideas, materials and images such as the patterns left by water on sand and rock or the moods of the sea and sky. Each year brings new designs and possibilities to pursue.

My enthusiasm for textiles arises from an absorption with colour and texture. I am also interested in promoting sustainable issues and this has a bearing upon the materials I use.

Where possible I try to work with reclaimed materials. It is one of the most challenging aspects of my work and although it can impose restrictions I experience great satisfaction in developing or adapting techniques that extend the use of redundant textiles. Reused textiles are often combined with sustainable materials such as wool, silk, cotton.

The effects I achieve have arisen from wide ranging experiments with textured, raised surfaces using traditional and contemporary techniques and I sometimes incorporate glass, plastic and wood. I enjoy using contrasts, the warmth and denseness of wool enveloping cool, rigid shapes of glass or wood. My work uses many textile techniques but I mainly focus on rag work and feltmaking.

A distinctive feature of my designs are 3D or textural surfaces many of which are inspired by natural forms and landscapes. A lot of the inspiration for these comes from the movement of water or land formations in the Lake District and the Cumbrian Coast, where I live.

Working with textiles is a very sensual experience and I like to produce work that both engages the eye and offers the opportunity for touch.

Much of my work is designed for practical use and is able to be cleaned by hand washing. As well as creating objects of beauty, I hope that my concentration on the potential of waste contributes to new ways of dealing with apparently redundant textiles.

The objectives of my work are:

To explore and demonstrate that waste can be transformed into useful, durable, beautiful objects.
To encourage the purchase and use of sustainable textiles.
To pass on skills and encourage creative work.
To operate a sustainable lifestyle /business