Hats, Workshop, and TIF

Don't laugh!  Pauline Verrinder, who organises Textiles in Focus at Cottenham puts out a call every year for people to wear a 'silly hat' when they come to the event so this year I thought I'd make the effort.  Well, you know me, if I made a hat (or decorated one) it had to be about the sea.  I covered an old sun hat with a blue silky scarf and then embellished it to death.  I think the fish on the front came from Sharne Gregory several years ago.  If you click on the link it will take you to Sharne's blog post about her glorious peacocks.  Sadly photographs were not permitted of the exhibition by Fen Edge Textiles to which Sharne belongs.  The standard of the work by Fen Edge was outstanding so do have a look at their site.  

Textiles in Focus is held at Cottenham Village College and the Hall where the main exhibitions were held had these wonderful glass leaf blocks hanging in the roof space.  

The other group exhibiting at TIF was Anglia Textiles Works.  I was particularly impressed by the work of Kathy Colledge who used close free-machining to achieve surface texture in her work.

Detail shot above.

Yvonne Brown - Thetford Priory

I couldn't resist buying this not-really-cuddly elephant embroidered by Bibiawa to raise funds for women in Afghanistan as part of the One Earth Textiles project  Isn't his expression wonderful!  I now have to find a project of my own to include him in, maybe a bookcover.  These small embroideries will be appearing at other shows around the country over the course of the year.

The morning at TIF was spent in a very busy and inspiring workshop with Lynda Monk who I have known through blogging for several years without ever managing to get on any of her workshops.  Lynda is the most generous of teachers and the workshop was fun too.

The workshop was just two hours long but in that time we added foils to painted lutradur which we then painted again and then some fun with Expandaprint on Lutradur and zapping with a heat gun.  They may not look too inspiring at the moment but eventually will morph into bookwraps.  Lynda currently has a new book out called 'Exploring Creative Surfaces' which is well worth a look.

I suppose it's now time I owned up to the shopping I did on Sunday at the show, which was the other main attraction at TIF.

Before the show had even officially opened I succumbed to this beautiful book.  You can see some of the images from the book here.  The book has the added bonus, for me, of being written with text in both French and English.    I am completely entranced by the beautiful work inside.

I think I must be planning some serious sketchbook work! 
 

Another thing I couldn't resist was the lovely bobbly yarn above from Fibre Tastic.   Lesley Mackie, who is FibreTastic, is a lovely lady and we had a very nice chat at the end of the day.

I thought that fibre lace would make an interesting textured stamp.  It was only 50p!

Going back to my silly hat, I did have an ulterior motive when I made it.  As you know, whenever you go to shows it is always nice to meet up with fellow bloggers but it is not always easy to spot them in the crowds of people, even at a small show.  The combination of my hat and a name badge strung round my neck resulted in a hello from 3 bloggers and one of my followers on here.  So hello to Crafty Mugwump, otherwise known as Pam, Sharne, already mentioned above, Pat of Altering Thoughts and Maureen who follows this blog.  Thank you all for saying hello :-)  I must give a mention too to Art And Stitch who I've mentioned here before who always make me welcome at their shop in Peterborough and who had a stand at TIF.