Pippa Foulds RSN Talk

Today we were really pleased to be able to have a talk by Pippa Foulds (RSN) via Google Meet. 17 of us made it despite a Google outage which seemed to affect some of us – shouting at laptops ensued when emails and the internet disappeared, but we eventually made it!

Pippa’s love of needlework started at a young age and continued through her school years and career as a solicitor. At the Knit and Stitch she visited the Royal School of Needlework stand and from that took Tracy Franklin’s course in Durham.

Her journey through to the RSN Diploma encompassed crewel work, silk shading, canvas work, goldwork, blackwork, whitework, stumpwork – you name it Pippa’s done it! Part of her qualification as a future tutor involved conservation too.

Pippa has a particular interest in historical 16^th/17^thC embroidery but since completing her Diploma is branching out into more contemporary work requiring a little less precision.

You may have seen the White Walker embroidery Game of Thrones – many RSN embroiderers worked on the piece and Pippa contributed one of the shields

Pippa has gone on to create a corsage for the queen and became head broiderer at York minster.

She is now working on a degree at Bradford in contemporary textiles.

We had an enjoyable afternoon listening to Pippa tell us about her embroidery journey and it was lovely to be able to have something that resembled a normal meeting even with fickle technology.

A few screen shots (apologies for the quality) of Pippa's talk.

Pippa's pieces from her RSN qualification

Conservation before and after

GoT White Walker

Fit for the Queen

York Minster

Some contemporary work

Instagram

We now have an Instagram page - I'm getting there slowly with photos as I had to  individually upload photos from the FaceBook page and it drove me up the wall! Hopefully I'll be organised enough to do the Blog, Instagram and FaceBook all in one go next time. Please follow us - you can spot us quickly by our profile pic.

November Virtual Meeting

 We had another virtual meeting today and twelve of us made it with a few technical hitches! It was lovely to see people for a catch up and share what we have been doing. We have made quite a few plans for the future and are hoping to have some virtual talks/workshops from speakers, we know this has worked well for Grassington branch. We also decided to postpone the planned exhibition again as the Covid situation is still proving to be a worry. We have decided to continue with the monthly colour theme but have asked members to produce a 4"x4" square in the chosen colour.

Here's a couple of examples from Dee, Claire K, Sue I and Sally. I'm gathering up some more photos so watch this space!

Colours for 2021 if you want to get ahead

December 2020	Red
January	Blue
February	Purple
March	Yellow
April	Green
May	Brown
June	Lilac
July	White
September	Pink
October	Indigo
November	Orange
December	Black

Yarndale 2020 - sort of.

Bit of a different Yarndale this year! The weekend has gone online and you can see what's available on the Yarndale website. We haven't been very busy as a group recently for obvious reasons but members have been stitching away and you can see our Chair, Claire's little video for the Yarndale website here. We're keeping our fingers crossed and hoping we can return to meeting again in January 2021 although what that will look like is uncertain! 

Monochrome Book

 It's been a while since I posted, it was our little get together in the church grounds; we had planned another get together as it was so nice seeing people and having a chat, but given the new "Rule of 6" we've had to abandon that! Anyway, Jackie, one of our very talented members had been busy and so here's some photos of her beautiful work.

August Meeting

 Today we had our outside socially distanced meeting and the weather was kind to us. It was lovely to see everyone and have a chat and catch up with what what people had been stitching amongst other things! Our meeting was particularly beneficial for those who have been more isolated in recent months and as a consequence we are hoping to have another similar get together in September. Chatting to those who have contact with other branches about their experiences with Zoom meetings we might give this a go too - we had tossed the idea round before and have had committee meetings this way, so it would be another way of including more people. Members have been busy and I didn't get round everyone for photos of their work but here's a small sample!

 

UPDATE

Well, things have certainly been different the last few months! In light of the Covid situation we had another virtual committee meeting and confirmed our decision to suspend 'normal' meetings until January 2021. The current committee will remain in post until the next AGM - September's has obviously been formally cancelled. However, we did think it would be nice for those who felt able to have some sort of get together; we are proposing, weather permitting, to have a short meeting on Monday 17th August in Christ Church grounds (Tesco side) 10.30-11.30. It would be lovely to see people and we think we will be able to socially distance in that space - bring something to sit on, a drink and some stitching (we won't have access to the building, so no toilet facilities!). We would like to welcome all members and anyone who would like to join us when things get going again so do drop by and say hello if you can. I will post an update nearer the time here and on the FaceBook page and also email members.
In the mean time can I remind members that details for the Exhibition are on a tab on the main page - keep going, we will have our exhibition but it will probably be at a later date than originally planned. If you are wanting a canvas for the tree part of the project Claire will have these on the 17th if you want to collect one. I would love any photos of what you have been up to and you can email them to me at skiptonsec@embroiderersguild.co.uk.
Hope to see some of you in August all being well, keep your fingers crossed for sunshine.

Bisa Butler Quilted Portraits

I have only just discovered Bisa Butler - her work is just incredible. Her beautiful quilted portraits are so vibrant and joyful. You can see more of her work here and I have liked her FaceBook page on ours. Do have a look at the FB page and the gallery in the link - really inspiring work.
I particularly love this piece.

Helen Barnes online course

Skipton branch member, Helen Barnes has also been busy. She has written to tell me that she has just finished a 10 week blog on North Country Quilting https://helenbarnestextiles.co.uk/blog/. Helen is also doing an online course to make a North Country Quilt panel for a cushion or mat through 'Oh Sew Sweet' a patchwork shop in Barnsley. If you are interested in taking part, please follow the link below or contact Helen directly.
https://mailchi.mp/7362edfde368/heritage-quilting-slow-stitch-a- long.