Eight of our members set off early on a bright, sunny, Saturday morning to arrive in Lancaster by 9 o'clock, in order to help Lancaster Branch with stewarding on Regional Day.
We had been allocated various jobs including raffle, tombola, competitions,traders and general help.
All the stewards were given red sashes to wear so that they could be picked out in a crowd.
The doors opened to members at 9:30 and people were welcomed with a drink, biscuit and a chance to chat with old friends.
In the morning there was a chance to do some shopping, play the raffle or tombola and look at the beautiful textile work by Lancaster Branch, North Wales Young Embroiderers and the entries for the two competitions.
Some of our members helping to steward below;
Display of work by Lancaster Branch;
Competition Entries
Young Embroiderers
After very pleasant lunch with a beautiful view of Lancaster and the Bay we all made our way to the lecture theatre for a talk by Nicola Jervis.
Nicola gave a very informative and enlightening talk on her development as a textile artist and how she had developed her present work on birds with inspiration from William Morris.
After the talk prizes were given out and a goodbye and safe journey home was wished to all members.
It was a very enjoyable and interesting day and a big thank you goes to Lancaster Branch for organizing the day.
This month we made a start on our Chairperson's Challenge, A Continous landscape, led by Anne Covell one of our own members. A few of us had made one before but this new landscape was a different size and using different materials.
Anne had brought with her some of the older ones to show how they fitted together in a line and therefore the measurements needed to be accurate. See Below
This time the instructions said to use vilene and paint the background.Anne suggested we marked the measurements down the side and then apply water and paint so that there was some flowing of paint to give a softer look.
Because the piece was bigger than we needed we could then choose the piece we liked best and cut to size.
When dry we chose the piece we were going to stitch into by using a window.
Anne then suggested various techniques for adding interest to the piece, applying sheers,trees from hessian fibres, couching and embroidering over the top to name just a few.
Most of us only got as far as stitching or trying out ideas by placing fibres over the top but we all went away quite happy to finish off at home and hopefully when we bring them back they will all fit beautifully together because of our accurate measurements!
A big thank you to Anne for leading us through the instructions, making packs for us and offering us creative ideas to complete the landscape.
If you were not there on Tuesday and would like to make a landscape Anne still has some packs left price £1 if you would like to contact her.
Thank you once again to Anne and we are all looking forward to seeing them placed together.
One of our members has finished her continuous landscape and it looks a bit lonely on its own so as soon as some more are finished we can try and fit them together!
We now have a few more completed and they are beginning to look wonderful. Keep on sewing!
