dgguildswd Dyeing, Other woolly crafts, Spinning, Weaving

November 2019

D&G-SWD Gathering 2019Saturday 9th November was our Annual Gathering. Here’s a rundown of what went on:

  • Busy Mrs B Pottery – Gene’s daughter Sarah brought her beautiful hand crafted pottery
  • Crazy Daisy Crafts from Lockerbie with yarn, knitting supplies and general haberdashery
  • Fiona Moir – Guild Member – with hand dyed spinning fibre, hand dyed yarns, hand dyed threads and fabric and finished items
  • Gene Howe – Guild Member – hand and machine knitted items
  • Happy Knitter Yarns from Dumfries with yarns and general haberdashery supplies
  • Jane Rutherford – Guild Member – fleeces and needle felted items
  • Liz Booth – Guild Member – hand crafted semi precious stone jewellery and felted items
  • Low Auldgirth Steading – Ruth brought a selection of lovely fleeces
  • Roz Plant – Guild Member – with Guild Member – hand dyed spinning fibre, hand dyed yarns and batik finished items
  • Solway Woolscapes – Guild Member – needle felted pictures and cards, needle felting kits and kits for various crafts
  • Sue MacNiven – Guild Member – hand crafted buttons, hand spun yarns and finished items
  • The Threshing Barn from Reeth, Yorkshire Dales, with spinning, weaving equipment, sinning fibre, yarns,dyes etc.

We also displayed our members’ exhibition with the theme of Ethnicity which, from a textile perspective, provided an exciting creative challenge:

dgguildswd Dyeing

October 2019

7Our multi-talented member Roz gave a talk about the history and methodology of batik dyeing. With over 30 years experience of batik, she considers it “messy mindfulness”.  This was followed by a very hands-on workshop for members to put the techniques into practice.

dgguildswd Other woolly crafts

July 2019

4Carole led a very busy session on yarn hooking, providing all of the equipment required, including a nifty lap frame. Members chose their favourite designs and got going straight away to create their pieces. Carole is also one of the 5 organisers of Yarndale – the woolly festival of creativity in Skipton in September.

dgguildswd Weaving

June 2019

3Fiona gave a wonderful talk on tapestry weaving. Her work is narrative and full of simple abstract imagery, deceptively simple considering the design that goes into the process. Her obvious love of colour comes from her early childhood in India.

dgguildswd Spinning, Weaving

May 2019

2The development of spinning and weaving from cottage pursuits to factory endeavours was explained by Dick Moriarty in a way which enabled us to understand the relentless march of what looked like progress (for those with money and power) but which over the march of time threw countless skilled workers out of work. The architecture of the mills was explained and the cleverness of the design of Farfield Mill – which was a spinning mill – was demonstrated.

Among our members we have the English ethnic group (are most of them Northerners?). They have relatives/ancestors who worked in the Lancashire cotton mills and the woollen mills in Yorkshire. And some of them, who are tapestry weavers, are designing work which refers to this heritage. Drawings are emerging which touch on the landscape around the mills, the mill buildings themselves, the water/power sources and there was mention of the Pendleton Hills (witches, too).

I hope you are enjoying the 2019 Challenge and finding out a bit about your own heritage or about the wonderful textile traditions of the different peoples of the world.

– Rita

dgguildswd Dyeing

April 2019

1Fiona Moir led a full day workshop, aimed at dyeing yarns using a variety of different methods. The main fibres used were commercial and handspun protein bases (wool, alpaca, mohair, silk). Members brought design sources, pictures, colour schemes, and pics of yarn they liked the look of, and explored different techniques.