Thoughts from the first floor

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NEWS!

When Clare from Bloomsbury Publishing got in touch out of the blue to ask if I’d be interested in writing a book I said yes. That was in October 2020 and the proposition was, loosely, for a ‘maker’s guide’ to painting on fabric. After a lifetime of painting patterns on paper for ‘the industry’ I’d been slowly developing a new repertoire of pattern and gesture applied directly onto cloth. Re-reading my very first email sent in response to her I see that I’ve remained pretty-well true to my starting point:

When Clare from Bloomsbury Publishing got in touch out of the blue to ask if I’d be interested in writing a book I said yes, although I’d never undertaken, or even considered, quite such a huge venture before. That was in October 2020 and the proposition was, loosely, for a ‘maker’s guide’ to painting on fabric. After a lifetime of painting patterns on paper for ‘the industry’ I’d been slowly developing a new repertoire of pattern and gesture applied directly onto cloth. Re-reading my very first email sent in response to her I see that I’ve remained pretty-well true to my starting point:

page turning

A couple of days ago I had a longing to paint stripes! Luckily I found a new concertina notebook stashed in my studio drawer – couldn’t be a better match. Sometimes it’s so nice and so necessary to have a play, to make familiar marks and run colours together just for the fun of it; to use as many brushes and as many palettes as I want for no reason other than pleasure and curiosity.

a shop, a show, a show-off

I’ve left it rather late in the day to tell you about ‘Painted Treasures’! 

brushes with reality

A nephew, catching sight of the jars on my studio window-cill (or is it sill?) once asked me what all the paintbrushes were about. “Well, these are the flat ends for straight, choppy and also consistent strokes,

from my window

Each morning when I comb my hair I twist any stray wisps together and float them off through the open window in the belief that they will be found by some sharp-eyed avian and soon be lining a cosy nest.

…looking forward…looking back…

It’s lovely to welcome some new small people to the planet – several young friends have had babies this year, beautiful boys and girls, twins and singletons – congratulations to you all!

the three boxes

I inhabit a very nice, but not huge, flat; I work at home. My life and my work are inextricable.

currents and cloth

A drifting gin bottle, tossed into the seas in 1886 by Germans hoping to track ocean currents, has turned up on a beach in Western Australia.

then and now

 

At the end of the ’80s I was in Accra Ghana; cooked food was sold on every street corner –