It has been my Birthday weekend and – like any self-respecting gentleman of six and thirty years – I decided I would spend it immersing myself in the wonderful world of fibres, learning all about spinning, dyeing and weaving, thanks to Fay Jones (aka The Woodland Haberdasher) and the Lavenham Guildhall.
On Friday, I tried my hand at pin loom weaving on some DIY looms created by Fay from some old wooden pallets and a handful of nails. I’ll avoid using any of the words that are usually associated with craft – therapeutic, mindful, relaxing, etc. – because I have to admit that found the whole experience completely awe-inspiring.
For some time, I have been listening to The Long Thread Media Podcast, which had opened my eyes to the bottomless rabbit hole of fibre crafts, but sitting at a table surrounded by intelligent women (as usual, I was the only male) casually discussing sheep breeds, woad harvesting, fibre weights and Anglo-Saxon looms, I found myself completely stunned by the depth and variety of these traditional skills.
A few days later, I returned to the Lavenham Guildhall with Elle to look at an exhibition of Fay’s work, entitled ‘RAW: Tactile Viscera’. The works straddle two distinct, but connected, materials – wood and textiles – and she seems perfectly at home with both.
The name of the exhibition is very fitting, as much of Fay’s work demands to be touched – there are signs encouraging you to do so – and most of the pieces seem to suggest things that have been discovered in or extracted from the bodies of living beings. In one corner, tiny, exquisitely carved sculptures that resembled runic divination stones look as though they have been ‘found’ rather than ‘made’. Through the middle of the room, in a river of organic material, you can trace the process of sheared wool being transformed into woven textile.
Upstairs, Fay has created a ‘pop-up studio’, where you can rummage through the tools of the trade – wood samples, colour swatches, dyeing materials – as well as a split-log puzzle, which I spent rather more time reconstructing than I would like to admit (though I got there in the end!)
Obviously, we both already have interests in textiles: I do embriodery and Elle does dressmaking and knitting. But now having dipped my toe into weaving, and begun to learn about natural dyeing, these are certainly going to be skills we are keen to explore more in future. Watch this space!
RAW: Tactile Viscera, by Fay Jones, is at the National Trust Lavenham Guildhall until Sunday 29 September. You can find out more about Fay on her website, or on Instagram and Facebook.
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