My Awesome Journey

I'll start this with an introductory:  At the age of 4 my mother had me tap dancing and ballet’ing my way through toddlerism.  I loved it… 

I don’t remember when I started creating with textiles, be it sewing a new blouse or stuffing a furry bear and applying a hand stitched nose… I just know I always have.

It started out with Barbie doll clothes (the launchpad for many designers!!) and moved on to my personal wardrobe, sometimes to my dismay – I would have loved to gone to the mall and buy those awesome Star Jeans.  But in retrospect I had a one-of-a-kind wardrobe.

My mother has inspired me my entire life.  All of the aspirations we had together have culminated to this time in my life.  I wish she were here to see the exciting things on the horizon.

Somewhere along the line it went from working with manufactured fabric to raw textiles…  I discovered I could actually make a piece of felt!!!  The oldest textile known to man.

But I had a hidden (rocky?) path before I got to where I needed to go.

My quest for attaining fulfillment started with making natural soaps…  and man… I went for that!!!  I made some really cool soap… but there are a lot of great soap makers out there…

Then… VIA Pinterest… I came across this thing about needle felting.  I’m not even sure what I was looking for – maybe something about penny rugs, I don’t know but all of the sudden I was ordering wool roving and wool pre-felt and needle punches and… OMG!!  Yea… I never looked back.

So, first in my textile journey was needle felting.  It was a great introduction to wool roving and the reaction to a hooked needle and raw wool being manipulated onto a pre-felted surface.  The methodic rhythm of punching wool through wool is very meditative!

After the feel of raw wool on my hands I couldn’t resist exploring the further possibilities…  and a whole new world opened!

I started out thinking I was going to be an artist in the medium of wool…  and I did do some cool but unreasonable work! 

I am still trying to master the art of Nuno Felting but the scarves are my true ZEN.

I soon realized there are WAY too may mediums in wool!!  Vessels became an obsession… a good one!

But then…  when I was all absorbed in the wool…  along came Japanese Shibori… and my world went wonkers!!

So now I am learning the techniques of Kanoko Shibori, Miura Shibori, Kumo Shibori, Nui Shibori, Arashi Shibori & Itajime Shibori… And yes, they are all different.

Shibori is the Japanese lingo for shaping and resisting cloth to create a pattern before dyeing. 

Along comes the Indigo Dye Vat…  what an amazing thing!  Indigo dye is an organic compound with a distinctive blue color… the more your dip the darker it gets.  But it is a little more complicated than that and I set out to make a conquest…  Still working on that.

And by the way… I’m not stuck on Indigo.  My next venture is Ecco Dying… Wish Me Luck!!!