Storrington Quilters Workshop

A few weeks ago, during my hugely busy run of workshops, I was invited to run a workshop with the Storrington Quilters. We were in a fantastic building - Storrington Village Hall - which had lots of windows and loads of natural light. Plus it was a huge group of ladies so we made a big table that seemed to go on forever, piled high with the creative bits the ladies had brought in, as well as my own provided things. 

This was a mixed theme class so some had requested a seaside themed pack and others had asked for a countryside themed pack (with sheep) so it was a fun one to put together and have a play around with combinations of fabrics. Some of the fabrics I'd cut for each theme started blending together as well which created some interesting interpretations of what a beach and the countryside looked like. (The counter to that in this case would be 'whatever you wanted it to look like'.)

There's no pressure for the ladies to specifically use the fabrics in the packs provided, or in the same order as I've layered them, the idea is just to start generating ideas and thoughts so layers can be swapped out or disregarded completely.

It was such a fun day. As mostly fairly experienced quilters and stitchers, I didn't have to do so much teaching of the stitches and giving stitch demonstrations, but it was talking through of the ideas and supporting the "would this look ok do you think?", or "have I done this wrong?" questions.

I say in every single workshop that I teach that I have never told anybody that they were wrong in a decision or a layout. When you are being creative and creating pieces for yourself, how can what you like be wrong? It may not work out as you intended but that's ok, you can usually undo it or try again with something else. It's a learning curve and you have to make mistakes to learn - next time you could try it differently, or with another colour, or in a different scene, but you aren't wrong for trying it. 

How cool are these hoops? We can go from a wonderful boat sailing on the high seas, to rockpools with velvety turkey stitch anemones, to a sunset over lavender fields. There's even a yo-yo (or Suffolk Puff) sun a little further down in the photos. 

The piece above has little pieces of raffia cut up and stitched down to add further texture to the wheat print at the bottom. Along with bullion knots, fly stitches, straight stitches and french knots, there's a lot going on just in that one layer if you look very closely. 

There were 16 ladies in this workshop in total but I seem to have missed the photo of all 16 together so here's 12 to start you off. They work so beautifully together as well as stand alone individuals. Do any jump out at you?

There is a website for the Storrington Quilters and they made a fab little video of the day. I haven't seen myself in action like that before, no one usually film or photographs me, it's all about the ladies and the work they're doing. If you click on the link below it will take you to the page about the class, along with the video and some photos - there's even a photo of a piece that has been made since the workshop which is just lovely! Events — Storrington Quilters

I'm keeping an eye on it myself to see if any other finished hoop pieces pop up.