Fabric collage and Interpreting buildings in stitch

I love to interpret buildings in stitch.  Perhaps I am a frustrated architect - or maybe I like the idea of representing the solid hard form of stone, brick and slate in the soft and textured surfaces of textiles.  

This has been part of my textile art practice from the start when I was in school I did fabric collages of my house and a derelict tower in the Scottish Borders - both of which hand on my wall today and were part of my (never completed) GCSE textiles.  

Now I find I try to include buildings wherever possible in textile art.  I regularly participate in the Embroiderers guild challenges and also in Quilter Guild contemporary quilt group exhibitions.  

I love to share my skills in creating applique and collaged fabric pictures and abstracts and regularly run creative textiles topic driven workshops at the studio.  We have an applique houses workshop coming up later this month. 

We recently had a visit from Anne Kelly who taught us her hints and tips around creating textile art collages based on the folk art tradition - of course mine included a building!

Several of these pieces include free motion stitching on a sewing machine - we have a handy starter kit available to get you started using your sewing machine to doodle with - it includes a narrow embroidery hoop, free motion foot for your machine and some stitch and tear to try along with the workshop worksheet you can buy the kit here.