Bowberhead Wet Felting Workshop

 As it was National Meadows Day, Cumbria Wildlife Trust had an open day at Bowberhead; allowing the public to explore the beauty of this upland hay meadow. As part of this I was able to run two workshops: in the morning a wet felting workshop and in the afternoon a sketching workshop. I began both by leading a guided walk through the meadows looking at the flora and management of the meadows and hopefully inspiring participants for their artwork! The meadows, due to the weather this year, are past their best, but there was still plenty to see with notably good displays of Hay Rattle seedheads, Betony, Knapweed and a range of grass species. Due to the unpredictability of the day's weather, we felted inside the lovely old cattle shed ...everyone was pretty much a beginner and threw themselves whole heartedy into the process! The photos below are while the felts were wet and some will be embellished with a bit of needle felting, embroidery or bead-work once dry. Well done all!

Drypoint etching

The first of this year's workshops with Cumbria Wildlife Trust - and what a pleasant day with some cracking work produced! 

We began by doing small etchings of butterflies to give everyone the chance to do a trial etching for reference, whereby they could practise using the different tools and learn how to ink up and print the plate. After that it was free choice! 

I did test two different inks - previously I have stuck to the Aqua ink, but it's a bot of a pain to clean, so I had bought some Calagio Safewash which like the Aqua is oil based, as it has to be to print onto damp paper, but it is washable. How oil based and washable combine I have no idea but it was, as it says, water proof and washable in soap and water. The Calagio, I think, gave a crisper print - but the Aqua is easier to rub into the plate and gives a more 'etching-like' effect ....swings and roundabouts comes to mind! 

The initial trial prints - well worth doing to give everyone a feel for how hard to scratch in, how to use sandpaper and how much ink to put on ..it also gave participants an idea of what size piece(s) were achievable in the given time. 

The final wokshop of 2022

On a cold and foggy day I led my last workshop of the year. To be honest, I was glad the fog didn't clear into sunshine as I was well aware of the fact that it would be a beautiful day on the fells and while I couldn't see the sunshine, it didn't feel like I was missing out. I do enjoy leading workshops though, and this one, with mulled wine (non-acloholic) and mince pies yielded some excellent and rewarding results! Attendees were complete lino cut beginners and certainly challenged themselves - well done all! 

A frosty start at Gosling Sike.

...and the lino cuts ....

Gosling Sike printing workshop

It seems to be all workshops and craft fares at the moment! One of the most successful has been a recent Cumbria Wildlife Trust printing workshop held at their Gosling Sike property near Carlisle. The day was loosely based on seedheads as sources of inspiration. We did lino printing for the morning and then after a late lunch gelli printing - there were some fabulous results! 

Get Buzzing - the fringe!

As part of Cumbria Wildlife Trust's Get Buzzing events to promote the role of pollinators, I was able to share my love of gelli printing - this time inspired by pollinators. This was a drop in type event, so it was lovely to meet and inspire some new people. 

Bowberhead Cushion

Following my visit in early July to Boweberhead, I came back and gelli printed some fabrics based on a Hay Rattle in seed motif. I then patched peices together and quilted  them into a cushion ...

Printed fabric piece.

Patched and quilted. 

Detail.

Cushion front.

Cushion back.

Detail, 

Abstracting Bowberhead

While at Bowberhead, I did a quick concertina sketchbook Click here to see them. I then decided to do a larger scale version of one of the images, trying to retain the looseness. 

Detail.

Gelli printing on fabric

Inspired by my recent trip to Bowberhead nature reserve, I have been playing around with stencils that I made based on Yellow Rattle. These were used with Golden Open Acrylics and a touch of textile medium to print with a Gelli Plate, onto fabric. The first three inages are using my smaller 6 inch square plate nad the last four are using my big A3ish plate. I now need to work out how to make them into a cushion ..