Reflective Stitch

An intriguing and inspiring textile art book that explores how to incorporate notions of time and place to give deeper meaning to your textile work.

This fascinating book explores how to introduce notions of time and place to your textile art practice, to give deeper meaning and emotional resonance to your work.

Renowned British textile artist Claire Wellesley-Smith demonstrates how these two fundamental concepts are linked – we experience time through place, and vice versa – and make endlessly rewarding themes for textile art. Practical ideas for incorporating time and place into your work include:

• Taking the time: how to observe mindfulness and care in choosing materials, and how to stitch with intention to create a more meaningful piece of work.

• Textile temporalities: observing time passing through stitch, through daily embroidery journals and recording aspects of life, either environmental or personal, over certain durations of time.

• Gathering together: Using textile art within the wider community to record memories, share ideas and create a sense of togetherness.

• Geographies of making: creating site-specific embroidery pieces, for display or otherwise, that are tied to a specific place and time.

• Stitching connection: ideas for collaborating with other artists in group projects that are passed back and forth between the participants over time.

Illustrated with exquisite examples of the author’s own textile work and that of other artists from around the world who embrace similar topics, this thoughtful, contemplative book offers a wealth of inspiration on how to incorporate these important themes into your own textile art practice.