Next Year's Programme

The programme for next years is provisionally as follows:- 

Feb         AGM, Taking a closer look at the completed Travelling books and                         Trader Quiltese

Mar        Moira Neal - A View from my Kitchen Table

Apri        Practical evening with Trader Julie Chapman

May        Angela Dayman

June        Michelle Moody - My life in pieces

July        ?Gilly Mac - To be Confirmed     

September   Mark Francis (Sewing Bee)

October     Nicky Parmiter Post cards and Projects  + Workshop

November       TBA

December       Practical Session

We are also taking part in the Yarnbomb challenge next year.  The theme is "Fun and Games, Mischief and Mayhem" and we will be producing a piece based on characters from the Beano Comic.

December Meeting

 Our Christmas meeting on Wednesday 6th December proved to be a cosy social afternoon.

There was time to chat over seasonal refreshments as well as making paper Kusadama flowers thanks to Jo supporting us all.

"Show and Tell" provided an opportunity to see new work and many gained inspiration from the current "Travelling Books".

In addition we saw how ingenious our members are in the challenge to make a Christmas decoration using a "curtain hanger".

Happy Christmas from all the committee and hope to see you in February for the AGM.

Completed Flowers

Decorations made on a Curtain Hook for the challenge

This one was the most popular and won the competition

Roxanne from Hannah's Room

Wednesday 1st November might have been a wet and windy afternoon but at Cosby Quilters we were treated to a colourful meeting.

Roxanne, from Hannah's Room, brought a huge selection of Indonesian hand dyed batiks. We saw the long labour intensive process needed to produce these stunning fabrics.

In addition we learnt how Roxanne designs scenes using them to great effect and prepares her kits.  There was a terrific range of packs to encourage us, especially as most of them had worked examples.  I'm sure many of us give in to temptation!

Kathy Francis

November Meeting

The November meeting will be in the afternoon and Roxanne from Hannah's Room will be giving us a talk entitled "Creations and Procraftinations".

Roxanna is the owner of Hannah's Room, which is named after her elder sister.  When she her sister left home in 1999 her bedroom became their mother's sewing room and eventually the base for a fabric business, specialising in Batik fabrics. Since then Hannah's Room has grown and grown.  Roxanne took over from her mother eight years ago.  She juggles a busy family life, as she is the mother of 4 children, with running Hannah's Room.  She is keen to show her children the pride in working hard as well as the value of quality time together.

She is passionate about Hannah's Room and all that the business does.  They only stock the best quality of Indonesian Batik Fabrics.  

She is keen to constantly improve the experience for her customers whether that is online, at shows, talks and workshops.

 

October Meeting

We had an enjoyable evening listening to Pascale's talk and she advised us that although she did not use her artistic skills for her occupation, she has always painted in her leisure time.   About five years ago she acquired a sewing machine and taught herself how to use it and started making quilts and small hangings.  She tried lots of different techniques and fabrics and eventually decided that she liked silk fabric best as when it was painted the results were very vibrant.  She has incorporated her artistic skills, used for painting, into her designs for her quilted pieces. Once the design is created she then uses quilting to enhance her work.

She showed us a number of pieces of work that she has made over the last few years and the detail of the quilting is beautiful and definitely needs closer examination.  At the end of the talk she encouraged us to look her work and was quite happy to let us touch and examine it.

Some photos of her work are shown below.

October Speaker

Our speaker for October is Pascale Michalski and her talk is entitled "Moral Fibre"  

Pascale Michalski is 38 years old, and while she’s originally from Luxembourg, she has lived in London/United Kingdom for 19 years now. Since the start of her quilting journey five years ago, she has created many award-winning art quilts, exhibited across Europe and the Middle East, and contributed to many quilt festivals. Her quilt Meet Me Today has been awarded Excellence in Machine Quilting at the Festival of Quilts 2021 in Birmingham, UK. By getting involved in events, she doesn’t just support her quilting community; she also supports the craft she loves so much. 

Examples of her work

September Meeeting

 Janet and Kathy from Traverse brought some interesting, unusual and colourful work along to the September meeting.  

Traverse is a well established group of mixed media textile artists who create and display their work at a professional exhibition level.  

They pieces displayed were made using a variety of techniques and materials, including stitch, felting, yarns, metallic elements to name but a few. 

They encouraged members to take a closer look at the work and many ladies did so. 

We hope to book the group for a future workshop as there seems to be sufficient interest. 

Gina Cooke

Examples of their work

September Speakers

Our speakers in September are Janet and Kate from Traverse and the title of their talk is "Looking Sideways".

Traverse is a well established group of mixed media artists.   They are set up to create work, often using diverse themes as a starting point, with a view to seeking out opportunities to exhibit at a professional and exhibition level.  They use a variety of techniques including stitch, felting, painting, yarns, metallic elements etc and have exhibited at the NEC and the Big Textile Show, as well as locally.  All the members of the group use some form of textiles in their work.

July Meeting

Our July speaker, Suzie Duncan, began her story tracing her career, working on micro biology. She described her progress through association with several well known fabric developers and designers.  As a child, like so many of us, she had sewn and she gradually became more involved with textiles.

Suzie is currently known as a presenter on Sewing Street.  She brought many work samples but says she doesn't really own many actual quilts.  She is really keen on bags and matching accessories and makes items to showcase new fabric ranges.  Suzie ended with a really hard quiz but in the end we all had a reward.  Thank you.

Kathy Francis

July Speaker

 

Our July Speaker is Suzie Duncan.  Suzie is a trainer, designer and demonstrator of sewing products within the UK and Europe.  She is a designer of fabric kits working freelance within the sewing craft industries.  She is also known for her appearances on Sewing Street.

June Meeting

 Our June meeting brought us a beautiful sunny evening, so welcome after many cool grey days.  

Our speaker Dawn Cameron Dick had an equally sunny disposition.

Dawn is a textile artist and teacher of many years experience.  It was the progression of these years that led to the title "One Woman Show".

We saw her very first quilt, in fact she had forgotten it until her son produced it for "renovation" for his own child having kept it since his own childhood.

We saw her quilts in chronological  order and she explained her ideas and methods which led to the development of her own style.

We saw her signature technique of invisible machine applique and those who joined her the next day for her workshop also had a chance to use reverse hand applique.

Dawn was an excellent speaker with great humour.  Interestingly although she sews commissions her love is of teaching rather than being competitive.

One could not fail to be impressed with her volume of quilting even on large quilts, many of them being hand quilted.

June Speaker

Our speaker for June is Dawn Cameron Dick with her talk entitled "One Woman Show".

Dawn has over 40 years experience working in the textiles industry and is best known for her signature technique ‘Invisible Machine Appliqué’. She teaches all over the world including the Festival of Quilts, Houston Quilt Festival & QuiltEuro. Dawn has written four books, presented on a TV sales channel, filmed classes for Just Hands on TV and filmed her own DVDs.

May Meeting

 Textile artist, Sally Hutson visited us on 3rd May.

We were treated to a lively explanation of how  here interest in fabrics, sewing and creating grew.  She told us of the process of developing each idea she had brought and the pieces were all passed round for us to examine closely.  In addition several large "kimono" style garments were displayed and she ware an attractive patchwork jacket herself.

Each of her creations are unique and often include vintage fabrics and those with special memories.  Much of her work is commissions and she had had success at quilt shows in this country and abroad.  

Sally explained her use of paint and stitching on her pieces and was generous with her tips and ideas.

Kathy Francis

Examples of her work 

May Speaker - Stitchywoowoo

Our speaker for the May Meeting is Sally Hutson of Stitchywoowoo.  Her talk is entitled "How did I Get Here".

Sally Hutson is a textile artist who uses a variety of techniques to produce one off textiles.

Embroiderer, Quilter and Doll Maker, her range of work is exciting and innovative. She has a passion for antique and vintage textiles and uses many old pieces in her work. She also combines commercial printed fabrics with many of her hand dyed fabrics. Every work is a unique one off piece of art.

Sally has an MA in Textiles and Anthropology. She has lectured full time in the History of Textiles and Applied Textiles. As a Textile Historian Sally believes old and worn cloth have memory held within the weave and threads. She stitches these fading memories into a beautiful rich narrative of past times and lives.

Sally runs workshops and gives talks to groups. 

 

April Meeting

 "Lock Down and Love it" seems an unlikely title for our April meeting, in view of our personal memories of that time. 

However, it was chosen by our speaker: textile artist Moira Neal for her second visit to Cosby Quilters.  Her positive attitude to her own experiences was refreshing as well as a little reminder of what many of us did at that time.

The positive slant covered teaching her 17 year old grand-daughter to drive on  relatively quiet roads while delivering the items she had produced for the NHS and care homes.  Even her array of colourful and often numerous face masks led to an artistic arrangement, not to mention her personal ones hung on a useful rack made from recycled materials.

She was also energetic and imaginative in the kitchen producing a variety of preserves from surplus fruits.

Moira brought her colourful and attractive cards and led a successful workshop earlier in the day as well as large quilts.

Her entertaining style gave us a very enjoyable evening and a positive feast for the eyes.

Kathy Francis

April Meeting 5th April 2023 7.00pm

 

The April speaker is Moira Neal and her talk is entitled "Lock Down and Love It".

Moira Neal is a free machine artist and she loves to up cycle old cotton sheets to use in her work.  She enjoys dyeing, printing, stamping, marbling and appliqueing them to create her own unique cloth.  She no longer makes large bed quilts and now concentrates on making quirky work which she can use for her range of greetings cards. 

She has had mobility problems and as a consequence wrote her first book called 'Colourful Canvas Landscapes.  

Her workshop is at Ashby Magna Village Hall on Wednesday 5th April and is entitled "Pick and Mix Tuscan Landscape".

Practical Afternoon

Our March meeting is a practical afternoon.  Following requests in the survey we will be demonstrating some techniques.

Pam Morris will be demonstrating "Flip and Sew".

Sue Skelton sewing a continuous border with mitred corners and finishing.

Pat Screaton and Jo Turner will demonstrate the perfect circle technique.

Gina Cooke will be demonstrating water soluble backing.

They will be at individual tables so that you can move round to view all the techniques or as many as you are interested in.

 

The AGM was quickly dealt with at our February meeting and was followed by our speaker Linda Hill, a member of our quilting group. 

Linda gave us a potted history of her life.  She grew up in Yorkshire and at eighteen enrolled at Leicester School of Art and Design.  In Leicester she met her husband and has lived in Leicester since then, other than two short spells living abroad.  Her occupation was in textile art and design.

After she retired a friend, whose mother had died, and knew that she sewed asked her to finish a tumbling block quilt that her mother had half completed.  Her previous experience of sewing was making clothes.

In 2018 a friend, who lives in Australia, contacted her with a proposal to go on a textile and sewing tour of Japan.  This included four workshops for different Japanese techniques, sashiko embroidery, cogin embroidery, shibori dyeing and boro embroidery.  She showed us her workshop pieces and also various examples of these techniques either bought or given to her during the trip.  She also showed us a video of photos that had been taken during the trip.  When she returned she decided that she would make a quilt using sashiko embroidery samples that she had gathered during the trip.  This was displayed on the quilt stand at the back of the stage.  When she had finished that quilt, she started another quilt using boro techniques.  She prefers the boro techniques as they are less precise than sashiko which better suits her style of working.  She then showed us the quilt, which is a work in progress.

Sashiko Quilt

Boro Quilt