I really enjoyed working with Lizzie, she said “the workshop was great for mindfulness and bringing her into a state of calmness”.
I gave Lizzie a private workshop experience before the actual workshop of Samines Red as she was stuck in doors with Covid, she choose to rest and heal herself before being fit enough to come back into the world again. During the workshop Lizzie decided to sew all her petals together to make one large corsage flower and I think it has worked out well.
It was great to see her on zoom, I love zoom as it has opened up the world for people to connect who are from different countries. The experience of the online workshops are quite different to that of an actual in person workshop and I love the online experience as I get to meet new people from across the world, who would not have the opportunity to attend a live workshop, especially during this time as we are navigating out of the pandemic into a new world where we have to live with Covid and the waves that has and will produce in the future.
I have been approached to be part of a auction on Facebook, so while recovering from my broken wrist I was thinking it is best to use one of the existing flowers that I normally sell at Greenwich market.
The ivory flower has wire work as a central theme, I was working on developing ideas with wire to incorporate into the fascinators, this small flower is the only one of its kind in the smaller flower range.
You can wear this ivory flower as a lapel pin to secure your scarf or onto your jacket as a broach or as a hair flower on the side.
This was Saturday night’s bubble, watching Downton Abbey, we are in series two and watched episode 6, I seem to be getting confused where we are as it has taken us a long time to watch series 1 and 2, we started watching in January and have recently started meeting fortnightly instead of weekly. I am so thankful for my bubble in meeting up, they have been a life saver for me and has been a highlight to the end of my week going into somebody’s else’s home or they coming to me.
This is my living room and over the season of Lockdown the room has turned into my studio, which means I had to do a major revamp of the rooms layout with shifting furniture and getting rid of pieces I no longer needed and that I had grown out of. I think sometimes we and I can hold onto things that bring us comfort, but we have stretched out of and need to be giving it away, so we can be growing into the new space and new space is here within me through teaching online workshops. Thankfully I was wise to keep old files of my teaching notes and how to create a course outline, scheme of work for a ten week course and lesson plans, I have been using these templates to build my own for delivering the workshops. I recently taught with Blackheath Embroiderer’s how to make a fascinator, on the lesson plan I put in demonstrate and student watches and then has ago, but I realised, (a light bulb moment!) that this would not be the case, as my attendees will be working alongside me in creating their fascinator; because it is online, all they need to do now is have the computer in front of them and have a clear sight of what I am doing while stitching along.
My new workshop I have been working on and ready to be delivered is how to recycle your denim jeans into a Boro sewing roll, I am quite excited by this piece that I have created. A friend gave me his old jeans that were going to the charity shop, that are good quality and has no holes within the trouser legs, I have cut one pair up and used one side of the leg and folded to make insert pockets to put your sewing equipment in, like scissors and pins or if you were into stationary one could put their smaller pencils and eraser’s in. https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/upcycle-your-denim-jeans-into-a-boro-sewing-roll-tickets-153201962193?aff=ebdssbonlinesearch
Saturday 24th May saw me leading the above workshop, when I was composing my lesson plan, I had on there teacher demonstrates and students watch demonstration, and then work on making the fascinator, then I realised the participants will be making the fascinator along with me. Now that I am teaching online a whole new concept of guiding participants through the stages of making a project is quite different from in person teaching.
As I was demonstrating, these lovely ladies followed the stages of making their own Blackheath Ladies Fascinator. I was asked by Rebecca Cole-Coker who is the current chair of Blackheath Embroiderer’s, we used to be Blackheath Embroiderer’s Guild, but the Guild decided to cut loose the branches and slim down to hold the collection centrally and many branches have either closed or gone online during Covid to fight in keeping going.
A lot of reflection has gone into making this fascinator for the group, I realised I needed to make it as simple as possible, it turned out great, but there were a lot of stages in thinking, designing and creating it. I generated a PowerPoint, I had 15 slides in the presentation thinking that was enough and when I asked for feedback, (which was very constructive) I realised I needed to create more slides and photograph each stage of the process, I did work on the PowerPoint and I have now added a further 10 slides so it comes to 25 slides in total. I used black tulle as the main point of the head piece as black stands for Blackheath and I knew that would stand out great, I worked with a new piece of material which was tulle and it turned out to be quite fiddly and the feedback given was this workshop would not be the best for a beginner to start off with, especially if you haven’t worked with fabrics before, it could be quite frustrating and likely for the student to give up at the first hurdle. As this group has been meeting over years, we have tutors within the group sharing their expertise with us and another tutor had taught a workshop on how to make a bead mandela which was used as the central piece for their fascinator, not everyone used theirs and so the majority used the bead that was given.
This has been a great learning curve for me in creating and delivering workshops and I know this will be an adventure for me working with people online encouraging them in making projects they can complete and have a great sense of achievement knowing they have made it themselves.
The Star Fascinator was created as the client had a wedding to attend and fitted in with the dress that was made for the occasion. Below is the link to Samines shop of other fascinators that can be purchased.
