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I jotted this title in my diary last week when I was feeling fed up. Maybe I should give it a positive twist and call it, ‘not succeeding is an option’, but failure is very much what I thought and felt at that moment, so let’s go with that. Things I think (in no particular order): 1. This is rubbish – the weaving is too tight, too wonky, too difficult to ‘read’, too simple, too messy… 2. The plan I had in my head and the plan I drew don’t match each other – and nei

For most of my life I have pursued creative activities in solitude and often in silence. Not a heavy oppressive type of solitude and silence but rather the sort that makes you feel untethered, ready to float away on any passing flight of fancy. I suppose this made sense when my main creative outlets were writing of one sort of another. It is possible, but not easy, to write well on a crowded and noisy train. To write well whilst actively having an interesting conversation

I knew exactly what I wanted to say in this blog but have struggled for about five minutes to frame it with a sensible title. I still don’t think I’ve got it right, but it will do unless I think of something snappy and amazing before I get to the end of this piece. So, what do I want to say? Let’s set the scene. It’s another hot summers day – too hot for me to sit comfortably in the studio even with the fan on. There is a patch of shade in the garden and a nice breeze. I

It’s been a week of landscapes and of contrasts. Proper landscapes with bleak Lancashire moorland, pasture, shallow stony streams and solid stone-built farms and outbuildings. As you might imagine the countryside of Lancashire if you were pondering it. Or maybe not – in the valleys and occasionally straggling up the hillsides are the industrial towns; Accrington, Blackburn, Burnley, Nelson. And the over-grown townlets of places like Clayton-le-Moors or Great Harwood. And

I can’t really explain how to do it – there are lots of books out there which can help with that. I was lucky enough to be taught in real life, on an adult education course no less (rare as hen’s teeth) and I think it made a real impact on how I felt. I was learning the rules (there are a lot in tapestry weaving – but as I have discovered, most of them can be bent or broken. If you make something and it doesn’t fall apart instantly then you are winning). But I was also le

As part of my OCA course I undertook a virtual ‘drift’, led by maps. My first thought was to take one of the areas in Lancashire that I want to explore but don’t know well. I considered Bury and wondered if it would be interesting to “walk” the area in the shape of a letter; maybe even “B” for Bury. I had a desultory play around, but it just wasn’t grabbing me. I then decided that Google maps felt too constrained – their style of mapping, which we use every day, is about d