Thanks for joining me on my 2 weekly ramble. It’s lovely to have you here and I hope you have a quick 5 minutes to catch up.

From the Garage - painting

Born into an Audience

In Botticelli's painting, The Birth of Venus, (the Roman goddess of love and beauty) Venus emerges from the sea on a shell, already a complete image of beauty. The wind blows her towards the shore, wind god Zephyrus blows at her- shown by lines radiating from his mouth. He is in the air, and carries a young female, who is also blowing, but less forcefully. Both have wings. The figure waiting on land holds out a cloak to cover her. Venus is born and immediately becomes an object of contemplation. Her body is not painted as ordinary flesh. Botticelli stretches and elongates part of her, idealising her, making her less like a real woman and more like an idea of beauty itself.

There is something almost absurd about the original scene when you reduce it to its simplest terms: a naked goddess arrives on a shell and someone immediately rushes over with a covering. In my painting, I wanted to keep some of that strange theatricality, while replacing the Renaissance ideal of beauty with the much more complicated contemporary experience of being an image. It’s not finished of course and will have eyes and a digital stream instead of a puff of breath. Phones will litter the shore and cctv will replace trees.

And, you know me, because it’s important, the puff of breath will be an actual digital steam for “SHE IS BORN FROM WHAT WE MADE”. Here is the binary:

01010011 01001000 01000101 00100000 01001001 01010011 00100000 01000010 01001111 01010010 01001110 00100000 01000110 01010010 01001111 01001101 00100000 01010111 01001000 01000001 01010100 00100000 01010111 01000101 00100000 01001101 01000001 01000100 01000101

From the Garage - Textiles and sketchbooks

Do you keep a sketchbook? Or maybe work quietly in a journal of some kind? I just wanted to mention that a sketchbook can have a life of its own and you never quite know where it might end up.

This particular notebook has just found a new home into my local museum, as part of the record of a rather improbable adventure by myself and 2 other friends as guerrilla gardeners over a period of 16 years. We were given the QAVS. Great except that I wish to goodness I’d known this might happen so I could have put more effort into it!!

Tales from the Curator

(After staring rather too closely at the faces in some of my recent portraits, I realised that with precious little self-control, they had taken it upon themselves to live together in a fictitious village, free to be as daft as they liked).

The Community Hall Noticeboard

There has been some excitement at the Community Hall. Mrs Nugget, having decided that the village was suffering from a “serious lack of communication,” installed a noticeboard beside the tea urn.

For the first few days everything went remarkably well. There was a Pilates notice, a cake sale, and a reminder about the badger. Then someone pinned up a note saying:

WHO MOVED THE PIANO?

Mrs Nugget was extremely concerned by this. The piano, she explained, had not been moved. It had been in exactly the same place for years. Mr Trotter was called in to investigate. He measured the piano. He measured the doorway. He measured the piano again. Eventually he announced that, according to his calculations, the piano could never have got into the hall in the first place.

This caused some discussion.

Jimmy Nobbs, who had dropped in with a tray of curry, carrying his signature naan breads in a trolley behind him, suggested that perhaps it had been there before the hall, which wasn’t terribly helpful.

The following morning Mrs Nugget discovered three further notices:

HAS ANYONE SEEN A GREEN WELLY?

WHO OWNS THE DUCKS?

and, rather ominously,

STOP MOVING THE PIANO.

Mrs Nugget removed all three. The noticeboard has now been taken down, and now there is just one piece of paper left on the wall.

It says:

FOR ALL COMMUNITY ENQUIRIES, PLEASE ASK MRS NUGGET.

Mrs Nugget is not speaking to anyone.

And finally, Out and About

There’s a cracking exhibition on at Compton Verney at the moment.

Marx is best known as the designer of woven London Underground (Tube) seat moquette fabric and as an illustrator of children’s books. However, she was also a prolific producer of hand block-printed textiles (ca.1925–1940) and later designs for fabrics woven for the public (ca.1936–1947).

“Meet the Craftswomen Who Shaped British Design”

While works of Marx’s contemporaries at the Royal College of Art, St Ives School and Bloomsbury Group, such as Eric Ravilious, Paul Nash, Bernard Leach, Michael Cardew and Roger Fry, are well known, Marx’s close community of craftswomen and designers, including Ethel Mairet, Phyllis Barron, Dorothy Larcher, Katherine Pleydell-Bouverie and Norah Braden have sometimes been sidelined. Their approaches to handmade pattern and texture show how design acted as forms of personal, national and imperial expression, as well as embodying a series of double meanings reflecting queer identifications, intimacy and kinship.

Well, if that doesn’t make you want to break out the lino cutting equipment I’m not sure what will!

And that’s probably enough from the garage for now. The paintings are unfinished, the sketchbooks are multiplying, and the village remains under loose supervision. I have no idea what I’ll be writing about next, which is probably just as well. Experience suggests that the moment I start looking for an idea, something completely unrelated will turn up. Thank you for reading, and please don’t ask Mrs Nugget about the piano.

Out and About in the North

Lyme Park (top left) is, of course, Mr Darcy’s Pemberley in the famous Pride and Prejudice; the very house where Darcy stands at the entrance, watching Elizabeth, her aunt and uncle depart for the evening with that unmistakable expression of a man who has finally realised that he is hopelessly in love. Naturally, I felt it would be rather rude to visit such a place without dressing appropriately, so my granddaughter and I took advantage of Lyme Park’s wonderfully free Regency dressing-up service and spent the afternoon behaving as though the twentieth century had never happened. We wandered around the house and grounds in full costume, making tiny curtsies, dipping our heads to complete strangers and generally looking as though we had urgent business with the Prince Regent.

I was particularly pleased with my new social position as a matchmaking grandmother. Whenever anyone came near, I explained that I was looking for a suitable husband for my granddaughter and that, in accordance with the highest principles of the Bennet family, I would be accepting applications from gentlemen with at least £50,000 a year. I felt this was entirely reasonable. Mrs Bennet would have approved of my priorities, although she might have been slightly more frantic about it. My granddaughter, meanwhile, appeared to be taking the whole thing with admirable dignity, despite being repeatedly offered to the imaginary landed gentry of Cheshire by her grandmother. Frankly, I cannot think of a better way to spend an afternoon at Pemberley.

From Pemberley to China

I love the RHS at Bridgewater. (above)

After our afternoon at Pemberley, where we had been busy finding my granddaughter a husband, we moved on to another great British institution: the Royal Horticultural Society. It seemed a natural progression. If one cannot secure a wealthy husband, one can at least improve the garden.

RHS Bridgewater in Salford, is their newest venture, which opened in 2021 on the grounds of the former Worsley New Hall.

I have been visiting Bridgewater for the last couple of years and have shamelessly pinched ideas for my own garden- lots of raised beds, collections of pots and various combinations of plants which look effortlessly beautiful there and considerably less effortless when I attempt them at home. Still, one must persevere.

This time it was the Chinese garden that particularly caught my eye, especially the new Yangzhou Scholars’ Garden, being created as part of the Chinese Streamside Garden (pictured above, the completed bit and the bit under construction). It was beautiful even in its unfinished state, with its mixture of planting, water, rocks and elegant structures, and is intended as a place for contemplation and creativity. I found it extremely contemplative myself, although my contemplation mostly consisted of wondering whether I could squeeze another raised bed into my garden.

There is something wonderfully restorative about wandering slowly through a really good garden. You come home full of ideas, slightly obsessed with plants you don’t have room for, and with the firm conviction that your own garden would be perfect if only you had another two acres.

The Daily Negotiations of Mr Whiskers

I’m so glad some of you like Mr Whiskers as much as I do. In a few days’ time he will possibly arriving again for one of his extended holidays.

He will bring his usual luggage: a small selection of prescription medicines, an impressive collection of dietary requirements, and the absolute certainty that everyone else’s routines are about to become secondary to his own.

Caring for him is rather like working for a tiny, silver aristocrat whose physician has issued strict instructions but neglected to explain them to the patient. His heart medication is the daily highlight. Some people can apparently offer him a tablet and he simply accepts it.

This has never happened with me.

Instead, each morning begins another chapter in what has become an increasingly elaborate culinary research project.

The tablet disappeared into slices of cheese.

Rejected.

Tuna.

Rejected.

Pate.

Viewed with suspicion.

Small cubes of sausage showed promise until Mr Whiskers demonstrated an astonishing ability to consume every molecule of sausage whilst leaving the tablet sitting neatly on the floor beside the bowl, as though returning an unsuitable wine at a respectable restaurant.

Cats, it seems, possess equipment capable of identifying pharmaceuticals at concentrations measurable only by scientists and disappointed vets.

This led, inevitably, to considerable innovation from me. The sausages were diced into ever smaller pieces. Then came surgery. This is completely true and I wonder at myself as I tell you about it.

Armed with my bookbinding tweezers, I carefully inserted the tablet into each tiny cube, taking great care that no medicinal smell contaminated either the sausage or my fingers. The operation required concentration usually associated with repairing antique watches. However, Mr Whiskers remained unconvinced.

Naturally, matters escalated.

So, found myself standing in the kitchen, food processor assembled, pureeing sausages with a generous splash of olive oil in pursuit of a consistency that might finally outwit a unknown-year-old rescue cat with no teeth.

Had anyone walked in at that precise moment they might reasonably have concluded I was preparing pâté for an exceptionally discerning dinner guest, and I was, in a sense.

There was a time when I imagined my retirement would involve learning new artistic techniques, perhaps mastering a difficult stitch or experimenting with unusual papers. Instead, I find myself asking questions I never expected to ask.

Can sausage be smoother?

Would sardines improve adhesion?

How much olive oil is too much olive oil?

And, perhaps most importantly... where exactly does one go after pureeing sausages?

Mr Whiskers, of course, already knows the answer. He simply isn’t telling me.

And so, this has been my life this August: wandering through Pemberley in a bonnet, conducting discreet matrimonial negotiations on behalf of my granddaughter, stealing gardening ideas from the RHS, and manufacturing medicinal sausage pâté for a toothless cat who regards me with the cool suspicion. This month I appear to have worn Regency costumes, wondered about increasingly ambitious gardening projects and gained a specialist knowledge of sausage-based pharmacology. I can only assume things will become more interesting from here.

Thank you for reading and do come back soon to catch up on the village, the cat, the textiles, and life in general!

The Return of Mr Whiskers

Regular readers will be relieved (or perhaps alarmed) to hear that Mr Whiskers has returned for one of his occasional periods of creative oversight.

Nobody is entirely sure why.

He simply appears every so often like a mildly inconvenient comet, bringing with him a selection of prescription medications, several expensive dietary requirements and the unwavering belief that this is, in fact, his house.

For those new here, Mr Whiskers is a rescue cat from Qatar. He was found abandoned in a skip, looking like a forgotten duster that had experienced some very difficult life choices. Since then he has reinvented himself as a small, silver executive whose principal occupation is quietly interfering with other people’s plans.

His health remains, shall we say... ambitious. He has no teeth, a heart that requires careful negotiation, kidneys that operate largely on goodwill and optimism, and a digestive system that regards consistency as a personal attack.

Yet despite all this, he moves through life with the serene confidence of someone who has never once considered the possibility of being wrong.

Within ten minutes of arriving he had already reclaimed the studio, not by doing anything dramatic, he simply walked in, looked around very slowly, selected the exact piece of paper I needed most, and sat on it. For almost six hours, he blocked access to the sewing machine, shed approximately half a cat onto a finished piece and stared meaningfully at a pair of scissors for reasons known only to himself. I suspect he was buffering.

So there he is, a tiny, medically complicated dictator who believes creativity works best when conducted beneath a moderately fluffy paperweight.

From the garage - Textiles

From the Garage – Textiles

It’s been one of those fortnights where life has looked deceptively unproductive. In reality, I’ve been busy—but the sunshine has been far too persuasive to ignore. Every now and then it’s important to remember that sitting in the garden with a cup of tea is research too... probably.

Work on Residue has continued steadily, and I’m pleased to say that Chapter 3 is now complete. If you’d like to see the project so far, you can find it all here:

https://www.annabelrainbow.com/residue

Chapter 3 – On Being Stuck Fully Dressed in the Hammam

Dado rails, noticeboards, brickwork, arches and round windows have all made their way into the latest textile pieces. It’s been one of those chapters where seemingly ordinary architectural details have quietly become the stars of the show.

I’m now delighted to be starting Chapter 4 – Walking Along the River Leam and Through the Town in the Company of Dead Architects on My Way to the Pump Rooms.

So far the work appears to involve an unexpectedly large number of yellow begonias, thanks to the glorious hanging baskets outside the Pump Rooms. I make as many visual notes as I can while I’m wandering around, although I also rely on photographs a bit too. It’s not always convenient to stop the traffic in the middle of a pavement while I carry out a spot of sketching.

(”No, sorry, sir, you’ll have to walk in the road while I complete this very important study of Victorian utility ironwork.”)

Here are a few glimpses of the preparation for Chapter 4. I have a few more ideas to run through before I start on the textile part.

As always, thank you for reading and for following along with these slightly eccentric adventures. Whether you're here for the textiles, the architecture, the stories, or simply to check that Mr Whiskers hasn't staged a coup, I'm delighted to have your company. Here's hoping the next fortnight contains a little less sunshine-induced distraction... although I wouldn't put money on it. Until next time, take care, and don't leave important paperwork unattended if there's a cat in the vicinity.

I have been busy making a new website. For over a year I had simply pointed my domain name at a blog which was free, but I decided to give myself a treat - I do love a bit of playing about on a website, it’s fun! There is a form on the “studio page” that you can chat to me, should you wish - eg if you’re curious about how something was made, the materials or techniques involved, or the thinking behind a particular piece, ask away and I’ll get back to you. Or just to say hello.

I’ve also been painting a portrait this week as a kind of thank you for someone. It’s Owen’s mum, and I hope he likes it. I found baby pink and sky blue hard colours to balance with the bright yellow/white on the straw hat.

From The Garage - Textiles

Plans are coming along for the next piece in the Windrush series. I’m awaiting samples of cotton fabric from a well-known-mill-up-north. When they finally get here I’ll order the fabric and get started. The idea has congealed in my head somewhat and I have some lovely volunteers. The techniques I’ll need are still vague, but it will work itself out I’m sure.

A couple of lovely museums have also expressed interest in giving the Windrush Voices series a permanent home, but it’s a long process with meetings etc, so fingers crossed please!

Tales from the Curator

(After staring rather too closely at the faces in some of my recent portraits, I realised that with precious little self-control, they had taken it upon themselves to live together in a fictitious village, free to be as daft as they liked).

This week the village had a meeting and provided a “A Measured and Proportionate Response”to some magpies.

Residents are advised not to be alarmed by the armoured vehicle currently deployed near the Village Green.

The Parish Council wishes to stress that this is a measured and proportionate response to recent developments in the village’s magpie situation. (Under Item 14(c) of the Parish Constitution, military action may only be authorised in the event of invasion, insurrection, or "a feeling that something really really ought to be done.)"

Concerns first arose when Mr Humphrey Bellweather presented a paper entitled Corvid Numerology: Historical Lessons and Future Preparedness, in which he argued that the traditional rhyme should properly be viewed as “an escalating framework for avian risk assessment.”

While most members initially dismissed his findings, matters changed considerably after thirteen magpies were observed gathering in the trees near the village green.

Mr Bellweather (who is bird phobic after watching some Alfred Hitchcock film) immediately declared a Level 11B Incident. His brother is a former retired colonel of the 14th Foot and Mouth (reserves) assured the meeting that it was nothing to do with the French. The significance of the letter B remains disputed and Mr and Mrs Nugget believe it stands for “Bird.” Mr Percival Trotter insists it means “Brace Position” and Jimmy Nobbs maintains it refers to “Baked Magpies” (as in pie filling).

Conclusion

An emergency Parish Council meeting was called and it was decided that residents encountering a lone magpie should salute respectfully and enquire after the health of its wife.

Should thirteen or more magpies be present, residents are advised to proceed directly to the pub and await further instructions.

After much discussion responsibilities have since been allocated as follows:

Mother Marjoram Herbaceous Countermeasures and General Reassurance.

Jimmy Nobbs Public Relations and Emergency Curry Provision.

Miss Daffodil Pruett Monitoring Corvid Morale and Seasonal Intentions.

Mr Humphrey Bellweather Threat Modelling and Maps with Arrows on Them.

Mr Percival Trotter Equipment Procurement and Operational Enthusiasm.

Mr and Mrs Nugget Bird Counting, and while were at it, Badger Exemptions and Speculation.

Mr Planter Agricultural Liaison and Crop Security. He’s leaning on the gate having a think about tanks and pigeons.

Mrs Agnes Root Defensive Root Vegetable Planning. She thinks sprouts may be an acceptable alternative to armour piercing high explosives.

Ms Brunhilda Barfoote Strategic Oversight and occasionally asking everyone whether they have quite lost their minds.

Jason Barrier Operations and Cheese Sandwich Logistics.

The motion passed unanimously, with one abstention from Ms Barfoote, who described the entire affair as “deeply silly but unusually well organised.”

So that was the latest: websites tinkered with, portraits painted, fabric samples eagerly awaited, museum conversations quietly bubbling away, and an entire village mobilised against a potential magpie uprising. Art galleries supplied inspiration, the studio supplied chaos, and the Parish Council supplied tanks. As weeks go, I think that's a fairly respectable spread of activities.

Remember to stay hydrated people! I’m told we’re in for some summer weather.

As I seem to have discovered how to attach audio recordings to a newsletter, there is every possibility that future editions may become increasingly chatty. Whether that is a good thing remains to be seen. I hope they’re not too boring. The village, is as usual, at the bottom!

From the Garage - Textiles

Here’s a free pdf download of all the Windrush Voices collection along with explanations should anyone be interested! I’ve just finished the last Elder quilt and am now moving on to the next generation for a final piece. I was busy on Windrush Day calling for volunteers! It rather looks as if I may have some very interesting portraits to do!

The Windrush collection currently comprises eleven portrait quilts and two related works. Several pieces have entered private collections and one portrait was commissioned by the sitter’s family. The remaining works are being retained as a collection and are available for acquisition, long-term loan, touring exhibition or partnership opportunities.

Here’s the artist’s statement and the pdf is below if you’d like a copy.

Amended Windrush1

20.6MB ∙ PDF file

Download

Download

Windrush Voices “Legacy”

The piece will explore themes of inheritance, identity, belonging, resilience, achievement and cultural continuity. My intention is not to create a historical record in the same way as the original quilts, but to create a collective portrait that speaks about what emerged from the sacrifices, struggles and aspirations of the Windrush generation.

Festival of Quilts - Poisonous Plant

Also, here’s a little explanation of the quilt, Poisonous Plant, which you can see at Festival of Quilts on the Guild stand this summer. There will also be links to this sound explanation on the stand with a QRcode etc.

What I forgot to put on the recording is that whilst it’s obvious poisonous plants form quite a feature on the quilt, and even the whispering in the earhole is a poisonous plant, the reason I used the same model twice is that sometimes the “plant” can what we tell ourselves.

Tales from the Curator

(After staring rather too closely at the faces in some of my recent portraits, I realised that with precious little self-control, they had taken it upon themselves to live together in a fictitious village, free to be as daft as they liked).

The Summer Solstice was celebrated in the usual village fashion: with considerable planning, several misunderstandings, and a disagreement about where exactly the sun rises.

Mr Humphrey Bellweather organised proceedings, having produced a twenty-three-page booklet entitled The Ancient Solar Traditions of Lower Puddlington and Adjacent Parishes. Unfortunately, most of his research appears to have come from a podcast and a man he met once in a garden centre.

The Reverend Pottle offered a blessing, though it was interrupted when Sharon pointed out that Mr Percival Trotter had arrived wearing a ceremonial robe that turned out to be an old tablecloth.

Several residents gathered on the village green at dawn to witness the sunrise. They were still waiting when Mrs Nugget gently informed them they were all facing west.

By mid-morning everyone repaired to Jimmy’s pub, where the true spirit of the solstice emerged: three pints, a packet of pork scratchings, and forty-five minutes spent solving international affairs with complete certainty and absolutely no evidence. By closing time the Middle East had been stabilised, the economy rebuilt, and Mr Bellweather had developed a proposal involving windmills, turnips and local government that nobody could later explain.

Meanwhile Father’s Day passed peacefully. Jimmy Nobbs received a card from his daughter containing the words “Don’t do anything silly.” He spent the afternoon attempting to teach a scarecrow how to play cribbage and considers the instruction fully observed.

The village also extends its congratulations to Mr and Mrs Nugget, who celebrated fifty-two years of marriage this month. Asked for the secret of their success, Mrs Nugget replied, “Separate sheds.” Mr Nugget agreed immediately, from a distance of approximately fifty yards.

This month's collection of quilts, stories, voices and village happenings all seem to share something in common: the things we pass on. Sometimes they are histories, sometimes they are warnings, sometimes they are memories, and occasionally they are entirely unsupported opinions formed over a pint in Jimmy's pub. Either way, thank you for reading, listening and accompanying me on the journey.

It’s officially summer here in the UK, which means I’m currently sitting in the garden wearing three layers, occasionally moving my chair to avoid whichever direction the rain is coming from. We remain optimistic. We always remain optimistic. The sun must turn up eventually.

From the Garage - Textiles

Residue (textile notebook)

Chapter 2 finished and Chapter 3 begun. I’m having enormous fun with this project, simply letting go and doing whatever takes my fancy. I haven’t worked like that for what feels like ages.

I’m using a grid system, a method that goes back as far as the ancient Egyptians, and one that M.C. Escher famously used with square and hexagonal grids to map and rotate his interlocking motifs. It’s proving a great way to work. The shapes keep me on track and stop me wandering off into one of my frequent artistic cul-de-sacs.

Chapter 2 - Sitting in the Jephson Gardens daydreaming about life.

My first attempt at an etching. This is the Jephson Monument in the Jephson Gardens, printed on cartridge paper using Akua ink. Unfortunately, I forgot that scratching and gouging needs to be done in reverse, so the final image came out back to front. Much like myself on most days.

Windows, Alliums and Trees

A combination of a few sketches done in the park; some allium flowers that somehow evolved into either swirling lollipops or wind turbines, depending on your perspective. I enjoyed allowing things to become a bit abstract and seeing where they wanted to go, and windows, paths but mostly trees.

(above) The starting points. Then 2 smaller pieces showing a pathway through the trees and some windows overlooking the park and trees.

The alliums outside the Glasshouse Studio became the starting point for these pieces. One of the joys of working this way is giving yourself permission to stop asking sensible questions and just go with instinct. Lots of things poured onto these, especially the 2nd one, which has thick oil pastel which I’ve ironed into the cloth.

Chapter 3 - not sure of title yet, something like: On Being Stuck fully dressed in the Hammam

“A hammam (often called a Turkish bath) is a traditional steam bath and public bathing ritual originating from the Islamic world. Rooted in Roman and Asian bathing customs, it combines deep exfoliation, cleansing, and relaxation in a heated, humid environment.”

You’ll be relieved to know I kept my clothes firmly on however, and will share more of this chapter with you in the next newsletter but here’s some prep.

The hammam was restored as part of the recent Pump Rooms development. They were opened in 1814, and were the grandest of Leamington’s spa buildings remaining in operation providing swimming and water treatments until the 1990s, when they were converted into a space for everyone including the gallery and library.

This is my portable drawing kit. Just about covers everything except rubbing out which I’ve forbidden myself to do. I think it’s dead neat and the little paint box opens out to show the holes for water colours that you squirt the paint into, and a palette. The pen holds the water.

(below) Making papers for collage. I raided the bins for scraps - labels, corners of notebooks, old tickets, receipts, old gelli prints - anything was fair game. After that I painted, stencilled, scribbled and layered shapes I’d discovered in the hammam using acrylics, Posca pens, drawing pens, oil pastels and pencil.

There was no plan whatsoever. I simply kept going until a switch somewhere in my brain quietly clicked itself off and informed me that enough was enough. I am obviously a maximalist sort of person. (below) The image shows the drawings of the Hammam and then the collage made from the papers.

Tales from the Curator

(After staring rather too closely at the faces in some of my recent portraits, I realised that with precious little self-control, they had taken it upon themselves to live together in a fictitious village, free to be as daft as they liked).

Residents may have noticed an unusual stillness in the village this week.

Following Mr Humphrey Bellweather’s educational excursion to Leamington Spa, the village is currently unoccupied.

Mrs Nugget locked the hall and accidentally took the key with her.

The Reverend Pottle boarded the minibus under the impression that Leamington was near Jerusalem.

Sharon joined for the snacks.

Mr Percival Trotter came only because he believed there would be a functioning steam engine.

The Women’s Institute came to ensure Mr Bellweather’s historical claims were properly sourced.

Even Miss Daffodil Pruett’s seventeen cats appear to have gone.

The only remaining inhabitant is Jimmy Nobbs, who declined to attend on the grounds that “spa water is just rain with ideas above its station.”

He has since reported feeling lonely and has been observed talking to a scarecrow.

Normal village activity is expected to resume once the minibus returns, assuming Mr Bellweather’s colour-coded itinerary allows sufficient time for finding the car park and no one has to rush to the toilet.

As always, thank you for reading. These newsletters are becoming rather like the work itself: a collection of paths, windows, odd discoveries and occasional wrong turnings. I never quite know where they'll end up when I begin them, which is probably why I enjoy making them so much. Until next time, take care of yourselves and keep noticing the interesting things hiding in plain sight.

Here’s the cover to the book “Residue”. This is building slowly over time as the mood takes me. I’ve just started Chapter 2 - “Sitting on a bench in the Jephson Gardens daydreaming about life”

Quilts - Poisonous Plant

I was quite surprised to see one of my quilts in The Quilter magazine this month. This quilt was acquired by The Guild for it’s collection last year. The Poisonous Plant title not only refers to the plants around the figures but also the “planted” whisper in the ear.

You can see this quilt at The Festival Of Quilts, 30th July to 2nd August at the NEC, Birmingham.

Quote: “Annabel Rainbow’s stunning Poisonous Plant (2016) uses symbolic imagery and meticulously stitched words to highlight the dangerous nature of gossip and the vicious damage of words and speculation”.

I wondered if you’d like to see how the quilt was built. Very slowly as each petal was individually applied!

Windrush

The next generation - the thinking behind the next quilt

Here’s an extract from an open letter sent in the hope of recruiting some volunteers for the next and final stage of the Windrush quilts.

“My current idea is to create a final quilt, or perhaps a small number of quilts, (but I’m aiming for large, about 4 metres long) representing people who were born here to Windrush parents. In many ways, I see this as the next chapter of the story. The original Windrush generation made the journey and built new lives; their children grew up in the legacy of that journey and helped shape the communities we know today.

I am not trying to tell the Windrush story again, nor to speak on behalf of anyone. Rather, I am interested in recognising the generation whose lives were shaped by their parents’ courage, determination and experiences. I would love to hear people’s own reflections, memories and perspectives, and to understand how they feel their family history has influenced their lives.

Visually, I imagine bright, colourful portraits against a white background, each one focusing on the individuality, humanity and presence of the person portrayed. Unlike the quilts of the Windrush elders, where words and memories formed an important part of the visual language, I do not feel that a written story is necessarily needed here. My hope would be to express something of each person’s experience through colour, gesture, clothing and presence rather than through visible text. For example: someone’s favourite jacket, a church hat, a football shirt, a bright dress.Jewellery inherited from a parent.The colours they feel happiest wearing.

I am particularly interested in how people choose to present themselves. The clothes someone wears, the colours they are drawn to, the way they stand or sit, and the objects they choose to include can all tell us something about who they are and how they feel about their lives, their families and their place in the world. I would hope the portraits would reflect not only family history, but also individuality, confidence, joy, resilience and belonging”.

I currently have 4 volunteers, 1 of whom would like to wear Kente cloth, which is beyond perfect. She has a scrap of left over material which I can look at or maybe even use. I also have lots of small pieces of this African cloth given to me by a museum.

(Kente cloth is a highly revered, hand-woven textile made of interwoven cloth strips (traditionally silk and cotton) native to the Akan and Ewe peoples of Ghana and Ivory Coast. Known for its vibrant, geometric patterns and rich colours, it originally served as royal regalia. Today, it is worn worldwide as a celebrated symbol of African heritage).

Here’s Lucille, the last in the Elders series before she goes into storage.

Tales from the Curator

(After staring rather too closely at the faces in some of my recent portraits, I realised that with precious little self-control, they had taken it upon themselves to live together in a fictitious village, free to be as daft as they liked).

Mr and Mrs Nugget own the Community Hall (behind the church) and operate primarily from the back room. Mrs Nugget keeps everything running despite occasionally enjoying a large sherry “for medicinal purposes”, which can sometimes affect administrative efficiency. She identifies as retired, old, female and absolutely never falls asleep during Pilates.

Mr Nugget’s official duties are less clearly defined. He regards himself as Head of Strategic Planning, although others suggest his principal contribution is standing outside the hall with his hands behind his back, offering observations on weather patterns and parking arrangements. He is also the self-appointed custodian of village history, much of which appears to have been invented by Mr Nugget.

The Community Hall is nestled deep in the wild and lonely reaches of Somerset. Nothing bad has ever happened there, tea and cake are permanently available, and any rumours to the contrary are entirely unfounded. The annual Produce Show remains fiercely competitive, several residents are still not speaking following the 2018 Victoria Sponge judging controversy, and nobody has satisfactorily explained the disappearance of the Parish Duck Trophy.

Mr and Mrs Nugget live on the Green. Their front garden contains a collection of ornamental gnomes (RHS approved) arranged according to a system understood only by Mr Nugget and, possibly, the gnomes themselves.

Mr Nugget’s family crest. We don’t discuss Great Grandmama. Certain matters are best left in the past, particularly those involving the church raffle, that travelling accordion player (again), and the unfortunate incident with the vicar’s prize dahlias.

As ever, the garage continues to produce an unlikely mixture of serious quilts, experimental books, half-formed ideas and entirely unnecessary village gossip. Next month there may be progress on Residue, more Windrush portraits, and possibly further investigations into the Nugget family archives. Early findings suggest that Great Grandmama Nugget was responsible for at least three long-standing feuds, one unexplained disappearance of a Victoria sponge, and an incident involving the church flower rota that is still spoken of in hushed tones. Thank you for reading.

An extra newsletter for May as I’m having a productive moment or two!

So, the Windrush series has finally reached its conclusion, the Leamington Textile Sketchbook continues to grow one paving slab at a time, and somewhere amongst the scraps, stitching and portrait studies, Mrs Mavis “Mave” Pickering has marched into existence carrying pickled onions and unsolicited commentary about everybody’s business.

From the Garage - Textiles

The Windrush Series ends. There are 13 quilts in total, including the 2 non-specific.

The 2 quilts below were inspired by Benjamin Zephaniah words, who was being interviewed on TV at various times. Whilst not being Windrush portraits in quite the same way, they come from the same place and feature faces and words about difference and being tolerant.

Also:

Gone back to using shirts, so I can make this as another in the Costume series.

And:

THE LEAMINGTON TEXTILE SKETCHBOOK

Walk one: 250 yards up the Parade.

Finished piece for Chapter One; roughly the size of a bit of mountboard and assembled almost entirely from my increasingly judgemental stash of bondawebbed scraps, dyed cloth and printed leftovers.

I’ve applied very little soul-searching to this one, which was honestly rather refreshing. No grand artistic crisis, no tortured symbolism, just a cheerful abstract muddle made by switching my brain off and following whatever seemed like a good idea at the time. Amazingly, I quite like it!

Collage of images from Chapter one showing process. They will be part of the book too.

Chapters 2 and 3 will be about our local hammam and the Jephson Gardens.

And for village fans, we have a new member of the Parish Council. All bio’s under The Parish Council in website sidebar.

Tales from the Curator

(After staring rather too closely at the faces in some of my recent portraits, I realised that with precious little self-control, they had taken it upon themselves to live together in a fictitious village, free to be as daft as they liked).

Mrs Mavis “Mave” Pickering was a Lancashire shrimp seller who accidentally wandered into the village after her second husband died. She has a face that has survived the weather, grief, cheap cider, childbirth, gossip and at least one incident involving a goose. She’s a woman who knows where the bodies are buried because she helped bury one of them.

The village isn’t sure how old Mave is because she changes the subject whenever she’s asked directly saying “Old enough to know better and still young enough not to care”.

Her eyes are kind but evaluating and she notices everything. Her mouth has mischief in it rather than gentleness, and the lack of teeth makes her even more expressive. There is one tooth however which she keeps for spearing the pickled onions that she keeps wrapped in newspaper in her bag. It’s alarmingly efficient!

She claims to have been married three times, once for love, once for necessity, and once because “winter were long and he had decent boots.” One husband drowned. One disappeared with a travelling accordion player. (We think it’s the same accordian that’s in the Community Hall next to the trainer that’s still waiting to be claimed) The third “went peculiar after the chutney incident.” Nobody ever asked about the chutney incident twice, it seemed indelicate. She has eight children scattered across the West Country and enough grandchildren to make a classroom full.

Children adore her because she speaks to them honestly. Dogs follow her through the lanes in the village. Men flirt with her against their better judgement. She calls everyone “my duck” and sings rude mill songs under her breath. She also cheats at cards, smells faintly of peppermint, woodsmoke and damp wool.

Although she looks kind, her tongue is fully armed. She said of Jimmy’s new girlfriend (given to cosmetic improvements): “She’s got an arse like a shelf. How on earth does she sit down? Must be like sitting on a space hopper. Somewhere for Jimmy to rest his beer, I suppose.”

She believes that if the Lord had not intended people to be discussed, he would not have made them so peculiar.

She’s also a witch but not a dramatic one and merely knows which herb will settle a nightmare, how to stop bleeding with cobwebs and pressure, predicts rain from the ache in her knee, and talks to foxes as if they were friends. She doesn’t admit to magic, and says it’s just more about paying attention to people.

Whilst Mother Marjoram is respected, it would be fair to say that Mavis is trusted. She doesn’t use ritual but instinct. Both of them are slightly theatrical and together they are formidable. Mave and Mother Marjoram’s friend, Miss Daffodil Pruett, maintain what the village politely described as “a respectful distance.”

They are never openly rude to one another, but both women prefer Mother Marjoram’s company separately, rather than risking an evening in which all three occupy the same room forcing the laws of nature to become strained. Mave maintains that Miss Pruett is “too fond of secrets,” whilst Miss Pruett considers Mave “too fond of being heard.”

Mother Marjoram wisely keeps separate biscuit tins for each of them.

We don’t know if she’s rich or poor but she seems secretively comfortable. She wears patched clothes but uses suprisingly good lavender soap; haggles over pennies whilst slipping coins to struggling mothers; and will spend forty minutes arguing over the price of onions then buy everyone in Jimmy’s pub a drink.

She knows exactly when to leave though before trouble starts. She thinks the world is ridiculous, and it’s best to laugh at it before it laughs at you.

So that’s the current state of affairs from the garage: quilts completed, shirts sacrificed for art, paving slabs immortalised in stitch, and one entirely fictional village becoming alarmingly real. I suspect Mavis will continue causing trouble whether invited or not. Frankly, I’m just relieved she hasn’t discovered Substack comments yet.

Thank you so much for reading!

Hello everyone and welcome back! I hope you’re well and have a spare couple of minutes to catch up on the various things unfolding around here. As ever, the headings are there to help you skip straight to the bits that interest you most, because I do have a tendency to wander off down the occasional side road.

From The Garage, Textiles

Windrush 11 - Lucille Editha Ford. Not quite finished the hands just yet - needs a final coat - but all else done.

A Textile Book in the making.

“Residue”

What remains after looking.

Drawn, Reduced, Distilled.

But there’s no textiles?!!! There will be.

Years ago I took a workshop where the tutor used small square collages as a starting point for abstraction. (Tansy Hargan) She called this process palimsest, and there is no replacement word for this style of working in my view which is probs why she chose it. Clearly the imparted information lodged itself somewhere in my brain and waited patiently for the day I would become deeply invested in municipal ironwork. I had a look at her textile process too which is interesting, but quite different from mine.

Residue, Chapter 1

I went for a walk on 3rd May, and on our main shopping street in the 250 yards between Mint Velvet and Oliver Bonas, I saw 15 manhole or service covers.

Feeling like a prize idiot I stopped to photograph them all and when I got home made very small sketches of the bones of what I saw onto lokta paper. I then ripped up some khadi paper and using acrylics and watercolours, put some colour into the shapes. The words surrounding the drawings say: “cast iron, concrete, paint, repair and repetition. 12 utility covers documented along a short section of the Parade each carrying it’s own pattern of use, interruption and surface damage”.

This book is my attempt to develop that process of small sketches in my own way, by looking, drawing, simplifying, repeating. I have no idea at this stage what the textile pieces will end up looking like, probably they will be different from my usual, and a bit abstract too with luck. It’ll make a nice change from portraiture. I’m off to look for pointy things in the local gallery on Friday for Chapter 2!

A visit from Mr President

A loud orange administration arrives uninvited and we search for earmuffs

(Any resemblance to a certain real public figure is entirely intentional. The name of the cat has been changed to protect his identity).

Ordinarily, my garden is a place of relative calm. Birds mutter quietly in the hedges, bees drift about with good intentions, and I attempt, with varying degrees of success, to do something creative outdoors.

Then Mr President arrives.

He does not so much enter the garden as stage a territorial acquisition. One moment there is peace; the next there is shouting. As he literally screams for attention and I’ve nicknamed him Mr President.

Mr President is an orange cat from next door who patrols the neighbourhood with the confidence of someone entirely unfamiliar with criticism. He advances along walls like a visiting dignitary inspecting the troops, yelling continuously to announce both his presence and, possibly, his policies.

Nobody knows precisely what he wants of course. Attention seems to be part of it. Admiration certainly. Possibly tariffs!

He is extraordinarily visible. Not merely because he is loud, but because nature has seen fit to make him the precise colour of an international warning sign.

Once installed, he assumes ownership of everything within sight. Chairs become his chairs. Flowerbeds become his flowerbeds. Any patch of sunlight immediately falls under executive control.

He is also deeply committed to disruption.

If I am gardening, he supervises at close range while shouting commentary. If I am carrying tea, he appears suddenly underfoot like a furry constitutional crisis. If I attempt to photograph flowers, he inserts himself into proceedings with the absolute certainty that his public has gathered specifically to see him.

Which, to be fair, may be true.

Mr President believes the borders are his to command, but does not believe in schedules, privacy, or personal space. He believes only in visibility and volume. However a nice scratch on the head and a tickle under the chin makes him purr.

Tales From the Curator

(After staring rather too closely at the faces in some of my recent portraits, I realised that with precious little self-control, they had taken it upon themselves to live together in a fictitious village, free to be as daft as they liked).

All is quiet in the village at the moment. The Curator has been on a short holiday and will be back soon. In the meantime, here’s an update on matters. (Mother Marjoram’s profile is here).

A brief note from the village, where matters continue at their usual pace, which is to say, not quickly, but with conviction.

The camper van remains. The chair remains. Jason continues on Community Hall Door Management with only occasional philosophical engagement with hinges. Andreas has now been observed helping Mrs Nugget carry folding tables, wearing sunglasses of considerable intent.

Nothing further has been officially decided, though Jimmy maintains that “you don’t start helping with furniture unless you’re emotionally involved.”

Mrs Nugget, meanwhile, has begun sending Andreas home with leftovers “purely for practical reasons,” though the portions involved suggest a level of optimism not usually associated with practicality; certainly enough for two. She has also started referring to him as “that nice colourful man,” which in village terms is considered a fairly advanced stage of acceptance.

Elsewhere, Mother Marjoram has been seen emerging from the woods carrying three bundles of rosemary, a dented kettle, and what Mr Bellweather insists was “an atmosphere.” No one knows precisely what she is preparing, though a small queue has reportedly begun forming near the boulder outside her cottage. One villager requested clarity, another asked for courage, and Mrs Agnes Root is believed to have enquired whether it is possible to curse bindweed selectively.

As ever, Mother Marjoram has made no promises.

Things simply tend to appear, eventually.

The village, meanwhile, is continuing, which is generally how these things begin.

Thank you, as always, for reading along and indulging my various creative detours. I never entirely know where these ideas are heading when they begin, but that does seem to be half the fun of it. Until next time, may your projects behave themselves, your tea remain uninterrupted, and your local cats respect constitutional boundaries (they won’t though).

Hello and jolly well welcome. Thanks for being here and reading.

From the Garage (Textile progress)

Windrush 11: Lucille Editha Ford is very nearly ready to leave the building (or at least the garage) and should be making her debut in the next newsletter, assuming no last-minute artistic existential crises. Not quite there yet.

As well as doing endless machining for Lucille, I’ve also been experimenting with the textile book I mentioned in my last missive. One page down… an indeterminate number to go. It’s early days, so please imagine this accompanied by the phrase “trust the process” said with quiet conviction and slightly ink-stained hands.

My pages will be very different from those of Elizabeth Allen (more on her below), whose work is old school applique, but manages to be absurd, darkly funny, and eerily prophetic all at once; no pressure then.

I thought I’d start my book of Leamington (Working title, Palimpset) with a walk along the Riverside Walk and include my own little home which leads down to it.

Released from the Garage

Kenilworth Castle and some textiles from a new exhibition at Compton Verney.

Off on tour again. A quick primer, in case castles aren’t your everyday:

Kenilworth is one of England’s more theatrical ruins, showing off 500 years of architectural ambition, from the Norman keep to full-blown Elizabethan - ism. Highlights include the vast 12th-century Great Tower, John of Gaunt’s Great Hall, and the lovingly reconstructed Elizabethan Garden. There are soaring views, crumbling grandeur, and steps that appear to have been designed specifically to test one’s relationship with gravity. There is also, importantly, a perfectly respectable bun-stop.

Can you see the bowling green above? An immaculate lawn, dotted with small black shapes. Our granddaughter, spotting them, immediately slipped into full wildlife-documentary mode: hushed steps, intense focus and the kind of reverence usually reserved for rare and easily startled creatures. At her command, we froze obediently behind her, recalling that morning’s strict instructions about silence and stillness when observing impossibly tiny, soot-soft moorhen ducklings on a nearby lake.

She crept forward. The shapes held. The illusion held. For a moment, it was perfect.

And then, with quiet inevitability, the “chicks” resolved themselves into a small cluster of entirely unruffled bowling balls. The spell broke. The lawn, of course, remained unmoved, and any remaining dignity dissolved as we all clocked what had happened and collapsed into giggles, granddaughter included! My two G’s are my co-conpiritors in joy.

And on to Compton……

Troublemakers and Prophets - Textile exhibition

“Elizabeth Allen’s creations are absurd, darkly funny, and strikingly prophetic. In this exhibition she is joined by a host of other “visionary artists” who invite you to step into a vibrant, topsy-turvy world where 12 of her works are displayed alongside more than 15 artists who also saw life differently. Over four rooms, explore bold responses to contemporary life from artists who turn struggle into powerful visual statements.

Known as Queen, Allen was on the cusp of wider recognition when she died in 1967, after years of living in a cabin in the forest. Her work reveals a life shaped by fierce conviction and apocalyptic vision. This exhibition includes the first public showing of Queen’s handmade textile autobiography – the ‘Autobiraggraphy’.

Queen’s textile proclamations lead a chorus of works made from fragments – toys, furniture, clothing, news, religion and folklore. From detailed beadwork to large-scale sculpture, these pieces transform everyday chaos into something fantastical, reflective and urgent”.

Call to arms! (in case anyone out there would welcome an artistic shove)

Across the exhibition, fragments of toys, clothing, belief systems, histories, are gathered and transformed into something urgent, strange, and often unexpectedly beautiful. It’s a reminder that textiles don’t just decorate stories; they can argue, unravel, and rebuild them.

And if that isn’t a gentle-but-firm nudge to stop me circling my own half-finished pieces like a suspicious cat and just get on with it, I don’t know what is. Consider this an affectionate call to arms if you fancy it: pick up the needle, the pen, the glue gun, the whatever-it-is-you’ve-been-avoiding, and make something gloriously imperfect. No waiting for better light, more time, or a personality transplant into someone more disciplined.

Come on then garage-dwellers unite! Let’s crack on, make a bit of a mess, and see what turns up.

Kindest regards, Annabel

From the Garage (Windrush)

Cracking on with the cardigan. Process images.

I’ll see what happens to the contrasts when I stitch the background with heavy machining in dark blue - washboards. It may need the edges of the cardigan to be highlighted or the background to have a slight shadowy wash. Although the metaphor is of disappearing culture, I still want you to be able to see it all!

From the Garage - Sketchbooks

Palimpsest and Louse Bourgeois

Virginia Woolf once wrote, “Art is not beauty. Art is seeing things differently.” Which is reassuring, because if art were only about beauty, half my sketchbook would have quietly excused itself and left the building by now.

Does it seem to you that modern art tends to be less about producing something conventionally beautiful and more about provoking thought, emotion, or narrative? I often try and convince myself that the thing I’ve just made belongs to one of those categories and it often makes the decision for me of whether it’s worth keeping or ceremonially binning.

It’s really odd, as I keep mentioning, how things just plumet and crash together in your mind to give you ideas! In my sketchbooks I have many things I’ve worked on - little ideas I do on paper just to see what happens and sometimes I keep them and sometimes they end up in the bin. One of my sketchbook pieces is this which was done after a walk around the town I live in. (below)

I’ve seen the idea of working in little squares many times, and this example uses scraps of paper eg bus tickets, and corners of book pages, stamps etc, painted, and drawn on, and stuck together as a small scale collage. You get a whole new perspective making tiny works.

Around the same time, I’d been looking back through photographs of past exhibitions I’d visited, including one by Louise Bourgeois. She had created a fabric book documenting a visit she’d made. I’ll admit, I wasn’t entirely won over by the book itself, but the premise stayed with me. There was something quietly compelling about committing to a single, specific thread and following it through.

And perhaps that’s where these ideas begin to overlap; walks, memories, sketchbook fragments, other artists’ approaches. None of them quite complete on their own, but together forming a kind of layered surface. A palimpsest, of sorts. Not a clean narrative, but one where traces remain, half-visible, informing whatever comes next.

Below: The opening pages of a sketchbook about Compton Verney. The fold out concertina page on top is tucked into a little pocket on the main page.

So guess what’s next on the list to try?

Released from the Garage

The grandchildren had an Easter break, so we were out and about in Warwickshire - Lord Leycester Hospital

This charming place is within walking distance of Rainbow Towers. It’s often used as a film set, and for weddings. It has a lovely garden with a greenhouse I’d love to live in, and is a bit short of straight edges. We have a yearly pass so will be popping in for lunch now and then.

At over 700 years old, Lord Leycester Hospital, is the most complete medieval building in the UK. The buildings are extraordinary, but what makes them unique is the enduring communities that have lived within the walls since the 1300’s. First came the Guilds, and then the Earl of Leicester, Robert Dudley, who was a favourite of Elizabeth I. Dudley founded the Lord Leycester Hospital in 1571 – a philanthropic community of a Master and twelve Brethren. Coming from the ranks of soldiers injured in Tudor wars, the Brethren were deemed deserving recipients of Dudley’s philanthropy.

Below: some images of the buildings. I know it’s been upright for 700 years but I still backed away from the leaning walkway edges!

Below: I attempted to photograph a piece of 16th-century stump work, which proved to be extraordinarily difficult, partly due to lighting, partly due to glass, and partly due to my own increasingly questionable patience.

In the end, I resorted to standing with a coat over my head to dampen the glare, which I suspect made me look less like a serious photographer and more like someone attempting a minor haunting!

Still, I think I captured the gist: the Bear and Ragged Staff, an heraldic emblem associated with the Earls of Warwick and the county itself. A symbol of courage, strength, and feudal loyalty. All admirable qualities. Though if I attempted stump work myself, I suspect the resulting symbols would lean more towards perseverance (certainly), confusion (definitely), and a mild but persistent sense of regret.

I have, in fact, tried stump work once.

That felt sufficient.

Tales from the Curator

(After staring rather too closely at the faces in some of my recent portraits, I realised that with precious little self-control, they had taken it upon themselves to live together in a fictitious village, free to be as daft as they liked).

The village remains quiet. However, a camper van arrived in the parking bay outside Mr Albert Planter’s cow field at approximately 11:23 on Tuesday morning. It had a quiet confidence - the space is normally reserved for hesitation, three-point turns, and the occasional delivery of compost.

It was not a subtle vehicle.

It had the air of something that had seen festivals, opinions, and at least one regrettable sunrise. Its curtains suggested privacy, its exterior suggested stories, and its parking suggested a man entirely untroubled by local signage.

Jimmy’s reaction

Jimmy himself is a bit of a lad; tall, strong, short-tempered, and only loosely acquainted with the principles of customer service. If you’re a visitor and ask for an Americano, for instance, he will stare at you as though you’ve just requested a blood test. Then he’ll inform you, with some feeling, that you can have instant or nothing. He milks it. He sugars it. He does both even if you’ve explicitly said you don’t take sugar. He does not see this as interference; he sees it as visionary management. Still, the mugs are clean. We must be grateful. (read more on link)

Jimmy clocked the van before anyone else said a word.

“That’s not a vehicle, that’s a lifestyle choice gone feral.” He watched it a while longer.

“Curtains,” he added darkly. “Never trust a man who travels with curtains. Means he’s either hiding something or intends to stay.”

A sip of something amber.

“Parked like he’s not arrived but landed. As if the village has been waiting for him specifically.

“Give it an hour,” Jimmy muttered. “He’ll be in here asking for oat milk and emotional understanding.”

Another pause. A narrowing of the eyes.

“…I’ll give him instant.”

So that is the news from the garage this time: tiny collages multiplying quietly, medieval buildings leaning with confidence, and stump work firmly declined. I will continue with the sketchbooks, avoid unnecessary embroidery, and report back if anything becomes unexpectedly complicated.

Thanks for reading again, and staying with me.

From The Garage

(collage, paint as a basis for a quilt background)

It must have been a few years ago now that I signed up for an online course. Unfortunately I can’t remember the name of the artist running it, which feels a bit like attending a wedding and forgetting whose it was. Apologies, wherever you are. The course focused on creating interesting surfaces to work on. I only vaguely remember the gist, but I’ve been returning to the process every now and again, which is probably the point.

In the first image below, I’ve added different sizes of masking tape to plain cartridge paper. There are also sticky labels, some folded, some flat, along with a few strokes of white gesso. I dropped Quink ink onto the paper, not too much, and sprayed it with water. I love the way the ink dilutes into different colours and finds its way around the shapes you’ve created, as if it is making its own quiet decisions about composition.

I then added watercolour washes, along with Posca pen, using a broad outline of a building. In this case it is the Birmingham Art Gallery and Museum. There are also block prints and pen and ink details layered in. A thing not many people know about Posca pens is that if you are quick with a wet brush, you can soften the marks and make them flow. It is a slightly risky manoeuvre, but satisfying when it works.

Finally, more colour, more pen, more paper. One of the joys of this approach is that anything you don’t like can be gessoed over and reworked. A useful philosophy in art, if not always in life.

In my case, this became part of a series of Birmingham-based collages, all made in broadly the same way. The sketchbook was landscape A5, small enough to feel manageable, but large enough to get into trouble with. I put it away, as you do, and time passed.

When I came to work on my Windrush Series, I knew I wanted to create a quilt about Benjamin Zephaniah, who grew up in and around Birmingham. I returned to these sketches and used them to produce a background cloth, which was commercially printed.

For this piece, I needed to knock back the background drawings as they were competing with the colour washes in Benjamin’s portrait. I used diluted Titanium White after stitching, which added another layer of texture. I then wrote his words, with permission, and painted over them slightly to soften them and bring the focus back to the figure.

This process also led to the title
“The Background’s Too Strong, It Needs To Be Whiter”
which felt entirely in keeping with things Benjamin had said in the past.

The quilt was exhibited at Leamington Spa Art Gallery and Museum last year and has now sold. My favourite details are the shot of Cadmium Yellow on his elbow and T-shirt, suggesting imagined stage lighting, and the stitching of those wonderful dreadlocks, which felt like a conversation in themselves.

Windrush 6, The Background’s Too Strong, It Needs to be Whiter
150 cm x 100 cm

And onto more quilty things.

Lucille, Windrush No. 11

Lucille was born in 1920 and came to the UK on her own at 17. She showed me a photograph of herself in a beautiful green dress. I’ve used this to create an angled portrait set within a frame. Around it, I’ve added an NHS lanyard resting on what will become a table.

Like so many women of the Windrush generation, Lucille worked for years in the NHS, specifically in a local hospital for the “incurables”, hence the stitched words. It is a phrase that sits heavily, even now.

The inside of Rainbow Towers continues to evolve, now including a new painting by fellow local artist and friend Suminder Virk, which I absolutely love.

Tales From the Curator

(After staring rather too closely at the faces in some of my recent portraits, I realised that with precious little self-control, they had taken it upon themselves to live together in a fictitious village, free to be as daft as they liked).

A single trainer has appeared in Lost Property at the Community Hall. It is clean, modern, and entirely unclaimed, which in itself is unusual, as with most things in the village it can be traced back to someone within three conversations and a few biscuits.

Jason has labelled it “Footwear (Ongoing)” in neat, careful handwriting and placed it on the shelf beside the accordion, where it sits with a quiet sense of purpose. Several villagers have paused to look at it, some more than once, though no one has stepped forward to claim ownership.

It has been suggested, gently, that it may not be waiting to be collected so much as simply waiting.

I’d like to say that my work was all part of a thoughtful, well-paced process, but that would be giving far too much credit to what is essentially a series of improvised decisions and minor cover-ups. Still, between the overpainting and the small victories, something always seems to emerge in the end. Even if it does take the scenic route.

From the Garage (Out and About at Compton Verney)

We go on a visit to see:

Bruegel to Rembrandt-Drawing Life, Sketching Wonder

“This exhibition showcases artists across the 16th and 17th centuries, including Bruegel, Rembrandt, Rubens, and Jordaens, and reveals the magic of drawing as both an artistic tool and a means of storytelling. With charcoal, ink and chalk, these artists captured life in all its beauty, struggle and complexity during a period of extraordinary social, political and religious change.”

More importantly, and perhaps more memorably, it means I am absolved of cooking for the day, which feels like a small but meaningful domestic victory. We usually contrive to have lunch, and this time it was Chicken Waterzooi: vegetables and chicken in a creamy sauce, served in a bread bowl with the sort of confidence that suggested to me both history and a decent amount of butter. It was, I read, “inspired by the culinary heritage of Belgium and the artistry of the Dutch and Flemish Masters,” I suppose if Rembrandt had painted soup, it might have looked something like it?? Not totally convinced about that one.

I thought you might like to see some proper drawing for a change!

Drawing is often where artists begin, a way of thinking on paper, of testing ideas and making sense of the world around them.

This exhibition brings together works by more than 50 artists from across what is now the Netherlands, Belgium and northern France, all working during the 16th and 17th centuries. It was a period shaped by upheaval; religious conflict, political shifts, and the breakaway of the Dutch Republic from Spanish rule in 1581, but also one of remarkable cultural energy.

Artists absorbed new ideas from across Europe and experimented freely, with a growing interest in naturalism. What might first appear as simple scenes of everyday life often reveal themselves as something more layered with compositions that blend observation with memory, tradition and imagination.

The exhibits were drawn from the Royal Museums of Fine Arts of Belgium. They perhaps offer a way into the minds of artists navigating a changing world, and remind us how drawing can hold both reality and invention at once.

From the Garage (Textiles and Paint)

Sketchbooks

Shameful, after the above, but keep smiling. A couple of old ones just for spring!

Lucille - Windrush 11 begins

The processes for these portrait quilts seem to vary each time I do one! I’m still trying to find the most efficient and best way to do realistic paintings on quilts. The portraits need to be as fully painted as I can manage to honour the elders of the Windrush Generation who have volunteered their stories.

Tales from the Curator

(After staring rather too closely at the faces in some of my recent portraits, I realised that with precious little self-control, they had taken it upon themselves to live together in a fictitious village, free to be as daft as they liked).

Ms Brunhilda Barfoote (Strategic Direction & Quiet Correction)

Brunhilda is in her mid-thirties and built of competence, and so very, very quietly kind.

During the week she works in the city, where she leads a department in a company large enough to require diagrams. She is involved in high-level strategy, the kind that determines direction rather than stationery. She does not file things. She decides things, significant things. The sort of decisions that ripple outward and cause entire teams to reconfigure themselves by Monday.

She wears business suits and court shoes that expect progress. Shoes that click with authority but sadly lack imagination.

At weekends she returns to the village, where she has a house, a kettle that whistles decisively, and the freedom to dress as she pleases and be the person she really is; strategic but impulsively buys wild flowers, formidable but fond of the childhood pebble on her desk.

As far as clothing goes, she is a woman of two halves.

In the city: tailored, strategic, quietly formidable.
In the village: strangely gothic with big black boots.

She especially loves her boots because they have firm heels, clean lines, pointed toes and laces you can pull just tight enough. The leather bears the faint creases of use, not neglect. Movement has shaped it. Fun has shaped it. So has gravel, damp grass, uneven paving stones and at least one poorly stacked log pile (now corrected and categorised). This is not a boot that waits upright beside a copse, like Allesandro Porcinis. This is a boot that arrives, assesses, and proceeds.

The village is quietly thrilled to have her on the Parish Council. Meetings are swifter, and agendas remain on topic. Motions are proposed, clarified and concluded before anyone has time to mention badgers.

Brunhilda is a woman who rarely announces herself, and things simply seem to improve in her vicinity. She does not raise her voice. She does not need to, because she possesses the sort of intelligence and control that can untangle a funding application, rebalance a budget, reorganise a tool shed and still remember who prefers oat milk. On at least one occasion the Parish WhatsApp corrected its own spelling.

Her one known weakness is lemon drizzle cake. Not just a slice, but a whole cake situation. The village fete committee has noted this carefully and deployed it with restraint.

The village has, quietly and without recorded vote, come to rely on her.

So, thank you for reading! So lovely to have you here. The quilts inch forward, the faces becoming themselves in their own time, and I remain in mild negotiation with both process and patience. It is, on balance, a perfectly respectable state of affairs, productive, occasionally wayward, and just organised enough to give the impression I know exactly what I’m doing, including the confident reclassification of ancient vessels as banana holders, with mice.

From The Garage (textiles and paint)

I’ve been lucky in the past and found that magically the text has fitted the space available on the quilts - no idea how, luck not skill! For the last 3 quilts however I’ve wanted the words to be limited to a specific space along edges, so printing them out first helps. Lucille’s text was especially tricky as she has Alzheimers, and I had many, many pages to go through to distill her life, using her voice wherever I could.

More updates soon as I need to crack on with this last Windrush elders quilt, but I have something planned and on a much bigger scale!

From The Garage (life in general)

There are moments when one begins to suspect that one may be drifting gently into eccentricity.

One day last week, it was such a beautiful day, that DH and I decided to go for a walk in the sunshine, and perhaps have a spot of light lunch at a local National Trust property. Very wholesome. Very National Trust; the sort of outing that makes you feel you have lived your day properly.

One of the small surprises of getting older is discovering that one can leave the house apparently dressed for the day, discuss the need for coats, gloves and umbrellas with your partner, and yet not be entirely prepared. This became clear to me when I discovered, halfway across a car park, that although my top half was on point, I had entirely forgotten to change my slippers.

For a brief moment I considered retreating to the car. But then I thought: no. We are here now. The day is lovely. I shall simply brazen it out.

So I spent the morning wandering around the National Trust house and the grounds in my slippers. I did have a small story prepared in case anyone noticed (and dear reader, I fear they did). If challenged, I planned to say I was suffering from bunions and these were the only things I could possibly wear; I think it is important to be ready with a plausible medical explanation.

My daughter suggested she might have to ring Social Services (I am, after all, 70 and she feels I’m a little odd.) I’d be easy to spot as I’d be wandering happily about in padded footwear, probably doubled up with laughter, and possibly beside a husband studying the distance with great concentration and pretending not to know me.

It did remind me of the time I spent an entire day out and about shopping, going to an art class, and various errands, only to get ready for bed that night and discover I had been wearing my trousers inside out all day, labels waving cheerfully at the public like small fabric flags of mild confusion. No one had said a word, which either means people are extremely polite, or that I now move through the world with the gentle invisibility granted to older ladies, especially artist-icky ones.

Still, there are advantages to reaching this stage of life. One is no longer required to maintain the illusion of competence at all times. One can simply laugh, adjust one’s slippers, and carry on. In my defence, they were extremely good slippers and I saw at least 3 people wearing crocs.

A puzzle for you

We have a couple of family members with dyslexia and are troubled in particular by spelling. So I thought, as amusement and also confirming what a difficult language English is anyway, I’d offer up this nugget:

GHOTI a constructed word, often attributed to George Bernard Shaw, used to demonstrate the inconsistencies of English spelling.

Q) How do you pronounce ghoti?

A) Fish.

Explanation: Gh= f sound (cough) O= i sound (women) Ti= sh sound (station)

Tales from the Curator

(After staring rather too closely at the faces in some of my recent portraits, I realised that with precious little self-control, they had taken it upon themselves to live together in a fictitious village, free to be as daft as they liked).

Not a great deal happening in the village this week, but I did wonder if you’d like to meet Jason? (Community Hall Door Management and Cheese Sandwiches).

He’s quite quiet and very kind, but is built like a brick outhouse. When Mrs Nugget has taken one sherry too many, which is to say, any number after two, Jason has the gentle habit of appearing at her elbow and guiding her into a chair at the back of the hall with the quiet efficiency of a man accustomed to moving furniture.

A while ago, last year possibly, Jason went on holiday which surprised everyone, including Jason I think. He went to Protaras in Cypress which he described as sunny, civilised, and with good grilled fish, and stayed for a lot longer than the 2 weeks he told Mrs Nugget.

What he did not initially mention was that he had gone with a friend, Andreas, who lives there. He runs a bar in nearby Ayia Napa, where the nights are loud, bright, and full of people who believe dancing on tables is a sensible life choice.

Jason, it must be said, does not dance on tables. He’s more like a granite statue in a room of glitter.

Jason has now returned to the village for a while, which in rural terms, could mean anything between three weeks and the remainder of his natural life.

He says he has “a few things to sort out.” No one is entirely sure what these things are, but Mrs Nugget is keeping him busy with a few jobs.

• reorganising the Hall’s emergency exit signage

• locating a missing biscuit tin from the 2021 Harvest Supper

• re-hanging the “Fire Exit” sign that has been pointing confidently at the ladies’ toilets since 2018

Privately, she hopes he stays. The Community Hall door has never felt quite so secure as when Jason is leaning beside it with his arms folded and the calm expression of a man who knows exactly where the spare keys are.

Anyway, Andreas is visiting the village very soon to talk things through. The village will, I suspect, have views, but we wait with bated breath.

So that is the news from the garage this time: slippers behaving badly, paint behaving quite well, and quiet developments at the Community Hall. I will keep an eye on Jason, Andreas, and the biscuit tin situation, and report back if anything further occurs.

From the Garage - Textiles

If I’m honest, the textiles have ground to a temporary halt for a jolly understandable, human, reason I think. Not in a dramatic “I renounce cloth forever” sort of way. More in a slightly winded, regrouping, staring-at-the-wall, sad, sort of way.

“Hobbled” in the gallery at the 2026 Leamington Spa Open Competition.

I have a piece in the Leamington Spa 2026 Open, which, genuinely, I’m super pleased about. It’s a biennial show and being selected from hundreds of entries is no small thing. I know this. I am capable of gratitude. I can hold gratitude in one hand. In the other hand, however, I am holding mild deflation.

The piece was designed as a 360° work. It isn’t a polite, hang-it-flat-and-step-back textile. It has a front, yes, but the back is arguably where things unravel properly. There are layers, fragments, structural elements that only make sense if you can circle it. It was made to be walked around to be read, and be slightly nosy with.

At the Open, it’s positioned so you can really only see the front. The back, which as you may know, contains rather a lot of the story is essentially having a quiet, unseen life against the wall.

I am not scandalised or outraged, but it is… a mismatch.

It’s one of those moments where you realise how much of textile practice is about space and context. A painting tolerates a wall very well, so does a quilt. A 3D textile sometimes needs air. Or a plinth. Or a mirror. Or simply room to breathe.

I did have a gentle word. Nothing confrontational of course - this is how I am afterall. Just a small hopeful enquiry about whether it might sit differently. But exhibitions are complex beasts, with spatial politics and practical constraints that I understand having been involved slightly myself. On this occasion I wasn’t privvy to those difficulties, and so it remains front-facing, composed, and perhaps slightly misunderstood. None of the works has any explanation just a title and artists name which is also a shame.

If I’m honest, it has taken a little wind out of my sails.

There is a particular vulnerability in making something that has hidden hours of work, not just the thinking and research involved; the stitching, structural secrets and then knowing that much of it won’t be seen. I think textiles often carry a quiet underside but this piece was made with the reverse as a deliberate, noisy presence and seeing it muted has left me a bit subdued.

This isn’t a flounce. And it certainly isn’t a grand artistic crisis. It’s more a pause. A small recalibration. A reminder that once work leaves the studio, it has a life of its own, and not always the life you imagined for it.

I’ll return to cloth. Of course I will. I always do. There is something hovering about neurodiversity which is giving my sewing machine fingers an itch.

But just at the moment I seem to be hovering in paper-land with some enormous A2 sheets, (see below) perhaps because paper doesn’t mind which way round it’s shown.

From The Garage - sketchbooks

I’ve been having tremendous fun with sketchbooks again, the sort I make for myself in whatever size feels emotionally appropriate at the time.

Sometimes that’s A6: modest, containable, reassuring.

This week it’s A2. (see my efforts below - tales from the curator)

A2 is not a sketchbook. A2 is a bedsheet with ambitions! A2 is the sort of surface that makes you question your life choices before you’ve even sharpened your pencil. It does not want a gentle doodle in the corner. It wants narrative. It wants tectonic shifts. It wants commitment.

The paper is huuuuge, you call almost say garden sized.

Which would all be thrilling and expansive and “Very Serious Artist” of me, had I not, only last week, thrown away an entire stash of perfectly usable collage material in a fit of melodramatic self-purging, caused by the first bit of this newsletter!

And when I say stash, I mean a carefully cultivated ecosystem of:

• home-printing experiments

• stencilling trials

• geli prints in questionable colour combinations

• screenprints that “nearly worked”

• block prints that absolutely didn’t

• lino cuts that were one tweak away from brilliance (obviously)

All those bits I had lovingly kept in a wooden crate bought especially from Hobbycraft and which many were mere fragments but definite evidence of possibilities and hope!

Into the bin they went.

Because last Tuesday, high on righteousness and lack of self worth, and armed with a bin bag, I announced to the studio:

“I’m too old for this.”
“Who am I kidding, I’m going to retire.”
“I no longer need 43 versions of an over-inked fern.”

There is nothing quite like the clarity that comes from holding a bin bag. You feel decisive; streamlined and very minimalist Scandinavian, and ignore all those feelings of “keep everything, it might be useful” and replace them with “why do I own forty-seven experimental monoprints of a spoon?” I did hesitate slightly, but I’m afraid the mood was upon me.

I love working on a large scale which is one of the reasons I like quilting. On A2, things sprawl. They refuse to sit politely. Marks have to travel, and lines have to stretch their legs to reach the sides. A tiny wobble becomes a geographical feature and it’s rather freeing.

Also inconvenient, when you’ve just binned your collage ecosystem.

So now I’m back to generating raw material, printing backgrounds specifically so I can later tear them up. There’s something wonderfully circular about that. Make it in order to destroy it in order to remake it.

Perhaps the real lesson here is never to make life decisions while holding a bin bag.

Or at the very least, keep one folder labelled:
“Future Me Will Be Annoyed If You Throw This Away.”

The A2 sketch I made this week featured in the village as a travel poster. (below)

Breaking News from The Curator

(After staring rather too closely at the faces in some of my recent portraits, I realised that with precious little self-control, they had taken it upon themselves to live together in a fictitious village, free to be as daft as they liked).

The village is off on a trip.

Get in touch if you’d like to join us on a trip to Leamington Spa to explore it’s non-existent Tudor history. More details here.

Mr Humphrey Bellweather has submitted the following details for a trip to Leamington Spa this spring. Please read and let Mrs Nugget know if you are interested or have any comments. The trip will not take place unless we can fill the minibus (12 seats) Cost £40 inclusive of snacking.

Snacking: Optional Tudor-themed refreshments will be available, including:

• Marchpane (structurally sound and quite filling).

• Spiced biscuits (price permitting, but Mrs Nugget will investigate with Sharon).

• A historically suggestive but modernly hygienic meat pie.

Travel Poster: A2 paper with acrylic and posca pen, pen and ink, collaged papers (just a modest few!) stencilling.

I always come back to the cloth. I always make another print. I always start another sketchbook that is either absurdly tiny or impractically enormous.

So until next time, may your own experiments nearly work, may your hidden layers be appreciated (even if only by you), and may you never make irreversible decisions while holding a bin bag.

With glue on my sleeves and optimism nearly restored,

Thank you for reading. Annabel x

Mr Whiskers needs a groom now and then or he begins to look like a bath mat. He doesn’t like it much and we can’t seem to find him. If you can spot him do let me know.

From The Garage - sketchbooks

Sunday was wet and windy again and even I grimaced at the daily walk, preferring to sit and work in my sketchbook. Sketchbooks are for fun, experiments and just doodling around. I doodled myself around some apples in acrylic. I really like working on black paper and as this is a sketchbook I made for myself it has lots of black paper and all sorts of other colours too.

Just before Christmas I mentioned my plans to join with Laura Kemshall on the “fill a sketchbook page every day for a year” challenge. I’ve not done terribly well with that - (hangs head) I started by looking through my sketchbooks, revisted lots of old ideas, and got thoroughly distracted! The original plan I dreamt up was to use Grimms Fairy Tales (a very old copy my mum won at school in the early 1930’s) and illustrate the stories with my own sketches. Nope. Didn’t happen.

Then I tried using some of the photos I’d taken off the TV to sketch, but they took too long for this challenge - unsustainable to do everyday, because even this sketchy half done portrait took an hour. It would stop me doing all the other things I need to do.

Mark Rylance - Cromwell from Hilary Mantel’s Wolf Hall. (Did you watch the series? - I found it mesmorising).

Here’s one I made earlier!

I’ve been using some sketches and paintings from my old sketchbooks to make up stories, for my own amusement. It started by looking a little too closely at the faces in some of the portraits I’d drawn and, before I knew it, they were all living together in a fictitious village, free to be as daft as they like.

So, a circuitous route, but I got to the illustrations and stories thing in the end.

Below: is a pencil sketch I did earlier in the week after visiting my favourite art gallery, Compton Verney, and seeing an early Van Gogh of a peasant working in a field. Van Gogh painted several works featuring peasants in fields, primarily focusing on the harsh reality of rural life. Planting Potatoes (1884), shows a woman working. He’s used earthy tones, apparently “reflecting his commitment to portraying the dignity of manual labour”.

I loved how he used the paint simply but in an incredibly clever way. I kept looking at the way the light hit the back and parts of the skirt and sleeves and I wanted to do a sketch to record it.

Doing this has helped me to really look. As if you didn’t know already, the man is a real genius!! In a normal pencil sketch I would graduate the tones and marks more gently, but I wanted the contrast I saw in the painting so went overboard with the 7B pencils!

This is what the sketch inspired: “Mrs Agnes Root spends most of her time in the allotment, digging. She prefers this to talking and is widely considered content. She hums while she works, though never the same tune twice, and names her vegetables after neighbours, a habit she keeps to herself. She laughs at inappropriate moments, alone, usually when something unexpected turns up in the soil.

Mrs Root is known for bringing very good lunches wrapped in cloth, which she eats sitting on an upturned bucket. No one is quite sure what she is planting or why she always returns to the same patch, but things grow. This is generally felt to be sufficient”.

From the Garage - Textiles

I now have collected Marcia (Windrush 2) from the RSBA and am beginning to put together a portfolio/ proposal for all the pieces. I have a wonderful friend from the local Windrush community who has agreed to help and I think we have plans for a complete package including talks. Qian Zephaniah also said she’d help too apparently, because Benjamin’s mother came over - probably a bit before Windrush itself, I’m not sure.

You can see Hobbled at the Leamington Spa Art Gallery and Museum’s 2026 Open competition, between 20th Feb and 3rd May. All the work is for sale, so if you’re in the area do pop in and catch up with the work that is on show from a wide variety West Midlands artists.

Hobbled - some process photos

Based on the Cocoon Coat 1913 by Paul Poiret.

“Hobbled” responds to the 2025 statistic that one in eight UK women have experienced sexual assault, domestic abuse, harassment and stalking.

The title references Paul Poiret’s hobble skirts which were cut so narrowly from knee to ankle that women could scarcely walk, sometimes even binding their legs to stop seams from splitting. I have remade his design for a coat, using dye in peacock colours over digitally designed cloth which has fragments of text and statistics relating to harm and control. Trailing ribbons. spikes and hands encircle the body, but over this language of restraint and pain leaves unfurl, flowers push through, butterflies flutter as symbols of resistance, renewal and hope.

Beneath the coat lies a dyed silk dress marked with snake-like forms, embroidered with phrases beginning “free from, and free to”.

Designed and digitally printed cotton cloth stencilled and dyed. Embroidered and dyed silk. Leaves, flowers and embroidered butterflies: printed and dyed cloth, Tyvek, paint, and machine stitch.

So that’s this month: potatoes, protest coats, imaginary villagers and a cat disguised as upholstery.

If you need me, I’ll be in the garage aggressively shading things with a 7B pencil and insisting it’s “research”. Thank you so much for being bothered to read.

Mr Whiskers comes to stay

Ordinarily, this would be prime creative time. Unfortunately, I am currently sharing my life with Mr Whiskers (rescue cat from far-flung Qatar), which means productivity is now more of a theoretical concept than a lived reality.

Mr Whiskers has not always lived this quiet life of creative supervision. He was once discovered in a skip, in the blistering heat of a Qatari afternoon, in a deeply tragic, matted state, and rescued by my daughter. From these humble beginnings, he has risen to become a small, toothless, medically complex despot.

He has no teeth, a delicate heart, questionable kidneys, and a constitution best described as “ornamental.” He may only venture into the back garden with a personal escort, like a retired diplomat under light protection.

Naturally, this has not dampened his sense of authority. He insists on being involved in all artistic activity, but only in the least helpful ways possible. He supervises from inside paint palettes. He conducts quality control by lying directly across whatever I’m working on. He communicates exclusively through prolonged staring and strategic sighing.

When I attempt to sew, he positions himself between me and the machine like a tiny, furry health and safety officer. When I cook, he installs himself beside the hob as if preparing to deliver a critical review. Think of him as an artistic director with no portfolio, no qualifications, and very firm opinions.

From the garage, (sort of studio)

I occasionally write a blog about the fictitious village I live in, and make artworks and the like to illustrate the writing or vice-versa! Here is Mother Marjoram the old lady who lives on the village green. Here’s an extract…..

“Mother Marjoram wanted to start the 2026 with a new look. When she’d finally sobered up after the Solstice celebrations and made the long, reflective climb upstairs to the bathroom, she caught sight of herself in the mirror and realised she looked decidedly scruffy. There were wisps where there should have been structure, and structure where no one had ever asked for it. Something had to be done.

So she asked Tina for help. Tina is the local hairdresser; the sort who comes round to your house with her own scissors, strong opinions, and a commendable level of confidence, and has long been known to favour decisive action coupled with a complete disregard for personal boundaries. She has been known to say things like “Trust me” and “It’ll grow out” in the same breath, which should really be a warning.

Anyway, the upshot is that Mother Marjoram now has a pudding bowl cut. A proper one. The sort that suggests either a lost bet or a brief but intense encounter with kitchenware. The village is currently avoiding contact with her, as no one can keep a straight face. Even the postman is pretending to be very busy at the gate.

It is hoped that by Easter things may have improved. Or at least that everyone will have regained their composure”

(this bit was done by AI - I was playing with images to see what it could do out of curiosity, and it gave Mother Marjoram a lovely pudding-basin cut for me)!!

Didn’t see this coming. Quietly appreciated. Thanks to the Royal Birmingham Society of Artists. https://rbsa.org.uk/rbsa-friends-exhibition-2026-highly-commended-artists-announced/

Right, I’d better make another cup of coffee and see what Mr Whiskers is supervising now. No doubt something important is happening involving a sketchbook and his bits.

I hope you’ve enjoyed this small update from the garage/studio/temporary cat headquarters. Normal service will resume shortly, assuming it is approved by management.

With love, and slightly fewer working surfaces than usual!!

I have Type 2 diabetes and usually keep a very strict watch on my weight and what I eat, but over the festive period I did let go just a bit and it was absolutely fantastic to indulge slightly. My favourite bake this year was a chocolate fudge cake with white chocolate mousse. Completely unnecessary. Entirely joyful. I’ve put my recipes at the bottom in case anyone fancies a go.

I haven’t begun my sketchbook challenge yet, but will. I got a few old ones out for ideas and got totally distracted looking at them. There’s just too much to do around here what with creative stuff and plain boring life stuff.

From the garage (the proper name for the studio)

Since the New Year, I’ve been working on a handling sample for the Quilters Guild of Great Britain who bought a Life Quilt late in 2025. It was called Poisonous Plant and there are lots of details of my website if you’d like to know more.

It took longer than I thought it would, and here’s some process photos.

Quilters Guild handling sample construction

First stage is about drawing onto the cloth. I was copying an existing quilt so you’d think it might be easier, but it wasn’t and took some time. I tried to match the fabrics for the applique with those used originally but not having got the quilt in front of me and only poor images, it wasn’t that accurate. I used my drawing to trace the outlines onto paper which I then used as a pattern for applique, and once it was in place I could begin stitching it on.

The stitching is not just to hold the applique, but also to add text and definition, and then to completely cover the whole piece - I do like the effect of dense free hand machining.

Once the whole is stitched, I could add a little paint to the applique. To me, this transforms the fabrics and is essential for the look I’m after. There’s not masses of paint because there would be little point in the applique if it was covered entirely! Just enhancement and to give tone, eg the bottle fabric is striped to start off with (see above) and black and green threads enhance that, meaning only a little white acrylic is needed to show the light hitting the bottle on the neck and body (below).

I then added more stitch and more applique (maggots!) and decided to leave the right hand side as incomplete - as if in the process so that someone with visual imparement could feel it’s construction; the other 3 sides are bound as normal. I’ve sent a swatch of the fabrics along with the sample to the Quilters’ Guild, so if you come across the quilt at an exhibition, you’ll be able to handle them all yourself.

And talking of exhibitions, if you happen to find yourself in Birmingham, Marcia (Windrush 2) is currently on show at the Royal Birmingham Society of Artists.

Chocolate cake and white chocolate mousse.

The cake is as below without the icing and without the red food colouring. (I made a book years ago of fave recipes and gave copies to the family)

The mousse is simply:

• 300g/11oz white choc broken into squares

• 450ml/16fl oz double cream.

  You melt the choc and leave to cool. Whip the cream but make it softer than you might normally, as when you add the choc it thickens. You can always whip a bit more. Sandwich the cake layers with the mousse before it sets too much.

  Much nicer than the icing in the recipe!

  ---

So that’s January so far: one quilt sample, several maggots, a great deal of stitching, and a cake that was absolutely worth it. It feels like a good way to begin the year — making work that can be touched, handled, and occasionally sworn at.

More stitching soon, fewer maggots (possibly but I’m not promising), and I’ll let you know how long the “no ooomph” resolution lasts.

If you’ve scrolled this far, you’ve earned cake, a sit-down, and permission to make whatever noise you like. If anyone asks, it was the chair.

So, here we are DH and me: slightly softer, slightly rounder, slightly unsure what day it is… but still here. Surviving. Thriving (if your definition of thriving includes pyjamas and leftover blue cheese wheels).

Currently, my fridge is a bit of a somewhat traumatised ecosystem with depressed veg looking like they’ve witnessed things they shouldn’t speak of. There’s a tub of two of something beige that might be humous, or possibly custard, and I’ve decided we will not be investigating too closely. I eat the odd tangerine chosen alongside Quality Street and bread-based meals to show I can still make good decisions!

From The Studio

OK so a possible fail on new stuff for this newsletter. There’s already something out in the world: one of my Windrush pieces is currently on show (image below left) with the Royal Birmingham Society of Artists, and it’s been a real boost to remember that creativity did happen, even if December mostly felt like a long nap.

RBSA Galleries

4 Brook Street
St. Paul’s Square
Birmingham
B3 1SA

(Opening Hours: Tuesday – Saturday 10.30am – 5.00pm) From 8th Jan 2026 to 7th Feb 2026.

Here’s a link to a new challenge I thought I'd do for fun

The link is to Laura’s sketchbook challenge I mentioned in the last newsletter; very low stress, very playful, and absolutely perfect for nudging myself back into making without pressure. Expect rubbings, collage, ink splodges and the odd questionable decision, which I’ll bravely share here as evidence of effort.

Please do join us all if you fancy it, or perhaps just keep tuning in to see how long I last!

Anyway until I get going, and can move off the sofa….

…. may your fridge be navigable, your pyjamas resilient, and your sense of humour intact. We’ve made it through the big sparkle. Now we just have to drift gently toward New Year, like festive shipwreck survivors on a raft made primarily of shortbread.

Now I know I said I wouldn’t mither you until the new year, but I wondered if you were looking for something artistic to do over the holidays and all of next year? I’ve done an extra newsletter to tell you about this and see if you’d like to join in.

When I was a very small girl, about 6, my mother gave me a book of Grimms Fairy Tales that she had won at school - she did tell me why she won it but I can’t remember: Bestist Speller? Most Astute Example Of What Can Be Achieved With Good Posture. Unfortunately in those days - 1935ish - it was probably more like: most likely to make a cracking scone, most likely to be married at 16, Miss outstanding legs in a sensible skirt etc. All very character building I’m sure and the last three were certainly achieved!

I was reminded of that gift this morning while wandering around Compton Verney Art Gallery, where I somehow found myself buying a copy of Six Fairy Tales from The Brothers Grimm with illustrations by David Hockney. The drawings are beautifully simple, very modern, and just the right side of strange — as all the best fairy tales are.

And because I clearly cannot be trusted to behave sensibly in any situation, I also apparently signed myself up for a 2026 sketchbook challenge at the same sort of time. The aim: fill a sketchbook every month. (Do feel free to gasp in disbelief here.)

Madness? Quite possibly.
A triumph of excitement over commitment? Almost certainly.
Bonkers beyond belief? Oh, absolutely.

But then I thought- perhaps I could take pages from that battered old Grimm’s book and illustrate the stories myself. Not “serious” work. Not “worthy” work. Just playful, curious, slightly ridiculous fun. And honestly, that feels like a rather wonderful way to begin the year.

Click below if you’d also like to investigate this collective bout of artistic optimism.

https://substack.com/home/post/p-180897446

There are 335 pages remaining in this book (no idea where the first 35 are) and some original illustrations (which I’ll keep obvs) but as book binding is another mild interest of mine, I’ll also make a little book for each story and that should keep me going for a year. Some of the stories are quite gruesome so that’ll be fun.

So here we go: one slightly battered book, one over-optimistic promise, and one year of playful mischief ahead. If this sounds even vaguely like your kind of madness, consider this your official summons. Sharpen your pencils, dust off your imagination, and step into the woods with me — I suspect the wolves have excellent stories to tell.