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Programs 2024 – 2025
- June 2025 – Kim McCormack: Stitching My Place. Kim began her creative journey studying fine art printmaking at Grays School of Art, later moving into fabric-based printmaking while at Chelsea College of Art. Now working primarily in embroidery and botanical print processes inspired by her natural surroundings, her work reflects a deep connection to place, seasonality, and personal history. You can see her work on her website at https://kimberleymactextiles.co.uk/embroideries/
- May 2025 – Kate Tarling: As a self-taught artist Kate states, “…my textile work reflects my early career – my maps are all about a sense of place and stitching memories into a landscape. Stitched Maps – How, Why and Where? will be the topic of Kate’s presentation. You can discover more on her website at https://www.katetarlingtextiles.com/images
- April 2025 – Roberta Wagner: “I have used many mediums to make art over the past 40 years including ceramics, paint, textiles, and stitch. Most of my work is inspired by landscapes and skyscapes both real and imagined.” Roberta’s book Come Walk With Me: Why Art Matters” has received rave reviews. You can find out more about Ms. Wagner on her website at https://www.robertawagner.com/blog
- March 2025 – Emily Tull: Stitching A Spotlight On The Underdog will be the topic of Emily’s presentation. Emily’s artwork often features recycled materials like paper and plastic, emphasizing the vulnerable side of life. Despite having no formal training, Emily found that hand stitching gave her the control she craved. You can visit her website at https://www.emilytull.co.uk/
- February 2025 – Fleur Woods: “Stitched Paintings is the term I use to describe my style of work….Stitch for me has become a source of joyful mark making that allows me to express my reverence for nature through colour, texture and form.” She invites us to review her recent book The Untamed Thread. https://www.fleurwoodsart.com/about
- January 2025 – Mirjam Gielen – Stacked Running Stitch on 3D Objects. Marjam is a textile artist inspired by nature, especially by its patterns and textures, who likes exploring, looking at details and finding similarities with her own inner nature. Using techniques like embroidery, eco printing, crochet etcetera her goal is to make sustainable art, using eco dyeing, eco printing and organic or reclaimed fabrics and threads. You can find her on Instagram at https://www.instagram.com/mirjamtextiles/?hl=en or join her on Patreon, a creator community.
- December 2024 – Kat Diuguid – Into the Weeds – Katherine Diuguid is a studio artist specializing in hand embroidery, dressmaking, and textiles. Her current work investigates color theory and color interactions within stitching, especially goldwork embroidery. More information about Katherine and her work can be found here: http://katherinediuguid.squarespace.com
- November 2024 – Nicola Jarvis – Life in Seasons “Life in Seasons is a fascinating documentary of how Nicola collaborated with Inspirations Magazine to create a stunning book series inspired by the natural world near her Warwickshire home. Her deep knowledge of decorative embroidery and passion for natural history have culminated in a story of a year in the country through a series of stitched wildlife projects. This is Nicola’s tale of walking with her golden retriever ‘Quince’ in the changing seasons, and showcases the wild animals that she encounters along the way.” Nicola’s website can be found at here. Nicola’s embroidery kits can be viewed at https://www.nicolajarvisstudio.co.uk/category/all-products
- October 2024 – Sue Rangely – Embroidery Atelier More information about Sue’s studio and her work can be found here.
- September 2024 – Catherine Nicholls – Findings – will take you on what started as a 100 day project challenge and became so much more. How a little conversation over lunch turned into a project that has completely absorbed Catherine for well over the 100 days intended. Careful observation, reviving old skills and a few new ones, this project has left a mark on its maker and encouraged new work in similar directions.
PROGRAMS 2023 – 2024
- September 2023 – Jennifer Collier – Paper Techniques
- October 2023 – Jenni Dutton – Dementia Darnings
- November 2023 – Helen Hallows – Beyond the Sketchbook
- December 2023 – No Speaker
- January 2024 – Sandra Sawatsky – The Black Gold Tapestry – Sandra will talk about the inspiration and process of creating a tapestry depicting the saga of oil and energy transition. Various sections of the 67 meter tapestry will be included in her presentation. More information can be found here: https://www.theblackgoldtapestry.com/
- March 2024 – Thomas Roach – Spiritual Stitched Stories. Thomas taught himself to sew at age six because he couldn’t draw. Many years later he is still stitching, dyeing and using cloth as a medium to explore spiritual themes and community stories. You can find out more about his creative process and various projects at his website http://www.thomasroach.ca His latest exhibit “The Craft of Spirit” is now showing until March 31, 2024. More information can be found here: https://www.italianculturalcentre.ca/current-exhibition
- April 2024 – Tricia Wilson Nguyen Story Behind the Casket: A Four Season Casket. Tricia has been embroidering since she was a little girl. She comes from a long line of creative women who embroider, quilt or sew. We will hear from her via a YouTube recording. Follow her on her blog here: https://thistle-threads.blogspot.com/
- April 2024 – Vennie Chow – Medicinal Colours. Vennie will be presenting a discussion during our Thursday Stitch-In this month.
- May 2024 – Marie-Claude Tremblay – The Bayeaux Tapestry. During our online Chapter meeting Marie-Claude, a guild member, will be presenting her studies of this world famous tapestry taken during a course offered at Simon Fraser University.
PROGRAMS 2022-2023
- September 2022 – Marie-Renee Otis – Retrospective of Works. Embroideries of magical women, subjects of nature, stitch abstractions, pure exploration of the material. Works use fibres and textiles from different countries blended with goldwork material, beads, jewellery and elements of nature. Many traditional techniques are used to create contemporary works.
- October 2022 – Claudia Kistler – Perforated Paper Needlework. See the creativity of counted thread pieces worked on specific “fabric” that was once very popular but is almost forgotten today. Between 1840 and 1900 a popular needlework pastime for both children and adults was stitching on perforated paper. In this lecture you will see an overview of the history and different types of perforated paper needlework.
- November 2022 – No Speaker – Guild Garage Sale
- December 2022 – No Speaker – Christmas Luncheon
- January 2023 – Sue Stone – Woman With A Fish – Imagined Stories. Sue Stone is a UK based textile artist who is best known for textural, figurative compositions that often feature a fish. “A short introduction to myself and my narrative work including the techniques I use and where I find my inspiration. An in depth look at pieces in my Imagined Journeys series including how I combine images to convey ideas and the stories behind some of the individual pieces.
- February 2023 – Ruth Singer – Criminal Quilts is an art & heritage project inspired by photographs and documents relating to women held in Stafford Prison 1877-1916, created and developed by Ruth in partnership with Staffordshire Record Office.
- March 2023 – Irma Frijlink – “The history of women in the last century.”
- April 2023 – Nell Burns – Nell Burns is an award-winning contemporary textile artist, who specializes in free form machine embroidery. She essentially draws and paints with thread, using the needle as a pencil, and the fabric as a canvas. Her artwork contains sculptural elements, using fabrics and stabilizers to create 3D art. For more info click.
- May 2023 – Sharon Peoples – Freeform X Stitch
- June 2023 – Jo Hoffman – The Art of Noticing
PROGRAMS 2021-2022
- September 2021 – Pamela Robertson – Museum of North Vancouver Tour – Virtual Tour of MONVA: Our Fall season starts on September 9 with a virtual tour of the new Museum of North Vancouver, scheduled to open in late 2021. Located in the Shipyards District at 115 West Esplanade, North Vancouver, MONOVA is a brand new 16,000 sq.ft. facility where they plan to ignite curious minds through powerful stories of North Vancouver.
- October 2021 – Jill Taylor – Metal Thread Embroidery, from Ancient to Modern. Everyone has always loved bling! In her presentation ‘Metal Thread Embroidery, from ancient to modern’ Jill Taylor takes us from 330BC to today’s catwalks. We shall discover Anglo Saxon goldwork and Medieval ‘Opus Anglicanum’ masterpieces. Metal thread traditions from the Middle East to the Far East are explored and we shall see how Royal weddings, contemporary embroiderers and today’s fashion houses have kept the skills alive.
- November 2021 – Caroline Nixon – Eco-Print and Stitch. Caroline is a textile artist. She works with natural dyes and botanical contact printing ( ecoprinting), which is a contemporary adaptation of the ancient art of dyeing with plant based pigments. Using this technique she makes wearable art, books, wall art and home textiles, capturing the beauty of nature using the pigments and imprints of the leaves themselves – no synthetic ink, dyes or silk screens are involved. Hand and free machine stitch are used for embellishment, producing complex patterned cloth. The naturally occurring colours are soft and harmonious, and the process is non polluting and respectful of the environment. Despite the natural processes used, the textiles are colourfast and washable. [Source: Westoxarts.com]
- December 2021 – Edwina McKinnon – Colour Stories. Colouring fabrics is Edwina’s passion and she will share with us the many ways she dyes, prints and creates many special effects on cloth.
- January 2022 – Amanda Corbett – Fungi in Stitch. Amanda is a textile artist who explores 3-dimensional, papier-mâché and machine-embroidered sculptures. During her daily dog walk Amanda scours the understorey of the forest floor seeking its hidden treasures, photographing and collecting fallen debris. Over time, she has honed an inherent ability to locate intriguing flora in the most unexpected of places. Back at the studio, she ‘draws’ with the sewing machine needle into a dissolvable fabric, and by building up layers of thread creates a new fabric that she moulds into textile copies of the natural world.
- February 2022 – Richard Box – Drawing for the Terrified. Are you terrified of drawing but secretly long to learn how? Richard Box has an approach that will steady your nerves and build drawing ability and confidence. You will be amazed at what you will be able to draw by following his method. Richard is the author of a number of books on drawing and design. Above all, the course is to be considered as your first step towards a lifetime’s adventure discovering the nature of colour and tone.
- March 2022 – Catherine Nicholls – Designing the Canadian Embroidery Tapestry The Canadian Embroidery Tapestry was first conceived by Embroidery Canada in May of 2014 as a way to acknowledge Canada’s 150th birthday in 2017. Helen McCrindle, the tireless facilitator and project lead gave Catherine Nicholls the great privilege of designing the tapestry. It was a unique (and mind bending!!) challenge to capture all of Canada in a design that could be stitched by the Embroidery Canada members from coast to coast to coast. This presentation will give a little peek behind the scenes to the design process- some of the ideas that worked and a few that didn’t! Catherine will talk about the significance of each and every part of the design and how she attempted to capture the feel, humour and joy of our 9.9 million kilometre square country in 2 stitched panels totaling a little over a meter square.
- April 2022 – In person Show and Tell
- May 2022 – In person Show and Tell
- June 2022 – Linda Spence – Protein Fibre Dye Techniques
PROGRAMS 2020 – 2021
- September 2020 – cancelled due to covid
- October 2020 – Janey Chang – Gifts from the Salmon: Reviving an Ancestral Skill – The making of salmon skin leather is an almost forgotten ancient skill that many coastal and river communities in the Northern Hemisphere once practiced. Janey Chang is a Fish Skin Leather Revivalist and Ancestral Skills Artist exploring the old ways of living as a means to connect with her Chinese ancestral lineage. She will share some of the ways that fish leather was used around the world, as well as some of her own personal projects, and will also demonstrate some of the steps of the process of fish skin leather tanning.Salmon Skin Leather Tanning
- November 2020 – Show & tell by Zoom
- December 2020 – Christmas & Flight charm Challenge
- January 2021 – Susan Purney Mark– Icelandic Retreat. Susan will talk about her recent artist retreat in Iceland.
- February 2021 – Debbie Lyddon – Inspiration Sensing Place. Inspired by natural phenomena – air, wind, water, light and sound – in the environment.
- March 2021 – Catherine Nichols– Photographing & Preparing your Artwork for showing
- April 2021 – Monique Choptuik – Game of Thrones Costumes: A Closer Look at the Embroidery. — If you love beaded embroidery, stump work, ribbon embroidery and heraldic embroidery you won’t want to miss this!
- May 2021 – Marie Claude Tremblay – The Kimono Project, 2020 Summer Olympics. The Kimono Project, launched in 2014, was initiated by the Imagine One World organization when Japan was awarded the 2020 Summer Olympic & Paralympic Games. The project, led by Yoshimasa Takakura, president of Choya and 3rd generation Kimono maker, commissioned the making 213 kimono and obi representing all of the countries participating in the games. All of the kimono and obi were made by Japanese designers except for 2. The obi for the Palestinial kimono was created by refugees using embroidery as their primary technique. The kimono designed for Indonesia was made using batik techniques. (from Wikipedia)
- June 2021 – Anne Brooke – For the love of Stitch – Anne’s talk will reveal the story of her inspiration through to the realization of stitched collage and other work. The talk covers a brief history of her journey, but mainly focuses on 2021 to present day and the development of #sew4thesoul during the year and how she became more obsessed with stitch. The talk reflects the background to her work focusing on the development of workbooks and sketchbooks.
