Juliette Orton

Yesterday I went into London to attend an AQA A-Level Textiles Art & Design Standardisation course - in a nutshell, this is the exam board ensuring that the teachers understand what an  'A' grade should look like (and other grades too!). It's a pretty intense day with lots of concentration required so as a bit of light relief afterwards, I decided to go to the Knitting & Stitching Show at Olympia. I'm not sure what to make of it really. I've been to lots of shows over the years, Initially as a student participating in events like New Designers, then as a Buyer with visits to Top Drawer and the NEC and then as a Designer/Maker/Teacher to shows like Origin/Kirsty's Handmade Fair/Art in Action/Craft/MADE etc. Whilst I recognise that the K&S show is not selling itself as an Art Show but more somewhere for anyone with an interest in sewing to pick up resources and tips, I have to say I found it all a little confusing. It took me (and others) a lit...

I recently gave a talk to the Bedford Embroiderers' Guild and as I presented my sketchbooks and artworks many of the attendees admitted that they just didn't know where to start with new ideas.  I explained how I went about it and how sometimes inspiration can come from the most unexpected places - such as a cup of coffee! In this instance I just loved the shapes that the milk foam formed (or 'Latte Art' as those in the know call it apparently!) and as I am a lover of nature instantly saw an emerging bud with beautifully veined leaves. This led me to open my sketchbook and start drawing and developing the shapes. I loved the flowing forms and started to think of different media that I could use to explore them further. I used wire to recreate the shapes and bound threads and papers around them to add colour and texture. I also used scrunched up magazine pages (with floral images) and machine stitching to present the shapes in another way. ...

Having taken part in several Open Studio events, I have come to realise how much people do like to look at a sketchbook. I find creating the books a hugely enjoyable process and I'm still referring back to and using some of the imagery from the ones I did some 25 years ago! In this post I thought I would give you a quick flick through my 'Marine Life' book which is a more recent creation and helped to inspire my 'Shoal' and 'Sea Garden' ranges. Once I've chosen a theme I generally do a mind map and look at all the different areas I could explore within that theme. Over the next 5-10 pages I play around with different images, textures, media and scale to explore the possibilities. I also like to focus on a few artists or designers that inspire me too and may relate to my theme. I might do a few pages combining their style with mine and my theme and see what happens. I recently wrote an article for 'Workshop on the Web'...

I spent some time at my Mum's in Sussex over Easter helping her sort through bits and pieces from our family history. She is thinking of moving house this year which means going through 25+ years of 'stuff'! We came across some real treasures such as the family bible from the 1800s which I had never seen before. There was a page for births, deaths and marriages with numerous entries in beautiful handwriting and a lot of details about my ancestors which were fascinating. It turns out that I am a descendant of the Clark family who produced Clark & Co's sewing threads in the 1800s and James Clark who invented the technique used to produce a spooled cotton thread (as opposed to skeins) which we know today as the cotton reel.    Mum also showed me this amazing picture of what looks like a painting of Charles I but is in fact an embroidery that was produced by a family member called Wright Battye (!) to demonstrate the superior quality of Clark & ...