Friends of Haptic & Hue

In this month’s Travels with Textiles, Georgina von Etzdorf, one of the most talented textile designers to come out of Britain since William Morris, tells us how she began as a designer and why she and her partners have decided to sell their incredible archive. We also hear about Phoebe Anna Traquair, an extraordinary artist who in the late 19th and early 20th century spent nearly ten years creating a series of embroideries called The Progress of the Soul. And we go back to Venice to celebrate the publication of the Textile Guide to Venice.

Welcome to March’s Travels with Textiles, the podcast just for Friends of Haptic & Hue, with Jo Andrews and Bill Taylor. In this month’s episode we look at the most extensive collection of Bronze Age textiles and fibres found so far in the UK at a site that has been called Britain’s Pompeii. We also hear about the changing lives of Morocco’s rug weavers and we say farewell to the last of the Canadian wartime quilters who died this month aged 102.

Welcome to February’s Travels with Textiles, the podcast just for Friends of Haptic & Hue, with Jo Andrews and Bill Taylor. In this month’s episode we commemorate the first women to go to university in Britain, through a ground-breaking new 3D tapestry triptych woven by Dovecot Studios. We also hear about the history of jumble and rummage sales and its origins in the Victorian era. Lastly, we find out how the queen of mending, Kate Sekules, transformed hundred of pairs of old, holey, socks into art.

For the poor of the Victorian era the fun and interesting jumble or rummage sales were a serious business and a vital resource to help find the clothes necessary to send their children to school and dress themselves. Emma Donovan’s new research explores their hidden stories and origins dating back to the Victorians.

Look at a painting and what do you see – a great work of art or a textile? New research done by Helena Loermans, a Dutch weaver living in Portugal, shows that far from being plain woven canvas, pictures by some of the best-known Old Masters like Caravaggio, Titian, El Greco and Velasquez were painted onto complex hand woven linen. In a new interview, Helena discusses her project.

Haptic & Hue and Gray MCA have collaborated to make a new film about the visionary textile designer Barbara Brown in celebration of her 90th Birthday. Barbara Brown was one of the best known textile designers of the mid-20th century. Her strongly geometric work was the very essence of 60s art and style and today is highly sought after by collectors.

Venice is one of the great textile cities of the world. For centuries it was a centre of intense cultural activity and exchange across the Mediterranean. Venice has always been a place where original design and superb craftsmanship is prized and rewarded. That is still true today. You can discover the traditional lace makers and the carnival costume creators, the private collections where you can see antique embroidery and handwoven silks, and find the last studio in Venice where they weave figured velvets by hand.
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Lyon is a fantastic city for the traveller interested in textiles. It is the birthplace of the famous Jacquard loom and was once the beating heart of Europe’s luxury textile industry. Thousands of silk weavers once made this their home turning out some of the finest fabrics of the day. There is a huge amount to explore, from historic silk weavers’ studios to secret passageways that wind their way under the old houses. Along with it comes a great deal of good food!

Haptic & Hue and Textile Tours of Paris have just published a wonderful guide for the discerning traveller interested in textiles to the best that Dublin has to offer. Textile Travels Dublin tells you about the fine tweeds and woollens, the quality weaving and tailoring, Irish lace and fabric drawn from the colours and light of the Irish landscape. It is all here, waiting to be discovered.