Re-worked Skill Swap: Dundee

So today Nicola is visiting Dundee and it's my turn to show her a little tricks of my textiley trade. I had hoped, now being a Designer in Residence at DJCAD, that I might take her on a grand old tour of the dye lab, mix up some dyes and make some lovely prints in the studio BUT then I am reminded of the ethos of Re-worked; being spontaneous and reactionary to our materials. So, this considered, I have chosen to host my workshop for Nicola in my home.

Our workspace for the day (my kitchen table) with a range of fabrics etc.

I plan to work with Nicola on a dye technique called Shibori (often regarded as tie-dye but with more to it!) in emulation of some of our natural rusty dyes.

Some Shibori making materials - we will use the polystyrene and string as resist markers.

We will also construct a couple of collars (in a similar vein that is demonstrated by this A Common Thread blog post) mostly by way of hand stitching and perhaps a tad sewing machine as I would like to show Nicola a little pattern cutting and fabric construction. We will design our collar shapes together and pattern cut original shapes a la this. (Thanks Google!)

A vintage collar that Nicola sent me previous is inspiration for this route.

Nicola's workshop was such a wonderfully comprehensive one stop shop of a range of jewellery and metal work techniques that I found my own a rather difficult feat to plan but given the steps we are making towards creating our final pieces, I feel the dye, embellishment and construction techniques I will share with Nicola today are apt in helping us realise Re-worked project. 

Exciting! Can't wait for her to arrive!