Unit Twelve is home to a contemporary craft gallery and artist
workshops.
It can be found on Tixhall Heath Farm in Staffordshire and is
best described as a hidden gem! Jennifer Collier runs the space and it has her
signature attention to detail everywhere. A bright exhibition space full of
exquisite textiles work greets you as you enter the converted farm building.
Just beyond the gallery is the workshop area and studios belonging to Jennifer Collier, Emily Notman, Louise Dawn Wilson, Julia Jowett and Brady & Proud.
I left home on a sunny Saturday morning in April and drove
down to Unit Twelve for a Fabric Keepsake Book workshop with the lovely Becky Adams. Becky is a quietly spoken and witty lady – I could happily listen to her
stories for hours! Her art work has a nostalgic feel and at the heart of
everything she makes is a snippet of a story or saying. Her ideas and
observations are translated into stitch and applique.
Becky had brought along selected sketchbooks and one of her
fabric books that focused upon her love of walks along her local pier. She was
very generous with her ideas and had a genuine interest in all the stories
behind each workshop participant’s creations. The premise of the workshop was
to make a fabric book that remembered a personal memory or family saying. We
had been encouraged to bring along our own memories such as a photograph,
souvenir and trinkets.
I had every intention of making a fabric book and decided
that my book would be based around my gardening grandad. I had brought along some
of his letters to work with. Just to note, he has written to me every week
since university (that is a lot of ink and stamps)! I have kept all his letters
and I really treasure them as a record of how both our lives have changed over
the years. I started off by making a miniature envelope out of an old gardening
book as I was going to incorporate an envelope into one of my fabric book pages.
However, I enjoyed the process and outcome so much that I decided to make
another one and another one. In the end, I had a pile of small paper envelopes
that I decorated with text and fabrics before stitching together to make a book.
I used Becky’s stamps to print ‘Dear Clare, love and best wishes grandad’ on to the paper as
these words are a feature of all his correspondence to me.
The day was a great success and everyone left with a book to
treasure. The beautiful fabric books that other workshop participants made can be seen below.
Many
thanks to Becky for being such a good teacher. Thanks also to Jennifer for
organising the day and thanks to Julia for being a superb hostess (ie plentiful
tea, cake and biscuits!).
