Oh the joy of textiles!
It is vital for me that I find interesting and unusual things. Adapting traditional designs to western tastes enables aid projects, and fair trade employers to continue to produce saleable products, keeping people employed and crafts constantly rejuvenated. After many years now of working in India, I feel I have still only scratched the surface. While I try to visit new places and new designers, there is still much to see and do!

Travelling has not only opened my eyes to a myriad of religions, cultures, and climates, it has shown me a wealth of textiles I was hungry to enjoy. Over the years, I have learnt spinning and weaving along with a variety of other textile crafts but have never found myself particularly gifted in any of them!

The marvels of arts and crafts in India has dazzled and exhausted me! There are so many unassuming, skilled people producing treasures based on deeply rooted traditions which govern the lives of castes, whole social groups, as well as the individual. Here I have met people producing exquisite pieces with little more regard or notice of them than I have for something familiar and routine.

Although I have eyes for every gamut of Indian
society - faces and costumes, temples, palaces,
landscapes, the smell of fresh rice cooking,
the colour of the dust in the air as the sun goes
down, professional beggars, children flying kites,
river side cremations, the heat of July, street
dogs passing nonchalantly that elephant and
camel on the busy street, it is textiles for me
that are my true love.