Slow Work – making the upcycled cotton mosaic jacket – during a Season and a bit…

Slow in conception and execution.  My first objective was to use a bright piece of cotton muslin inherited from someone else’s stash – someone’s discard becomes precious to me (association of absence-presence and connection, which I’ll discuss below).  Other muslins of the same weight were hard to source.  So, I decided to see what was in my ‘not worn but serviceable’ bag.  (Since our downsize move a year ago, I had divided my clothing into ‘still wearing’, which was now hanging in the closet, or ‘not worn but maybe later’ still in bags in the shed.  I admit I find it hard to discard clothing).  I discovered two Indian cotton voile skirts not worn for quite some time and just right for the project.  Then I recalled a piece I’d cut off a long shirt (which I’d worn threadbare) in another bag of offcuts and fabrics, and gleefully discovered the cut-off was still spangled new.  So, lots of fabric was fossicked – enough for two projects I decided – a mosaic scarf as a test piece for the bigger project of jacket. 

Then began the work of unpicking to free the fabrics from their original shape and incarnation.  

This was done at the dining table since I had no other space.  Piecing together the new fabric – done at one point with my Mum and I hosting impromptu visitors.  It was tedious and fun at the same time because I had companionship and conversation.  The trouble with working on the dining table is that it is in a mess and things must be pushed to one side when you want to sit down and have a meal.  But on the positive, I am still in the hub of things.  I did my ‘doodles’ of how I had pieced the scarf and fabric for the jackets, to work out the colours and patterns.

If I look at my timeline for these projects – I started in late June and it’s half way through September and I have just put finishing touches to my jacket.  So, almost a season and a bit spent making two items.  Philip would say ‘not a very efficient’ way of working.  All the same, it’s been great to have a project where I could stay in the warmth of the kitchen, as opposed to the cold shed where I felt. 

The ‘making’ becomes an experience.  It’s not only about making a product but the time you take to think, dream, remember, converse and share reminisces while you unpick and piece together again, and as in my case also, form my wool shapes, which I would later take up to the shed to arrange on the fabric pieces and felt.  I have constant interruptions by mundane life – planning menus and the shopping, cooking meals, caring duties (dispensing of medications to all, including our Maudie dog), other chores like laundry, ironing, cleaning, looking after the four-legged children and the feathered ones; as well as the business of the roller, answering email queries, finding time to post to social media, testing new bits for the roller.  At most times I am overwhelmed.  So, making ‘slow’ work is slowing down on so many levels.  But in this pressured world of social media where you’re encouraged to post every day, I am usually way behind and my FB page forgotten because I’m unable to keep up with the speed that others produce work.

Claire Wellesley Smith in her book Slow Stitch, Mindfulness and Contemplative Textile Art (2015, Batsford, UK) has one consider these aspects – ‘Unpick, Rework, Develop, Adapt, Revisit, Permanence Impermanence’ (in the section ‘Unpicking and reusing old projects’).  Though I have not reused an old project I have certainly unpicked, revisited and developed, adapted old fabrics. 

While unpicking I have considered where and when the clothes were originally purchased (the skirts close to 30 years ago, the shirt around 15 years) – they were worn by someone else (myself in another relationship, myself in another skin and it wasn’t a time when I cared about reusing and repurposing.  If I look back, I notice that I wasted quite a lot.  There were projects that were left incomplete.  I now long for those bags of fabrics that I discarded.)  The precious muslin which was someone else’s discard was dyed by Rae, who passed several years ago.  I like having her continued presence in my work.  Which brings me to ‘permanence/impermanence’.  Usually I take fragile fabrics and give them new permanence through the medium of felt but even this permanence is fragile and temporary.  When I sell pieces, I can’t be certain what their fates are.  They may well end up in land-fill.  Of course, with felting, I also incorporate the new – new merino and silk fibres and I require these new materials to give the old a second chance.  I have tended to use superfine merino but of late, I have discovered the ‘Bunny Lady’ Charly McCafferty of IxChel Fibres and Yarns.  Charly sources wool from rare breeds of sheep (even bison) and her carding of mixed fibres (mixing the old breeds with new ‘eco’ fibres such as Tencel and Bamboo) and her hand-dyeing is second to none.  I look forward to using more of her fibres as I develop ways to reuse fabric for felt-making.  For both the scarf and jacket I used Charly’s ‘Hungarian Rhapsody’ which combined Racka (a rare breed of Hungarian long-haired sheep) and Cashmere, Angora, Mulberry Silk and Tencel.  (Ixchel Angora Bunny & Funky Fibre Art)

When you start to ‘unpick’ or deconstruct a work, it can certainly have lots of layers of meaning.  The recycling (memories/emotions, associations evoked as you work).

The skills (or not) of the artisan in the original piece and the rework which enables you to employ your skills.  I like to make functional items – wearables – but I also like to incorporate stories (even if they remain intimate to me).  There were lots of stories shared between my mother and me (remember when I wore this?).  My mother sits at the table reading her French novels (and I have captured her in photos wearing some of my scarves).  Sometimes she stops to reminisce about my father, or she grieves because she misses him.  It’s probably the reason that women like to gather together while they sew and piece quilts – it’s about companionship, sharing, making connections, all while the hands are busy.  It’s certainly a kind of therapy and coming back to the self, as well as being present to those who work or sit alongside you.  My mother tells me ‘you’ll have a nice souvenir of me when I pass.’  Indeed.

It’s been inefficient work, but satisfying nonetheless, because the prolonged duration facilitates contemplation but even when I put the work down, the contemplation of it remains in the background tone of mundane life.  I always wish for more time because my creative work must be snatched in-between lots of other activities.