Lark & Bower

03/09/2026

Among Friends, 2025, Weardale

03/09/2026

Process captured by Jessica Man 🙏🏼🥰

03/09/2026

I'm very much looking forward to experimenting with other base shapes soon. Who said weaving had to be straight?!

02/09/2026

We left these little woven rocks in Weardale last April after spending a month there working on the book. I wonder if anyone found them. Those mossy stone walls were to die for 🥰

02/09/2026

This one is still waiting for me in the studio - I'm getting itchy fingers!

02/09/2026

25/08/2026

We've come full circle!

Our advance copy of the book arrived at our house the day after we left for the Lakes - but my wonderful mother in law sent it on to us here, and now I am reading it at the same table a chunk of it was written at 🥰

It is by complete coincidence that we are staying in the same cottage again - and we didn't know the book was coming so it feels very nice, to be sat here with the real book in my hands finally after more than two years!

And of course little Wilbur has joined us this year too!

Many firsts for him on this trip; rolling from front to back, passing objects from one hand to the other, first time facing out in the carrier (a big hit), first mountain climb, first taste of a carrot 🥕 and a lick of Dal.

A first for me; breastfeeding in a carpark 🤣

04/08/2026

Isn't the 3/3 twill amazing?! One simple structure, sooooo many patterns!

I learnt how to weave on a loom. First a table loom, then a huge floor loom with a big old pedal (the type where you end up with one muscly leg and one not 😂), then a computerised one, then a jacquard, then an industrial one, and back to a big old floor loom (but with two pedals this time for equally toned legs 😂).

But I don't think I properly understood the magic, the potential, the miraculousness of woven structure until I started weaving with needle and thread during the covid lockdowns.

The 'up close' nature of it helped me to really get to grips with the overs and unders, to make real sense of it. Many an 'aha! moment' was had on the sofa at home with my bits of cardboard and hotel sewing kit 😂 (whilst quietly panicking about what was going to happen to my loom weaving business)

I did always find loom weaving magical - for the rhythm, the repetitive actions, the sounds of the shafts lifting and dropping, the cloth growing and growing before your eyes. I love them both for different things 🥰

27/07/2026

One of the chapters in my upcoming book is called 𝘼𝙣 𝙊𝙙𝙚 𝙏𝙤 𝙐𝙣𝙛𝙞𝙣𝙞𝙨𝙝𝙚𝙙𝙣𝙚𝙨𝙨.

Over the years (mostly during workshops or visits to textile groups) I have chatted with many people about unfinished projects and I noticed some anxiety around it.

During the research for my book I sent out a survey to as many crafty people as possible to ask them about their experiences as makers.

Many people felt they couldn't justify starting something new until they had finished their current ones, even if they felt inspired or had a great idea.

Some felt guilty about how many projects sat unfinished and untouched for long periods in their homes or craft rooms.

But others shared stories about projects that had been a work in progress, continuing to bring them joy over many years.

In her book Craft Psychology, Dr Anne Kirketerp suggests that having multiple projects on the go, of differing levels of complexity, allows us to pick up something that suits us on any day. Something simple for when we are tired, something more complex for when we are craving a challenge.

Sometimes it is easier to pick up and continue something that is already started, than feeling the intimidation of starting something new. (You know, that first blank page of a sketchbook feeling)

What constitutes a finished artwork, anyway? You are the artist, you can decide.

You may consider an artwork finished, but end up returning to it later to work on it some more.

You might decide that a 'half finished' painting is in fact finished, if you prefer the composition that has emerged half way through your process.

Sometimes there is more beauty in the process than there is in the finished article.

How do you feel about your 'unfinished' projects?

24/07/2026

Exploring colour pairings via Dogtooth 👌🏼🧶🪡

Reclaimed wool from Fairfield Yarns, Heywood, UK. All from textiles mills in the UK who are getting rid of it for one reason or another; old stock, colour imperfections, discontinued lines, end cones, half cones, mills shutting down.

If you ever get the chance to visit David's shop, you won't regret it - it's like a sweet shop - or a better comparison would be an old bookshop but instead of books it's yarn, lining the walls from floor to ceiling, big troughs full in the middle of each room as well as well organised 'piles' here and there. Heaven!!! Before Wilbur was born I used to make the trip once a year, and come home with a car full, which I used for all my workshops, kits, and my own work too.