About Susan
Susan has been teaching embroidery for many years and loves to share her enthusiasm for a wide range of techniques.
She completed her City and Guilds Part II in Embroidery with the inspirational Anthea Godfrey at the London College of Fashion (as it then was). Over the past twenty years, she has taught a wide range of classes including City and Guilds and leisure classes, with the WI, and most recently independently in the Wivenhoe and the Colchester area of Essex.
Susan took early retirement in 2013, giving her more time for embroidery and textile related activities. She enjoys being an active participant in the local branch of the Embroiderers’ Guild, visiting more exhibitions, attending workshops and reading more about her favourite textile art topics both in print and on-line.
She has also become a student again, signing up for the City and Guilds in Patchwork and Quilting with Creative Stitch Suffolk. According to Susan, “It’s been great to take on new challenges and learn new skills.”
Susan blogs regularly on her website, Threadlines, where she gathers together various elements of her long-standing fascination with embroidery and textile arts more generally. Her hope is that Threadlines will widen her circle of embroidery and textile art friends, and encourage non-embroiderers to try it – just once (that’s all it takes!
Signature Technique
Embroidery
Susan’s Top Tips
- The simpler the stitch, often, the more you can do with it.
- One of the (many) aspects of textiles that I love is that you don’t need to be doing just one project. Try new things…several at a time!
- Doing something completely new with a group of friends makes it extra special.
- If you want to know the ‘right’ way to embroider then turn to a technique manual.
Books and Patterns
Posts
Piping a cushion
Hi, I have just followed Jennie Rayment's video on piping for a cushion, and am delighted with the result. It is something I have avoided all my life (I am 64!) and now I cannot for the life of me understand why I was so afraid of it.
The piping I have done is, in fact, for the edging of the P&Q magazine project "Hand Quilting for All", which simply tells you to buy piping cord and insert into the bias strips (which I had just cut following the instructions). I bought 5mm cord hoping that was right. I now cannot wait to try it out on a cushion.
Beach Hut Prize Winner
Here is the lovely quilt as made by Carole, who was the lucky winner; and here is what she had to say: It was great to have all the instructions written out for me in a logical order. I made plenty of mistakes but what a great learning experience it was. Thank you once again Of course we can't see the mistakes - so well done Carole, it looks lovely.
New newsletter format
The new format was sent out on Friday 18th Oct -here is what one lady said:
A wonderful new layout. It is so easy to find ones way around. I love it !
but did you get yours? If not please let us know. Also if you are using an Ipad did you get the rh column downloaded?