Making Stitches Podcast
78 episodes - English - Latest episode: about 1 month ago -A podcast celebrating creative crafts and inspiring makers.
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Episodes
A Decade of Keeping Calm and Crocheting On with Heather Gibbs
March 15, 2024 04:00 - 26 minutes - 18.5 MBTen years ago, Heather Gibbs was looking for an outlet for her crochet creativity and set up her blog; Keep Calm and Crochet On UK. Little did she know that her blog would be going from strength to strength a whole decade later, but that she would also end up working with a selection of different crochet magazines and yarn companies as well. In this latest episode of Making Stitches Podcast, I chatted to Heather about how the blog came about in the first place, how her design career firs...
WHY SEWING MATTERS with Barbara Burman
March 01, 2024 04:00 - 47 minutes - 33 MBHello and welcome to Making Stitches Podcast! My guest for this episode is the historian and writer, Barbara Burman, whose latest book is 'The Point of the Needle - Why Sewing Matters'. Barbara, a retired academic from the University of Southampton and the University of the Arts, spent more than 40 years teaching and researching the history of dress and textiles. In her latest book, Barbara takes an in-depth look at the social and cultural significance of sewing, drawing on contemporary v...
Spinning, Weaving and Niddy-Noddies with Cathy Wright from Lazy Kate Textiles
February 16, 2024 03:00 - 27 minutes - 19.1 MBWelcome to the first episode of Making Stitches in 2024! Sorry for the longer than anticipated break. This is the first of the final three episodes in series seven. This time, I’m sharing a chat I had late last year with Cathy Wright from Lazy Kate Textiles. Cathy’s a spinner and weaver sharing her love of creativity by teaching these heritage crafts to anyone who wants to learn. Based in Liverpool, Cathy sells the equipment needed to take up the crafts and runs workshops to show stud...
MAKING STITCHES 2023 CHRISTMAS SPECIAL
December 22, 2023 04:00 - 27 minutes - 18.7 MBHello there and welcome to the Making Stitches Podcast 2023 Christmas Special. Join me for a selection box of treats looking back at the past 12 months in my podcast world. You can hear from guests including Dr Mia Hobbs from the 'Why I Knit' Podcast on the mental health benefits of being creative, Dr Fran Darlington-Pollock from the Greater Manchester Mayor's Charity about their yarny Christmas appeal this year and some more of my guests from the podcast this year. Also joining me are some...
LOVING THE LANGUAGE OF CROCHET with Jane Czaja
December 08, 2023 04:00 - 33 minutes - 23 MBJane Czaja has been trying to spread the love of crochet for decades, from teaching beginners groups back in the 1980s to running a crochet and chat group in her local library now! Jane has always been a maker, and since her retirement from computer programming and lecturing students about it, she has turned her attention to crochet full time. You can find Jane's name in the credits of crochet books, through her work as technical editor, she also does tech editing work for Inside Crochet a...
Deck the Halls with the Greater Manchester Mayor's Charity
November 24, 2023 04:00 - 15 minutes - 10.5 MBThis time on Making Stitches Podcast, I want to share a great initiative which is happening in my home city of Manchester. Homelessness is a problem all year round in towns and cities across the world, not just here in the UK and it's a complex problem to solve. Greater Manchester Mayor's Charity was set up after our Mayor, Andy Burnham was elected. He chose to donate a percentage of his monthly wage to combatting rough sleeping across the city, and it was thanks to that the Greater Manche...
THE GREAT NORTHERN TEXTILE SHOW 2023
November 10, 2023 17:00 - 44 minutes - 30.8 MBHello and welcome to this latest episode of Making Stitches Podcast where I'm taking you out on the road with me to the second Great Northern Textile Show which happened a couple of weeks ago in Manchester. You'll hear from a selection of traders who brought their products to sell to visitors, several crafts guilds and three hugely talented textile artists who were invited to exhibit their work. In this episode I also spoke to the really inspiring Taslima from CDM UK Manchester which works ...
Black Sheep Wools at 40 & looking ahead to the Great Northern Textile Show 2023
October 27, 2023 03:00 - 30 minutes - 20.7 MBBack in July, Black Sheep Wools, the largest independent yarn shop in the UK celebrated its 40th birthday. Friends of Black Sheep Wools were invited to join in with a two-day-long birthday party at the Craft Barn in Culcheth, Warrington. I went along to join the festivities and this episode shares a little bit of what went on. You can find the Black Sheep Wools website here, they are also on Instagram and Facebook. This weekend, the Great Northern Textile Show is back at Urmston in Manch...
KNITTING IS THERAPEUTIC with Dr Mia Hobbs
October 13, 2023 03:00 - 32 minutes - 22.1 MBWhen clinical psychologist, Dr Mia Hobbs, was studying at university, her mother suggested taking up knitting would be a great antidote for intensive study. Mia took her Mum's advice and started knitting a shawl which grew gradually as she worked. From then on, knitting became an important activity for Mia and over time crossed over into her work with colleagues and patients both within the NHS and private practice. Mia became so intrigued by the positive impact working with your hands can ...
From Food Styling to Sewing with Jen Rich
September 29, 2023 03:00 - 36 minutes - 25.3 MBHello and welcome back to Making Stitches Podcast, it's so good to be back with you. I had to take and extended break from podcasting due to a lot of 'stuff' going on, but I'm thrilled to be back with you now with the first episode of Series 7! My guest this time is Jen Rich, a food stylist & photographer who bought her first sewing machine back in the days of Covid lockdown. Just three years on from teaching herself how to sew, Jen has written a book called 'Stitch: Sewing Projects for the...
MAKING STITCHES PODCAST SERIES 7 TRAILER
September 15, 2023 15:00 - 4 minutes - 3.03 MBHello! Making Stitches is coming back very soon for a 7th series. Among my guests in the coming weeks will be food stylist & photographer turned sewing designer Jen Rich to talk about her new book aimed at beginners and established sewists alike, I'll take you along to the Black Sheep Wools 40th birthday weekend and clinical psychologist and knitter, Dr Mia Hobbs from Why I Knit Podcast will be speaking to me about the therapeutic benefits of crafts. I can't wait to bring you these creativ...
TAPESTRY CROCHET with CATHERINE CROCHETS
July 07, 2023 03:00 - 24 minutes - 16.6 MBWay back in December 2022 I promised you this episode of Making Stitches with crochet designer Catherine from Catherine Crochets. Unfortunately, life rather got in the way of those plans, so now, six months later than originally promised is the final episode of the current series of Making Stitches. Catherine got hooked on crochet while expecting her second child and since then, her passion for tapestry crochet has grown and grown. Her designs have been featured in books and magazines and...
2022 CHRISTMAS & NEW YEAR SPECIAL PART 2 : REVIEW OF THE YEAR
December 30, 2022 04:00 - 29 minutes - 20.2 MBIt's that time again, as 2022 draws to a close, I'm taking you on a romp through this year's Making Stitches back catalogue with a few of my highlights. You can hear from Figen Murray, Amanda Bloom from Cosy Life Boxes, Rafael Alcaide from Amoami, Beth Gillions, Conservation Officer at the People's History Museum, Eleonora Tulley from Coastal Crochet, highlights from the first Great Northern Textile Show, Leah Higgins, Tracy Fox and Kitey from the Yarn Whisperer. This year, Making Stitches...
2022 CHRISTMAS & NEW YEAR SPECIAL PART 1 : OLD FRIENDS
December 23, 2022 04:00 - 30 minutes - 20.7 MBIn this, the first of two Christmas and New Year specials this year, I catch up with a few old friends of the podcast: Lisa & Lynda-Rose from The Crochet Sanctuary (my first ever guests on Making Stitches) and Christine Perry, otherwise known as Winwick Mum, who first appeared back in Episode 31). We look back at what's been happening in the worlds of The Crochet Sanctuary and sock knitting in 2022 as well as their plans for 2023, and what they are hoping to achieve with their New Year's R...
Stand With Ukraine Art Quilts Auction with Olesya Lebedenko
December 20, 2022 04:00 - 44 minutes - 30.9 MBWe first met Olesya Lebedenko on the podcast back in March. Olesya is a Ukrainian textile artist who designs the most beautiful art quilts. She moved to Canada with her family back in 2014 and since then has become a Bernina ambassador as well as a regular on the quilt show circuit in Canada and the United States. In our last chat, in Episode 41, Olesya spoke about the evolution of her craft from making rag dolls and running workshops in Kyiv to creating quilts in Canada as well as her fear...
THE POWER OF SEWING with Clare Hunter & Michelle Edwards
December 09, 2022 04:00 - 44 minutes - 30.9 MBThis time on Making Stitches, I'm sharing a couple of chats I had recently with authors who have written about sewing and the power it gives, from offering respite and hope in the hardest of situations and a voice to those who have had theirs silenced and the simple ability to fix a hole in your clothes. Clare Hunter has worked with textiles for many years, working as a community artist, exhibition curator and banner maker. After hearing many stories about how important sewing and embroide...
Sewing to Save the Planet with Stitched Up!
November 25, 2022 04:00 - 25 minutes - 17.5 MBDisposable fast fashion is a huge cause of pollution and damage to the environment, but one community benefit society in Manchester has been doing its bit to help for the past decade. Stitched Up! which is now based in Stretford Mall in Greater Manchester has been rescuing unwanted fabric and teaching sewing skills in a bid to help people get more out of their clothes and slow down the damage being done to the planet. The organisation takes donations of unwanted fabric and sells it on to se...
Amoami: A Symbol of Crochet Resistance with Rafael Alcaide
November 11, 2022 04:00 - 20 minutes - 13.9 MBA chance experience at an airport back in March left its mark on Rafael Alcaide. On returning home to Madrid, Rafael saw a large group of Ukrainian women and children who had just arrived from fleeing the invasion in their homeland. Wanting to do something to help, Rafael turned to his friend Rita, a crochet designer, and together they came up with a design for a small amigurumi bear which has become a symbol of resistance for the refugees. Within weeks, Amoami, a social enterprise was bor...
THE GREAT NORTHERN TEXTILE SHOW 2022
October 28, 2022 03:00 - 43 minutes - 29.8 MBLast Sunday, the first ever Great Northern Textile Show opened its doors to the public, welcoming crafters to mingle with artists and craftspeople from a wide range of disciplines and enjoy a celebration of creativity. The event was Tracy Fox's idea - my guest for the previous episode of Making Stitches - as an artist, print maker and dyer of fabric herself, she felt there was a gap in the market for a show celebrating local talent in Manchester and the wider area. As a city built on texti...
FROM RUSTY METAL TO WORKS OF ART with Tracy Fox ~ Dyer, Print Maker & Artist
October 14, 2022 03:00 - 43 minutes - 30.1 MBThere are many strings to Tracy Fox's bow, she describes herself as a dyer, print maker and artist creating the most beautiful art fabrics in her home studio in Manchester. She also uses her fabric to make stunning art quilts and has exhibited her work and sold her cloth at various craft shows over the years. It was at one of those shows, the Nantwich Quilters Exhibition and Fabric Sale, that she was approached to take over the management and running of the show, which she has done ever sinc...
YARNDALE 2022 : A Festival of Yarn & Friendship
September 30, 2022 03:00 - 34 minutes - 23.6 MBIt hardly seems a year ago that I last followed the Yarn Walk to Skipton Auction Mart for Yarndale 2021. Last year saw the yarn festival based in North Yorkshire return after Covid, and this year it's celebrating it's 10th birthday. Seeing as I had such fun on my last visit, I had to return - not just to squish some gorgeous yarn - but to meet more lovely crafty folk. This episode, the first of the sixth series of Making Stitches Podcast, is a snapshot of the fabulous day I spent at Yarndal...
MAKING STITCHES PODCAST SERIES 6 TRAILER
September 26, 2022 13:00 - 57 seconds - 693 KBHello there! Making Stitches Podcast will be returning to your podcast feed again very soon with a brand new series. I'm looking forward to bringing you some more inspiring maker stories with guests from the world of yarn crafts, textiles and embroidery, as well as many other crafts too. Among my guests for the new 6th series will be Eleonora Tully from Coastal Crochet along with other crafts people I met at the Yarndale festival at Skipton in North Yorkshire earlier in September and a non-...
COLOURFUL SOCKS & JUMBO CROCHET HOOKS with Winwick Mum & Juey Jumbo Craft Tools
July 29, 2022 03:00 - 34 minutes - 23.7 MBHello and welcome to Episode 50 of Making Stitches and the last episode in this series. As it's the end of the current series, I thought I'd reconnect with a couple of friends of the podcast and catch up with their latest news. My guests for this episode are Sock Knitting Champion; Christine Perry or Winwick Mum as she's known online and Juey from Juey Jumbo Craft Tools who I met at Yarndale in September last year. When I first met Juey, I was stopped in my tracks as I walked past her stal...
KNITTING, CROCHET & THE ONLINE CRAFT COMMUNITY with Emmaknitty
July 15, 2022 03:00 - 31 minutes - 21.5 MBHello and welcome to this, the penultimate episode of this current series of Making Stitches Podcast! This time, Emma Munn AKA Emmaknitty is my guest sharing the story of her creative journey into knit & crochet design. Originally from the South of England, Emma and her family now call Oviedo in Northern Spain home and it's from there she manages her small craft business alongside her job as an adult education teacher. Emma specialises in homeware & accessory designs and has seen her work ...
YARN, FOOD, NATURE & THE UNIVERSE with Kitey from the Yarn Whisperer
July 01, 2022 03:00 - 49 minutes - 33.8 MBThe last couple of years have seen many of us take a step back and reconsider what it is we want to do with our lives. The pandemic gave us a new perspective and often forced us to change paths. Kitey from the Yarn Whisperer is no different. After a 30 year-long career in teaching in various countries around the world, he found inspiration in a plate of Padron Peppers whilst on holiday in Spain and decided yarn was the way forwards for him. Kitey's first attempts at dying his own yarns were...
Yarn, Food, Nature & the Universe with Kitey from the Yarn Whisperer
July 01, 2022 03:00 - 49 minutes - 33.8 MBThe last couple of years have seen many of us take a step back and reconsider what it is we want to do with our lives. The pandemic gave us a new perspective and often forced us to change paths. Kitey from the Yarn Whisperer is no different. After a 30 year-long career in teaching in various countries around the world, he found inspiration in a plate of Padron Peppers whilst on holiday in Spain and decided yarn was the way forwards for him. Kitey's first attempts at dying his own yarns were...
FROM LAW TO CROSS STITCH with Sally Wilson from Caterpillar Cross Stitch
June 17, 2022 03:00 - 31 minutes - 22 MBLike so many makers, despite loving all the creative subjects at school, Sally Wilson took a traditional route of study and then a 'conventional' career which for her was as a lawyer. However, whilst on maternity leave, she began to question whether a return to law was really what she wanted at the end of her family time away from her job. Sally found time to shoe-horn in an e-commerce course and to build a website around caring for her young daughter before breaking the news to her friend...
A NEW VENTURE FOR THE CROCHET PROJECT with Joanne Scrace
June 03, 2022 02:00 - 32 minutes - 22.1 MBThis time on Making Stitches Podcast, crochet is under the spotlight and Joanne Scrace from The Crochet Project in particular. The Crochet Project was set up to design and write beautiful crochet patterns using natural yarns and with inclusivity high on the agenda. Crochet Project patterns come in a wide range of sizes to fit all bodies, avoid gender assumptions and even come with directions for left-handed crocheters where necessary. Once a partnership between Joanne Scrace and Kat Goldin...
PRESERVING THE FABRIC OF OUR HISTORY with The People's History Museum
May 20, 2022 02:00 - 27 minutes - 19 MBThis time on Making Stitches Podcast, I'm taking you out on the road with me to the People's History Museum in the centre of Manchester. It is the national museum of democracy and home the world's largest collection of trades union banners. Being custodians of the literal fabric of our history requires painstaking conservation work to keep the banners in a stable condition for future generations to enjoy. I tagged along with a tour of the current banner exhibition and was then incredibly lu...
CROCHET & KNITTING AT THE WOOLNEST with Lynne Rowe
May 06, 2022 02:00 - 36 minutes - 25.2 MBCrochet & Knitting designer Lynne Rowe is my guest for this episode of Making Stitches Podcast. Lynne first learned to knit and crochet as a child, but it was after the birth of her own children that she turned to yarn crafts in earnest. Firstly knitting for pleasure, then to raise money for charity, Lynne then ventured into crochet and knitting design and has written several books as well as working with a number of different craft magazines. A passionate yarn crafter, Lynne runs works...
COLOUR, CREATIVITY & A COMMUNITY KICK-STARTER with Clare Albans from hellohooray.com
April 12, 2022 08:00 - 42 minutes - 29.2 MBHello and welcome to this episode of Making Stitches Podcast celebrating the joys of colour and creativity as well as community support. When Clare Albans left a career in music behind, hand embroidery helped fill the gap leaving her job had left her with. After blogging about her life and makes for several years, Clare launched her small embroidery business selling designs and haberdashery and filling her Instagram followers feeds with a riot of colour and inspiration. Last year, Clare ...
CROCHET-TASTIC with Hannah Cross from Hanjan Crochet & Amanda Bloom from Little Box of Crochet
April 08, 2022 04:00 - 31 minutes - 21.7 MBWelcome to a crochet-tastic double bill of Making Stitches featuring not just one, but two inspirational makers; Hannah Cross from Hanjan Crochet and Amanda Bloom from Little Box of Crochet. My first guest, Hannah Cross has been designing crochet garments, toys and soft furnishings for over a decade and has been featured in Simply Crochet Magazine many times over those years. After leaving a career in Midwifery, Hannah now designs full time and is about to launch her first crochet course t...
FROM UKRAINIAN EMBROIDERY TO CANADIAN QUILTING with Olesya Lebedenko
March 25, 2022 05:00 - 1 hour - 42.3 MBHello and welcome to the first episode in this new series of Making Stitches Podcast! Kicking off the series is a chat I had with Ukrainian artist Olesya Lebedenko. Olesya first got creative as a young child making up stories for her toys, then at the age of 5 she was taught to cross-stitch by her grandmother. Crafts would stay with her throughout her life - she says she has never been able to sit and do nothing with her hands. When the global economic crash hit in 2008, Olesya found hers...
MAKING STITCHES PODCAST SERIES 5 TRAILER
March 21, 2022 14:00 - 4 minutes - 3.12 MBHello there! Making Stitches Podcast will be returning to your podcast feed very soon with a new series. I'm looking forward to bringing you some more inspiring maker stories with guests from the worlds of quilting, crochet and embroidery as well as many other crafts as well. Among my guests for the new 5th series are Olesya Lebedenko, a Ukranian artist who makes the most amazing quilt blocks and appliqued items. Crochet designer Hannah Cross from Hanjan Crochet who speaks about how her cr...
FORGIVENESS, HOPE & KNITTED BEARS with Figen Murray
January 14, 2022 05:00 - 35 minutes - 24.6 MBFigen Murray first took up knitting seriously to help her cope with hearing loss. At the time, she was working as a psychotherapist, and decided to practice what she preached and turned to creativity to help lift her mood. Little did she know then that just a few years later her knitting would help her cope with the dreadful loss of her son, Martyn Hett, who was one of the 22 victims of the Manchester Arena attack in 2017. By the time of the attack, Figen had taken to knitting bears which ...
CELEBRATING FREEDOM & CRAFTY RESOLUTIONS FOR 2022 : The Making Stitches Podcast Review of the Year (Part 2)
December 31, 2021 03:00 - 46 minutes - 32 MBI hope you've had a lovely Christmas! I have one last gift for you this year before the clock strikes midnight again and we begin another year. Following on from the Happy Stitchmas episode published on Christmas Eve, this is my Hogmanay offering with a celebration of some of the freedoms I was able to enjoy this year as well as hearing about peoples' crafty New Year's Resolutions for 2022. Among my guests for this trip down Memory Lane are Crochet Sanctuary regulars Diane & Sam who I met o...
HAPPY STITCHMAS 2021! The Making Stitches Podcast Christmas Special & Review of the Year (Part 1)
December 24, 2021 03:00 - 35 minutes - 24.4 MBIt's Christmas Eve, so here's my Christmas gift to you dear listener! This year I'm splitting my Christmas Special into two halves, the first one is here for you today, and the second one will be out one week from today on New Year's Eve. In Part 1 I look back at a few of my personal highlights of the year so far on Making Stitches and feature little snippets from interviews with Sara Huntington - Editor of Simply Crochet Magazine, Louise Armitage aka Gini's Dorset Buttons, Great British S...
MOORIT AND THE WONDERS OF CROCHET with Alyson Chu
December 17, 2021 03:00 - 24 minutes - 16.6 MBWhen Alyson Chu spotted a gap in the market for a high-end crochet magazine, she decided to draw on her publishing experience and put one together herself. With Kick-Starter backing of over 600 individuals and the support of a group of crochet designers, Moorit was born this autumn showcasing beautiful crocheted garments to make as well as articles and a very cute sheep project too. A podcaster herself for more than 4 years along with her mother, Vivian, with Keep Calm and Carry Yarn, Alys...
CRAFTING A DREAM SEWING BUSINESS with Freya Gilbert and Sarah Wadey of Crafty Sew and So
December 03, 2021 05:00 - 30 minutes - 20.9 MBWhen Freya Gilbert and Sarah Wadey met at a sewing workshop in 2014, they knew they had met a kindred spirit. Within months they followed their dreams of setting up a sewing business and opened their bricks and mortar shop Crafty Sew and So in Leicester selling fabric haberdashery and offering award-winning workshops. They used their skills gained in retail and the fashion industry to build their business which included a variety of craft workshops as well as dressmaking patterns and kits. ...
THE POWER OF THE CRAFT COMMUNITY with Sara Mulvey of Black Sheep Wools
November 19, 2021 04:00 - 30 minutes - 20.8 MBI have been wanting to share this episode with you for a very long time. Back in the darkest days of Covid and lockdown in the Spring of 2020, one of the things which kept me going was watching the series of videos posted by Sara Mulvey from Black Sheep Wools. They ranged from chats about yarn supplies and things which could be ordered from the shop to projects she and the rest of the team were working on to general chit chat about surviving the mundane routines we all found ourselves in dur...
LIVING A COLOURFUL CROCHET LIFE with Emma Leith
November 05, 2021 03:00 - 44 minutes - 30.8 MBWhen I sat down to chat with the self-named 'Queen of Colour' & crochet designer Emma Leith, I was in for a treat. Emma's enthusiasm for creativity and colour is infectious and she was a delight to speak to. She started out teaching mosaic but a couple of large scale yarnbombs brought Emma to prominence and two books of crochet patterns soon followed. Emma's mindful creations and colour choices are so zingy and uplifting - you can't help but be filled with optimism when you see them. I hope...
THE PATCHWORK GIRLS with Elaine Everest
October 22, 2021 01:00 - 28 minutes - 19.4 MBFor many of us, our crafts take a back seat as we concentrate on our careers and creativity can be stifled by everyday life. For novelist, Elaine Everest, a childhood growing up with a mother who made clothes and sewed for friends and family, that creativity stayed with her. From dressmaking as a young girl to making designer garments on a knitting machine for London boutiques to then setting up her own business sewing raincoats for dogs, Elaine achieved a lot before she embarked on yet anot...
YARNDALE 2021 : A FESTIVAL OF YARN, CREATIVITY & COMMUNITY
October 08, 2021 03:00 - 36 minutes - 25.3 MBAfter a hiatus due to the pandemic last year, Yarndale returned to Skipton Auction Mart on 25th & 26th September and I was thrilled to be able to go along! As well as my mask and hand sanitizer I took my microphone and met so many truly lovely people. This episode is my experience of Yarndale 2021, which in a nutshell was wonderful, friendly, colourful and utterly uplifting. In it you will hear from yarn dyers, craftspeople and business owners who were exhibiting their wares along with Ma...
TEACHING THE WORLD TO KNIT SOCKS with Christine Perry aka Winwick Mum
September 24, 2021 01:00 - 35 minutes - 24.5 MBHello and welcome to the first episode in series four of Making Stitches Podcast. It has been a very busy summer for me researching stories and makers to share with you on the podcast as well as working on my own creative projects too. It's a real joy to be back with you! In this episode we hear from Christine Perry, who you may know better as Winwick Mum, a champion of sock knitting who has made it her life's work to simplify the sock-knitting process so anyone can achieve success and kn...
MAKING STITCHES PODCAST SERIES 4 TRAILER
September 20, 2021 13:00 - 1 minute - 987 KBHello! Making Stitches Podcast is returning with a brand new series very soon. I'm looking forward to bringing you more inspiring maker stories and sharing more inspiring conversations. Among my first few guests will be the a a queen of colourful crochet, a sock-knitting champion who wants to teach the world to knit socks and a novelist who has used her love of patchwork quilting and sewing as the inspiration for her new novel. Please make sure you subscribe to Making Stitches on your favou...
A FLOCK OF CANARY CRAFTIVISTS - BONUS EPISODE
August 05, 2021 23:00 - 25 minutes - 17.2 MBHello there! Although Making Stitches is supposedly on a summer break, here's a little bonus episode all about a project I've been involved with recently which began with a previous episode of this podcast. Back in May, I released Episode 25 of Making Stitches which featured a chat I had with Sarah Corbett from the Craftivist Collective. In it, she told me about her plan for a summer of 'craftivism' featuring flocks of Canary Craftivists staging public displays of crafting to raise awareness...
SEW ON THE GO with Mary Jane Baxter
July 23, 2021 01:00 - 53 minutes - 36.4 MBBack in the days before Covid, when the notion of being able to pack up a camper van and do a road trip of Europe was a thing, former BBC Brussels Correspondent Mary Jane Baxter did just that. She did it in style in a 1986 Bedford Bambi van adorned with vintage wallpaper. Taking just a few possessions with her, including her hand-crank sewing machine and a collection of her own hand-made hats, she set off on a voyage of creativity and adventure calling in on former work colleagues and discov...
FROM SEWING SCRUBS TO SEWING BEE with Adam Brooks
July 08, 2021 23:00 - 35 minutes - 24.4 MBI don't know about you but this year's Great British Sewing Bee was just what the doctor ordered for me. After a spring of lockdowns, isolation, burst bubbles and home schooling, the creativity, colour and humour of GBSB was so uplifting. The standard of the contestants this year was really high, and many of them could have gone all the way to final had it not been for one bad day when things didn't go exactly according to plan. The camaraderie of the 12 sewing competitors, the friendships...
HOOKING A BRIGHTER FUTURE with Louise Murray from Hooked by Lou
June 24, 2021 23:00 - 15 minutes - 10.8 MBSo many of my guests on the podcast so far have spoken about the healing properties of their crafts, the mindfulness of repetitive stitching, be that with a sewing needle or machine, a pair of knitting needles or a crochet hook. For my guest in this episode, Louise Murray, crochet and other crafts have helped her in her journey since losing her brother suddenly four years ago. Back on 22nd May 2017, a terrorist attack on an Ariana Grande concert at the Manchester Arena left more than 800 p...
CROCHET, CHERRY BLOSSOM & FRIENDSHIP - A DAY OUT AT THE CROCHET SANCTUARY
June 10, 2021 23:00 - 24 minutes - 16.6 MBI'm so happy that I've been able to bring you this latest episode of Making Stitches. Back in the spring of 2020 when I was recording my first episode of Making Stitches, I imagined that before too long, I would be able to travel to meet inspiring makers and record their stories in person. Thanks to Covid lockdowns and restrictions, that hasn't been able to happen until now. That first episode of the podcast featured two ladies, Lisa Hesketh & Lynda-Rose Simonini, the creators of The Croche...