One of my favourite capitals is a circle of carved oak leaves – I just love how the stone masons brought nature in from the outside and made the stone come alive.

John Ruskin was a big fan of their bringing the outside in approach in such a free and effortless way. I learned all about his love of medieval sculpture when I visited and researched the amazing Tyntesfield House near Bristol

This is the feeling I wanted to create when I designed my Sussex Oak design – partly inspired by the carvings but also influenced by local patternmaker Peggy Angus who lived not far away. Do visit her archives at The Keep near Brighton if you can. Many of her wonderful prints are boxed up as she left them – she worked with such energy. Partly because she had to (she was a single parent) but also just because she was just that kind of person. She had quite particular views about history and as a teacher designed a wonderful scheme of how each age developed it’s own patterns. She got the students at North London Collegiate School for Girls to paint this as a mural around their art class. She was interested in the meaning behind patterns and this is one of the reasons why she inspires me so much.

My Oak Leaf pattern has been in my mind for over 20 years since I made a little oak leaf print many years ago – sometimes I work very slowly and I just needed the extra time offered by lockdown and my connection to the beautiful church carvings to finally finish the design.

When it came to cut the block I worked in my usual way, cutting and printing and recutting and reprinting until the design had that sense of movement and balance that I seek to create in all my designs.

I printed it onto fabric and paper and because we were in lock down and I had more time, I started to paper our hallway  – the colours made me very happy. I’ve also been printing it onto fabric that I mordant with oak galls that I forage for in the fields around me here in Steyning.

I’m pleased other people like this design – I feel it connects me to the past and also offers some ideas about how we might go forward in the future – making beautiful textiles that are kind to the environment.

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I’ve always been a bit of a hippie – I worked for the new economics foundation for many years where our slogan was ‘economics as if people and the planet matters’ so I’ve always been interested in alternative ways of doing things and making the radical alternative not only possible but real.

When I left Chelsea College of Art 5 years ago I got a job as a hand printer at the wonderful Ivo’s screen printing factory in Southall. The printers who work there are rare and wonderful master craftsmen capable of printing 25 colour chinzes but there is an incredible amount of waste and pollution involved in the process. And Ivo’s is only small – the textile industry as a whole is responsible for more greenhouse gases than air travel & maritime shipping put together. That’s why Extinction Rebellion has been campaigning at London Fashion Week and why I decided that when I came to set up my own workshop in Sussex I would try to clean up my act and develop my work using natural dyes and use organic fabrics where ever possible.

Thanks to lovely Jaine McCormack  and the team at Guy Goodfellow in Chelsea, I was able to launch my naturally dyed collection at their  Showroom 2 years ago. Since then I’ve been on a really steep learning curve – educating myself as well as my clients as we gradually explored the idea of seasonality, reusing valuable fabric where appropriate  (I remember one interior designer’s shock when I suggested that we re-dye her curtains!) and the notion that using natural materials means that nothing can be reproduced exactly the same – instead variation and difference should be embraced and celebrated.

Then I came to research my book into the wonderful 1930’s block printers Phyllis Barron and Dorothy Larcher. I spent a whole winter transcribing Phyllis Barron’s talk – ‘My life as a Block Printer’ which she gave in 1962 at Dartington, nearly 30 years after she closed her workshop down and stopped printing altogether. Her talk shares in detail the trials and tribulations of a life times obsession with a few simple dyeing and printing processes which she had to pioneer herself – not unlike William Morris.  Indigo, cutch and iron were her materials and although she left no technical notes – her commitment over decades to perfecting these difficult processes inspired me to deepen my practical research – a journey I’m still very much at the beginning of.

I’m now really into the natural colour palette and relish the sensuality and seasonality of the whole process. It’s been wonderful to work alongside Alice Garner and form the Steyning Imprint together – making things together and teaching others. Her interest and knowledge in the natural world plus her creativity and attention to detail makes her fab partner to work with. Having a flock of sheep really helps when it comes to providing the wool filling for our South Downs cushions.

Together we’ve come up with a few ways to make what we do as sustainable as possible. Alice is making beautiful sketch books using recycled coffee cups and we are trying to source more organic hemp – woven small scale to print our vegetable dyes on. Thanks to Alice’s sheep plus some neighbouring farmers who have been very generous we are now in the process of producing South Downs wool cushion pads. We’re trying to really cut down on waste – all spare scraps of fabric are used to overprint labels on or sew into lavender bags. By thinking about our supply chain and how we can make a positive difference we are also reaching out to others who share the same values and vision – it’s been really empowering to discover how many like-minded people are out there and to start supporting each other.

It’s just a beginning and only a drop  in the ocean but it makes me want to keep making – not just so there is more stuff for people to buy – but because the way we’re doing things is helping to pioneer a different way of living and working. It keeps me feeling positive and feeling excited – we’ll be at the Downland and Weald Christmas Fair from the 23rd – 26th November & would love it if you came and said hello or do please get in touch if you are doing something similar – we would love to hear from you.

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This is something I’ve been fascinated by for a very long time and over the years pieces of the jigsaw puzzle have gradually fallen into place. Finally after much trial and error I have developed a simple process of block printing with natural dyes that I’m reasonably confident in and am able to reproduce and share with others, though I still feel I’m very much a beginner. I owe alot to many people who have shared and taught me along the way – most especially Shirley at Handprinted

My process in no way compares with the wonders of Indian block printing. The intricacies of block printing with natural dyes were so very complex that English traders from the East Indian Company were dazzled when they first set eyes on Indian fabrics: layers of colour were laid one upon the other using a complex system of mordants, dyes and resists. It took the Europeans centuries to understand how the Indian craftsmen made their beautiful chinzes and many decades before they were able to replicate pieces that looked a little like them.

I first fell in love with the colour palette of cutch browns, madder reds and indigo blues when I saw the textiles of Phyllis Barron and Dorothy Larcher in the Whitworth Gallery, Manchester many years ago. I started trying to print with onion skins and did get some marks but it was only when I was researching my book into Barron & Larcher 20 years later that I got a few more clues.

Barron and Larcher didn’t leave any technical notes but in her wonderful speech ‘My Life as a Block printer’, Barron describes how after making her first patterns using indigo and nitric acid (not something I am keen to try) she made up a paste of cutch using gum traganth (she compared the gum in it’s raw state to toe nails). I spent a whole winter transcribing Barron’s talk and in the process got to feel quite close to her and the way she worked.

I don’t have a steamer large enough to steam lengths of fabric so I decided to try and work with mordants instead; different mordants fix different kinds of natural dyes allowing you to print with a range of natural print pastes.

When I visited Bagru, the village of printers outside Jaipur in Rajhastan, I discovered how the cloth is first dyed with a tannin so that it can fix the iron dye and how alum is used to fix madder. My process is hardly comparable to the the beautiful and intricate patterns produced in India but I  still enjoy the process – preparing the mordants, fabrics, dye stuffs and pastes. It’s very sensual process that is sensitive to the slightest change and one that always entrances me everytime.

Most importantly for me is the fact that my workshop is becoming less toxic, involving more natural vegetable and plant based dyes and pastes. Not only do I feel safer working around my family and students, gardens, insects and animals, I also feel like I am  making things in a kinder way.

So many things in the textile industry look quite beautiful but when you scatch the surface you discover a toxic and environmentally damaging process that destroys any superficial beauty: I want the things I make to have a positive impact on my environment  – supporting organic farmers and growers and becoming truly beautiful in the process.

I hope this blog  inspires you to think about printing with natural dyes – do get in touch if you would like to have a go at making things in a different way.

All the images here are taken from my book ‘Barron & Larcher – Textile Designers’ and from the Block printing with Natural Dyes workshop that I have run with Alice Garner at Ditchling Museum of Art and Craft and as part of their wonderful Women’s Work show (it’s on until October 2019 so do go if you get the chance) plus from workshops in my own studio – thanks to all the students for their wonderful experimental work.

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It was a fascinating process for me as it was the first time I had a design produced commercially. It was also very special as I was the hand printer working on the sampling table at the wonderful Ivos Print when the design came to be sampled – basically sorting the colour and scale of the final print out. So I got to sample my own design – a real thrill!

Virginia wanted something lacey for her fabric collection and kindly asked me if I could design anything. So I went away, rummaged in my old fabric collection (a fabric black hole) and started work on a woodblock design based on a piece of antique french lace. I didn’t work straight from the lace but made shadows with it, which were slightly wonkier and got under the skin of the pattern a bit more. Doing this gave me the kind of information I needed to start drawing and cutting the block: sometimes it helps to make things look a bit strange first, then you see them in a fresher way.

Once I’d cut the block and taken the print, I scanned the prints and worked to scale up the design using photoshop. Photoshop saves a lot of time scaling up repeats but I’ve never been able to make very good marks with it so always prefer using hand made art work. Then Amelia in the Ivo design studio helped me transfer my print onto a large screen, advised by factory manager and general print genius Podge and produced by screen maker extraordinaire Chris.

This part of the process can be very tricky as you have to balance the hand made marks of the block print with the requirements of the commercial screen printing machinery. Luckily, Ivos have a very skilled team to do this as this would have been impossible for me to do on my own.

When it came to sampling the new design – basically exploring the best colours, scale and materials to print on – I worked with Monique and Jo on the hand-table, and then Chris and Ian took over to print show lengths on their galli machines. Virginia’s bold use of colour was sometimes a bit of a challenge for me, as she often told me she didn’t want anything crafty looking, but this was great as it shifted me out of my comfort zone.

The whole process, taking many months – was a real team effort and opened my eyes to the reality of designing and making – which always involves drawing heavily on the expertise and knowledge of others rather than sitting designing on your own in a little bubble.

The experience also brought together my two different worlds – working as a hand printer at Ivos and producing my own designs. It’s helped me to understand the pressures and constraints of commercial production and overall helped me become a better designer.

Since designing Honor & Honoria, I have produced two more block print designs – ‘Sompting’ and ‘Tirzah’, all available from the Virginia White Collection

Time for lunch time with the factory girls!

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Mostly Chris prints the most amazing designs that use over 10 screens so this single colour was a doddle for him. He even spotted that the repeat is about 1mm out. Chris is our printing guru (just like his dad Podge) and he looks out for Mon and I spotting any mistakes we’re making before we’ve even made it. Naturally we adore him because he’s such a master craftsman and also because he’s so nice.

First Chris prints every other repeat, then he goes down the 50m table a second time and fills in the gaps when the first print is dry. Most days he walks over 10km!!

Here I am looking very pleased at how my little lino cut design has been transformed into a 50m length, something that would take me at least a week to do at home. I remember from when I studied politics, reading an essay by Walter Benjamin called ‘The work of art in the age of mechanical reproduction’ – which wasn’t very kind about processes like this which it claimed destroyed the spirit of the original by endlessly reproducing it…. reproduction does change the original but not necessarily into something less, it can also distill essential parts and help to simplify it as well.

Anyway, as a designer, it’s something very beautiful to watch when your idea becomes reality and you see it being produced and going into peoples homes. I also remember something I think Liubov Popova, the friend of the constructivist designer Vavara Rodchenko and a wonderful painter and designer herself said – how she would far prefer for an ordinary woman to buy 1m of her fabric in a department store than her painting to be hung in a famous gallery and just seen by just a few.

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We’ll be selling them at Christmas markets at the Downland and Weald Museum and Crafty Fox Market in Peckham.

My print day was the culmination of 2 weeks work outside in the garden with metres of heavy, wet cloth soaking and boiling them in wood ash to mordant them (so that the dye stays)

and then dipping them into my bubbling caldron of walnut and rhubarb dye. All my fabric is odds and ends recycled from the factory. At Dora Fabrics we are very sustainable!

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