Connecting with Nature: Mindful stitching and textile art through the seasons

Take inspiration from nature and sew, create and craft all year round with best-selling author and textile artist Tilly Rose.

Boost your creativity, develop mindfulness through making, and create your own unique textile treasures.

Bursting from every page are ideas for unique and meaningful textile artworks, each with a story to tell. From eco-dyeing, cyanotype and weaving to collage, embroidery and slow stitching, Tilly harnesses an exciting variety of crafts to help her connect with Mother Earth in every season. She creates beautiful keepsakes that capture memories and encourage creativity with wild and natural materials.

Discover how to:

arrange nature mandalasmake your own natural paints and dyespress your own flowersenjoy slow stitchingexplore sun printingcreate botanical journalspreserve and display your work.

Brimming with inspiration, this is a treasure trove of 12 simple-but-stunning seasonal projects that will draw you closer to nature and improve your well-being whatever your age or ability.

Check out Tilly’s Slow Stitch Café website: a friendly online community offering a tranquil space to explore slow stitching, make beautiful projects and learn valuable stitching and textile techniques. There are also video tutorials, livestreams and book reviews to help you embrace your own unique creativity. Visit: www.tillysslowstitchcafe.co.uk

From the Publisher

Take inspiration from nature and sew, create and craft all year round with best-selling author and textile artist Tilly Rose.

Boost your creativity, develop mindfulness through making, and create your own unique textile treasures.

Bursting from every page are ideas for unique and meaningful textile artworks, each with a story to tell. From eco-dyeing, cyanotype and weaving to collage, embroidery and slow stitching, Tilly harnesses an exciting variety of crafts to help her connect with Mother Earth in every season. She creates beautiful keepsakes that capture memories and encourage creativity with wild and natural materials.

Pressing flowers and herbs

Flowers have been collected for centuries and there is documentation of pressed petals found as far back as Ancient Egyptian times.

Pressing flowers and leaves is another form of storytelling. It allows you to preserve the beauty of nature in a way that is both simple and long‑lasting.

Botanical eco-dyes and paints

Foraging for plant material of all kinds and then taking them home to experiment with a little eco-dyeing has been an favourite pastime of mine for decades. It is the most exciting part of my textile work and, even after all these years, I am still absolutely mesmerized when I take the dyed cloth or paper out of the pot for the big reveal. That sense of serendipity and wonder is so magical!

Weaving

Weaving is a calming and meditative craft that stills the mind while creating beautiful designs. Its history connects us to our past. Our ancient ancestors experimented with a whole host of different natural fibres such as nettles, flax and tree bark to discover which fibre was the strongest, the hairiest and the most durable in terms of warmth.

Slow stitching

Slow stitching is my absolute passion. As many of my loyal readers know, I love working with cloth and thread. Cloth combined with vintage or natural treasures creates a gorgeous fusion, especially when a little sewing is thrown in for good measure.

Seasonal projects include:

Winter – Memory Sticks

This activity is an easy introduction to collecting natural elements and looking at them as keepsakes or treasures. It is a wonderful prompt to start off your year with a happy smile, beginning in the wintery months of January and February when the ground is icy and barren, Mother Earth is enjoying a quiet slumber, and you are nestled by the fire keeping those toes warm after a long walk.

Spring – Stitch Diary

Spring is a beautiful time of year to appreciate the tiny details that appear as we venture from the gloomy days of winter and start looking forward to the warmer days of sunshine. Mother Earth is beginning to bloom again after her long slumber and there is an abundance of inspiration all around us as we start to notice the new plants, flowers and trees with their leaves starting to awaken.

Summer – Mini Flower Press

In the summer months, when the gorgeous wildflowers and garden blooms are aplenty, I love collecting a few of my all-time favourite flowers and pressing them ready for adding into journals or other craft projects.

Autumn – Artist’s Brush Wrap

There is something exciting about capturing the textures and patterns given freely by Mother Earth and using them in your own creative way. Leaf prints are a perfect example. Leaves are one of the most popular natural ingredients to use as they are so readily available and easy to use.

Publisher ‏ : ‎ Search Press (11 Oct. 2024)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Paperback ‏ : ‎ 128 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 1800921918
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1800921917
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 20.65 x 1.14 x 26.04 cm