I've finished renovating our house, 2012 and my next book - all culminating in the same week! The garden is still rubbish and I'm not looking my most glamorous , but seed lists are being drawn up as we speak and the glamour - well it's nothing a bit more sleep won't sort out.
I am however really happy with this book, as although it is a making book, I hope it is also a thought provoking book. I know it will be propped in the craft section of bookstores which is absolutely dandy, but I just wish there was a section called Mindful Making - because I think of good making as thinking with your hands.
Waterstones in Kensington call their craft section Practical Art - which is a little better, and an old local book store has craft books next to 'mindfulness' books - but I don't think that was intentional. I worry that craft and craftmanship are sliding further and further apart with craft becoming very much a bish, bosh, bash approach and craftmanship slipping further out of reach. We all used to make because of both necessity and desire and it was mostly great stuff. I wouldn't be the me I am today without the teenage 'making experimental fashion' years - and I get positively grumpy if my hands aren't active, but I have never thought of myself as a 'crafter'.
I haven't made New Years resolutions - mainly because of the first line of this post, but I know that 2013 is steering off into a slightly different path, where my hands and my mind are a little more closely engaged.
I can't think of anyone who lives and breathes MM more than Dosa or Alabama Chanin.
5 comments:
'Mindful Making' sounds like an excellent bookshop section! And I think it's an important idea, too, because sometimes sewing/crafting seems to become just another facet of modern materialism - people churning out endless unnecessary and quite meaningless *stuff* just in order to have it.
I like the term, Mindful Making. It's what i like to do. I don't like the term crafter either. i prefer craftsman/craftsperson. it connotes a sense of practice and expertise.
Having just read the article in The Observer about yourself and the publication of Quilt Love, all I can say is 'spread the word'. Patchwork and quilting is going through another renascence in this time of austerity. For myself this is what I have been practising for years. Currently making a quilt from old kurtas (tunics) worn, and now worn out, during my travels in India.
There is nothing quite like a quilt made with love and memories.
Couldn't agree more. There is nothing wrong with have-a-go enthusiasm, especially if it leads to a lifelong passion for a subject, but I do wish publishers would cater to those who don't only crave instant gratification. I'd love to see books that filled the void between the weighty tomes written for 'artists' and project books for hobbyists.
Hi Cassandra. Its Trillian from NZ. I am sitting here browsing your book for the umteenth time. I just love it and have promoted it and your philosopy on mindful making at my local quilt group. I havnt done much myself lately as in process of selling our house. Did i read that there is a next book. When does it come out. keep up the good work. Blessings, Trills.
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