The group has been working all year towards our new exhibition…which this year is a virtual exhibition for our web pages. Normally we dont name the individual rug makers, but this exhibition showcases the lovely work done by some of our members.

The theme of the exhibition was to take inspiration from one of the books in our rug making library, and be inspired either by a design or a technique, or to find inspiration from another source. With such an inventive group, the interpretation has been wide.

If you like our work, and want to see more, we have a small exhibition at East Riddleston Hall until the end of September 2011.

Hannah Southern moved  to a  tall end of terrace stone house just before Christmas, and she has had time to make this lovely wool hooked picture of this typical Northern Terrace.

 

Freda Ellis was inspired by a picture of a bookcase, and decided to hook her own bookcase at home. The first picture is her design process. The rug is quite long, so I have photographed it in two halves.

 

 

 

Linda Murray took her inspiration from a tile made by a woman in a small village in Peru where a potter had established a small workshop.The rug is hooked in wool on hessian.  The design indicates the sea, mountains, sun, stars and the Condor.

 

Jenny Salton has been knitting a rug called  ”Seaside Blue”. It is made with t-shirt material, bought as a three metre tube, and knitted on 12mm needles. It forms a dense stiff rug. She told us that it took a whole day to cut the material into one long strip… no joins.. the ball of material was huge.

Margaret Kenny says that this hooked rug was inspired by an article in a rug hooking magazine. The original was a group project by women who wanted to raise money for an African village by selling the finished wall hanging. Margaret designed the two women with the fruit.

 

Veronica Metcalfe has still to finish this prodded wool rug, the design is taken from a traditional Locker hooking pattern. She is working it on an old sack. I love the juxtaposition of the lettering and darning.

Margaret Halff was inspired by the squares in Cindy Murrays book on locker hooking.

This is the locker hook rug she made. She says that she is not a very adventurous rug hooker and tends to stick to simple locker hooking. She says that doing the squares was not as easy as the usual straight lines, but she is pleased with the result… although a little hard on the fingers… and we all certainly thought it worth the time.

Kay Royce has made a traditional prodded rug using all wool tweed in sombre colours called ” Grandmas Rug-Memoires of Beamish”

Brenda Jarman also has a wartime theme to her prodded 1940s style rug.

Sue Barrass has made a prodded rug inspired by William Wordsworth’s poem “My Heart leaps up when I behold”.. a rainbow in the sky. It is made with 36 t-shirts, the prodding took 90 days at one hour a day. Look carefully at the colour mixing in each segment..

Diane West is in process of completing a finely hooked piece called “Lora” inspired by her daughters 21st birthday photo.

Keri Di Souza has been working each meeting on her first rag rug. She choose blues and greens, all the materials are recycled clothing no longer fit to be worn, including her brothers old socks…

Lily Barton has used her grandsons holiday alarm clock as inspiration for her cockerel.

Penny Godfrey has been working on a variety of projects. she has been exploring the use of ruffles in various techniques throughout the year, and this bag was adapted from a pattern in “Quilted bags and purses” by Mary Jo Hiney. This is a small version of a rug I eventually hope to make using this technique.

Continuing the ruffle theme, this tea mat was made using a ruffler on the sewing machine. It is glue gunned together.

and in use on the garden table…

I am also interested in mixing techniques together, and after trying my hand at crocheting a granny square in our tent visiting  Woolfest this year, I decided to make it into a small bag to take to the music festival at Latitude. I hooked the surround with some lacy material left over from Dianes Baildon Community project, and machine knitted the back to save time.

My final piece was also inspired by crochet. I had a old cotton crochet top by Gap that I no longer wear, and decided to update it with crochet flowers. The surface crochet technique I  used on the shoulders is the same as the way you can make crochet rugs. Many moons ago I had also acquired a pair of lace sleeves from our fabric swap at the group, and they fitted the top perfectly.. thanks Amy…

We all hope you have enjoyed this exhibition of some of our work… Let us know if you like it via our comments page.. tell your friends as well.