Marché de Noel

We had a very successful day last Sunday,
However some did not find the date good
and asked for this coming weekend instead.
So we are doing an event - Gifts and Foods -
on both Saturday and Sunday afternoons
from 2pm 'til 6 pm..
If you would like to come we'ed love to see
you, all the details are on Fb Event - there
will be discounts and 'dégustation' - tasting -
of Bio juice and other artisinal food stuffs,
All Welcome - No Obligation.

TEXATELIER Marché de Noëll II

We are up and running again this weekend

TEXATELIER Marché de Noëll II

Marché de Noël Maison

Instead of freezing on a street corner in one of our local towns for a  Marché de Noel we are offering our Jewellery, Hand produced fabric Items  & accessories - eg; Bags and cushion covers at a 'chez-nous'  Christmas sale, with some discounted prices.

There are also some small and affordable original paintings,  prints and cards by Artist Nikola Orpen and some of Cassette's famous Bougeois - (Candelabres).

Joining us will be Sarah Baghadoust  (and hopefully others).

We will all be selling some home produced festive food stuffs including Bio Apple juice and Prunes as well as Jams, marmalades and cakes.

We also roll out a new line in hand-produced soaps.

Nous vous convie à une après-midi marché de Noël à domicile, chez mes amis Shaun et Nikkie, qui ont choisi d'organiser cet évènement plutôt que se transformer cette année encore en glaçons en tenant un stand dans l'un de nos petits villages...

De nombreux articles faits mains à offrir vous seront proposés (bijoux, accessoires, sacs, coussins), ainsi que de petits tableaux réalisé par l'artiste Nikola Orpen à des prix tout à fait abordables, ainsi que d'autres de ses créations (cartes de voeux, impressions...)

Vous aurez aussi la possibilité de repartir avec un des célèbres bougeoirs Cassette !!

Vous bénéficierez de prix réduits pour cette occasion et pour avoir une idée des chefs d'oeuvre proposés je vous convie à aller faire un tour sur http://www.bijouterie.ateliersudouest.com/

Sarah Baghadoust participerai également à la vente en proposant des confitures et petits cadeaux maisons, et nous espérons que d'autres se joindront à nous !

Vous trouverez également des préparations culinaires pour les fêtes à emporter, confitures, marmelades et gâteaux, ainsi que du jus de pommes et des pruneaux bios.


Some items are also available at our Web-Shop

Felt Making Course Details

Click here to view Outline for the Day

Felted Jewellery Workshop - SURVIVE FRANCE NETWORK

Felted Jewellery Workshop - SURVIVE FRANCE NETWORK

One day workshop - come and make some gifts fror friends and relatives.

Felted Jewellery Workshop - SURVIVE FRANCE NETWORK

Felted Jewellery Workshop - SURVIVE FRANCE NETWORK

Make your own Christmas present jewelry in this workshop

Das Affel Weekend

We at Texatelier are made of stern stuff - it ain't just embroidery round here.
The studio is surrounded by our beautiful organic orchard of some sixty trees.
We invited friends last weekend to help with the harvest - some said they'd rather stay home and sew, some came, got cold, climbed trees, pressed jus, and got a good feed into the bargain. It was fun and thanks to everybody who helped.

Indigo, Silk-Screen, Bags, Sarves .....

I have had a very busy time recently, so not had a great deal of time to write anything. I was over in the Uk in October at the Quay Arts Centre on the Isle of Wight working in their fabulously well equipped teaching space overlooking the river, 2 days of fun feltmaking with a group of about 10 people each day.

Day 1 was making nuno felt and embellished felted jewellery, and day 2, 3D feltmaking, where students made either a bag or a pot, using 2 different felting techniques. The photos speak for themselves.

Later that week at the City Art Gallery in Southampton, I gave a day class in screenprinting using hand cut stencils, this was a great success and all went home with fabric prints a plenty. And with much hard work, Prema even created some fabulous T shirts with a very simple but effective design. Well done her.

I was also able to cram in a day in London and went to Origin at Spittalfields to see lots of lovely handcrafted things for inspiration.

Then back here in France we were able to put on a day of Indigo dyeing with shibori. Deborah brought some of her homespun alpaca wool to experiment with ;

and Melanie went home with a beautiful upcycled indigo/shibori dyed shirt. 5 of us had a great day, wish it had been sunnier though, but lots of good company made up for the lack of sun.

I've now had to move the studio indoors as it's too cold to work in the Tex'Atelier barn, but next April we will open it up again for some new and exciting classes. Watch this space


I'm sowing some woad this week for next years classes so come the Spring we can be working with the traditonal dye material from this corner of S.W France.

I've recently been concentrating on creating some wax resist and indigo dyed pashmina type scarves, either in wool or viscose for, super colour, machine washable and lovely and warm too, perfect pressies.

 I have also created some small lined vintage linen bags/purses with a long strap. An ideal gift for the busy woman who travels, as they are perfect for flying, enough space for your essentials such as lipstick, glasses, money and documents



(I recently made one for myself and found it really useful at security as you don't have to cram it into your handluggage, just treat it as another item of clothing that goes through the xray, and it has a hidden pocket for those all important documents and passport. Oh and it also looks good too!)

I'm now making some lovely soft upcycled blanket cushions embellished with vintage linen.. I found a beautiful old witney blanket that needed some TLC - Pictures coming soon .............

Felted Jewellery

A one day workshop making embellished felted jewellery at Tex'Atelier.

Create some highly personalised christmas presents for family and friends.
Learn how to make your own felted beads to turn into a necklace, bracelet, earings, and brooches, incorporating threads and yarns and beads and buttons you will be certain to go home with some lovely handcrafted gifts.

35€ per person. All materials provided

Please bring something to share for a communal lunch.

Call Nikkie at Tex' Atelier
06 01 89 78 34 or 09 50 62 24 95
to reserve your place.
events at Texatelier: "- Sent using Google Toolbar"

Shibori & Indigo Day

New PDF format workshop details -

View & Download

New website pages

The web site is being rebuilt with new pages, new departments, new products and new options.
There are items from necklaces to cushion covers to bags .. all safely purchaseable using PayPal
and at great direct sale rates.
boutique Texatelier

Summer days, gone too soon ….

^{The workshops at Southampton City Art Gallery in July went really well with students making some interesting experimental painterly prints on paper, using collographs monoprints and stencils printing techniques (with the wonderful etchting press they have there) There will be a lead on from this course on October 5th, where Nikkie will be holding a class in basic ways to create simple designs on fabric and paper using handcut stencils for screen printing.} 

^{Nikkie also held a couple of Indigo and shibori dyeing days, which lead to her new line in individually crafted indigo scarves, on sale soon.} 

^{Sean lead a workshop in building a clay oven in deptartment 46, it has to dry out before any bread or delicious pizzas will be baked in it, but what an achievement to have your own handbuilt clay oven in your back yard in which to bake super-good-for-you bread and if the urge takes you to use it additionally as a kiln for Raku or even for forging metal. (Watch this space for workshops!)} 

^{Then there was Beauville .. Sean did four weeks of Arts Plastique workshops with about 200 International students, He designed and built all the sets, with the 'kids' - aged 8yrs to 18yrs. Shows this summer: Oliver, Annie, Moulin Rouge and Mamma-Mia!} 

 

Texatelier by Texatelier on Etsy

Beautiful and hand-made cushions by Texatelier

Texatelier by Texatelier on Etsy

Autumn Agenda

CLICK HERE TO SEE THE EVENTS PAGE

New Stuff at TEXATELIER for Autumn 2010

Recent Workshops Summer 2010

It's been a busy couple of months with workshops here in France at Texatelier and in England also.
Not too many words necessary just a few pictures.

Aquitaine Fermette House Sale - reduced price

Farm house sale - Aquitaine - price reduced 20.000 Euros

Aquitaine Fermette Home

Arty Partys

Fun, affordable, crafts entertainment for children's partys and even afternoon workshops see: Texatelier page for more details.

Group 47 - Local events

Group47 news is a great local resource:Group 47 - Submit an Event - Textiles Crafts - Natural Dyeing workshop with Nikola Orpen

Aquitaine gite - some summer places available

There are still some places available in both July and August for some of the most reasonable prices in the south of France for upto six people.

Aquitaine gite, vall�e du lot - holiday rental

New Summer Listings

New events listings Facebook | Texatelier Cassette

Summer Occurances

Batik workshop at Dolmayrac village school
A two hour batik afterschool workshop with 20 children aged 6-9yrs was held last week in my local village of Dolmayrac.
The children wanted to make something for Mother's day which in France is at the end of May.
Each child used hot wax and dyes to produce a fabric piece for their mum.
Lots of excited children created some super fabric works.

Barn
Now the weather is better Summer courses are starting up in theTex'Atelier Barn.
Indigo dyeing with shibori resist, 20th June
Feltmaking, ( flat, nuno and 3D felting) 26th & 27th June
Natural dyeing 4th July, all courses run from 10.30 am – 5pm and include a light lunch and cost 65 euros per person per day.
Booking for more than one day will allow a 10% discount

Workshops at the Southampton City Art Gallery
'Painterly printmaking' courses are running in the UK on 22nd, 23rd and 24th July, this will include mono print, monotype and collography. An experimental course where students will be encouraged to push boundaries.

Texatelier Opening Page

The new Website structure should make the navigation process some what easier, particularly if your first language is French. Texatelier Opening Page

Southampton City Art Gallery textile week

I have just got back from England although getting there was hard due to volcanic ash, consequently my plane was cancelled and I was so very lucky to be able to get a lift up to Calais and go through the tunnel with Jim and Sue Lindop who had already booked ages before the volcano errupted.
The first day was using procion dyes and  manutex thickener to produce experimental printed and painted fabric samples on natural fabrics.

Day 2 was indigo dyeing and shibori, where folk created sensitive and beautiful samples using this ancient Japanese method of resist dyeing with deep indigo blue.

Days 3 and 4 were a 2 day workshop called 'Memories are made of this'. Participants created textile wall pieces using collage, photo transfer and stitch. Special fabrics, old letters, photos and other souvenirs were incorporated into the pieces that were highly individual and significant to the maker.


A Felt-making improptu at Pelham House Gallery on the Isle of White - with Carol Ann

Nuno Felted Scarves

I've been making nuno felted scarves to take to my friend's shop on the Isle of Wight, Pelham House Gallery in Cowes. They also have a vintage french button brooch for an elegant look
I am holding a workshop in nuno felting next wednesday 21st April at Southampton City Art Gallery, so you can have a go yourself! The whole week I'll be there doing textile workshops, check out our events page a Texatelier: 

laying out the fleece before 'Nunoing'

Testimonials

some commentary on past but recent events: testimonials

Street festivals and 'finds' !

Couturiers' market
Last weekend I went with Véro to a Couturiers' (dressmakers) market at Auvillar in  dept. 82. A beautifull small market town with a wonderful halle, it is an annual event with lots of stands full of stuff to die for, for any textile person. I found some lovely soft muslin for nuno felting, some beutiful buttons and a piece of old quilted fabric also bumped into a few people I know. And it was sunny and warm. A great day out.


Carding machine
Look what I found at a vide grenier(car boot sale) a carding machine for my feltmaking, now all I need is  to source some fleece to wash, dye and card and then I'm away......a bargain at 25 euros they are around 195 pounds normally!!!

Upcoming workshops
On 19th April I start a week of workshops at Southampton City Art Gallery.
Experimental paint and print on fabric, indigo dyeing and shibori, nunofelting, and then a 2 day workshop called 'Memories are made of this', where each participant will create  a visual  narrative on fabric using old memorabilia such as photos, buttons, old letters, jewellery, special fabrics etc.

Easter chicks

We have got 5 new little chickens and we let them into their new home yesterday, they seem perfectly happy and even eat out of my hand, so sweet. I do however think there are 3 cocks and only 2 hens amongst them... time will tell for real though.

New Page - ''Testimonials'"

New Web-site Page : testimonials See what the Students' say

Feltmaking Residential Mars 2010

I, Nikkie, have just spent  2 days feltmaking with Olwyn and Véro. Exhausting but fun. Day one was making 3D pieces. 


Olwyn made a lovely bag and an exquisite large pot, quite a feat. Véro made a wonderful pair of boots for her son Stéphan and a beret for Morgane’s doll.

Then we moved on to ‘Nuno’ felting on day 2, which was very different as ther isn’t the same physical effort involved as with 3D felt. We experimented with various open weave fabrics to felt onto and also with the idea of dyeing the fabrics prior to the felting. Laying, (in threads), and stitching loosely into the pieces before felting; it lead to some interesting developments.

So nice to work with others and to bounce ideas back and forth.

Brilliant fun.