Maker's Residency, East Quay, Watchet 2026

Selvedge: Weaving the Margins of Landscape

This April and May, I will took part in my first residency, at East Quay, Watchet.

Studio 10, East Quay, Watchet. 

I explored a body of textile work exploring their themes of 

Periphery, Transition and Alternative Futures.

This work was informed by my life as a landworker on the periphery, geographically, culturally and ecologically, and by the possibilities of transition, including raw fleece to finished textile, seasonal cycles of change and plant growth, ecological regeneration; and alternative futures re-imagining how textiles, craft, land-use and community might create a more resilient and planet-friendly future.

I set up my 10 shaft countermarch loom, spinning wheels and equipment and displayed stages of process: raw fleece, plant materials for dyeing, dyed skeins, woven samples.

I used raw fleeces from my flock of rare breed sheep and locally foraged plant materials from the local area, to spin and weave them on my loom.

I explored the notion of “margins”, of landscape and craft systems: sheep flocks grazing the moor-edge, colours from hedgerows, finding value in overlooked wool. I created a series of textiles that reference this edge-zone: fleeces and yarns whose origins lie in often under-recognised rural fibre systems, and whose futures might propose alternative textile economies.

I was pleased to use the studio as demonstration space, inviting visitors to participate in the process of transformation from sheep to fleece to textile and to reflect on how future textile systems could look if rooted in locality, traceability, ecological care, rather than mass-global supply chains.

 

Community Weaving

Throughout the residency, visitors were invited to contribute their own rows of weaving in a community cloth that grew as the residency continued.

 

Themes

Periphery:

Living and working on the edge of Exmoor, my practice engages with marginal spaces. Small-scale sheep farming, rare breeds, plant-dyeing, local wool production — systems often overlooked by the mainstream textile industry. My interest is in making these peripheral systems visible and exploring their value. 

Transition:

The entire fibre journey is one of transition: raw fleece to spun yarn, to woven textile to end-use, and at the end of its life it will compost down into the earth. I navigate transitions of land-use, craft traditions, ecological systems. I also explore transitions in my own life journey from someone living in a city with poor mental health, to someone with their feet rooted firmly in the soil.

Alternative Futures:

I believe textiles can imagine different futures. Slower, place-based, biodiverse, traceable production; craft-led economies; community engagement and crafting to improve mental health and resilience. Through the residency I will explore what textile practice might look like outside dominant industrial models. Tethered to landscape, to small flocks, ecological cycles, part of a circular system. I hope to spark dialogues around and live my life demonstrating those futures.