My Unstitched Coif Reflections
100 Hours of Stitching
When I first learnt about this project, I was excited about potentially being part of a collaborative piece of embroidery that could be part of the V&A collection. The V&A museum has given me many wonderful memories and inspiration over my artistic life. I served an apprenticeship at The Royal School of Needlework in the 1980s, and the institution was asked to help restore some of the costumes that the V&A had to get ready for a new fashion court area. I loved being part of a team helping restore textile history. The RSN at this time was based in Princess Gate in London, just up the road from the museum where the conservation studio was based. At the same time, I created one of my all-time favourite embroideries, a blackwork piece of a Samurai headdress, taking inspiration from Japanese armour displayed in the V&A. The RSN provided a wonderful technical training in hand embroidery, however I wanted to explore my artistic side and went to art college to do so.
During my art student days, I spent many afternoons sitting on the floor of the V&A museum drawing inspiration from all the wonderful artefacts. It is an amazing institution that I hold very dear to my art. I am now a member of the V&A and use the member's room with my husband, where we enjoy chats about the latest V&A exhibitions.
I have been teaching embroidery for several years, have written articles for magazines and books, and use my embroidery to unite communities. I deliver speeches to embroidery groups nationwide, including the Embroiderers Guild. I specialise in helping people design their pieces. My teaching motto is, 'I aim to inspire, and it is not about what I can do but what I can help you create". I love helping people design and workpieces using stitches and fabric. My students create traditional hand-embroidered items to very modern machine embroidery works of art.
I am fascinated by the meaning of stitching and why people create what they create. I curated the Heroes Quilt project during the first lockdown during the Covid-19 pandemic. We were suddenly asked to stay in our homes and not mix outside with other people to contain the virus. It was a time of great uncertainty for many people, especially those who lived alone. So many of my students asked me to organise online lessons, which I did. These were mainly technical classes, but I wanted to do something to bring people together through stitch. One of my students contacted me, and we chatted and came up with the Hero’s quilt idea. I set out information on my social media sites and asked people to embroider a square with their Hero and write why they embroidered what they embroidered. I received almost 50 squares and their stories. I published a book as a historical document in stitch, recording people's thoughts. All profits went to a collection of NHS charities. Many people made quilts and community projects during the lockdowns, expressing various opinions. I feel privileged that I put this together and people trusted me with their art and stories.
Another project I put together was the "Jubilee Collage," funded by The Arts Council of England. It was about creating something artistic to celebrate Queen Elizabeth's Platinum Jubilee, who became the longest-living monarch of our times. I taught embroidery across North London, to dementia patients, kids on free school meals, and the North London Stitch Community.
So, returning to the Unstitched Coif project. I loved the coif design and enjoyed the embroidery process, from thinking about the design to the stitching. I wanted the piece to be meaningful because of the above projects and my practice. I didn't want to pick up a needle and start embroidering; I had to think long and hard about the message I wanted to create in the design. One day in June, I was walking down Regent Street in London, and above me were hundreds of Pride flags triumphantly waving away, celebrating Pride Week. The word 'pride' is an integral cultural concept within the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer, and Intersex (LGBTQI) community, representing solidarity, collectively, identity, and resistance to discrimination and violence.
Currently various parts of the world have many problems accepting people for themselves, and I feel very fortunate to be living in Europe, where people are not persecuted for being who they are. We are all equal, and I wanted to embroider that into the 'unstitched coif". I wanted to illustrate through the flag's colours how society has changed from the hundred years ago when the coif design was originally created.
I thought about how the design would look on the piece if it were made up into a coif. I decided to mirror the flag at the back of the coif so there is more of a design feature. I made the red band narrower so that when the fabric is sewn together, the stripe is the same width as the rest.
While embroidering, I decided to leave some areas unfinished such as the leaves as I wanted to illustrate the silencing and oppression many queer people still face around the world today. This week, India rejected in their top court that people cannot marry if they are of the same sex. Russia is taking steps to make sure people who are queer are persecuted.
I wanted to include two pieces written by two of my friends and their thoughts about being gay in 2023.
Pride - Rainbow by Luke
Joy, safety and acceptance. As a young, gay, Christian man planning on joining the Royal Navy. I feel thankful to have grown up in the UK. LGBT+ rights have come so far, and we still have a way to go. I am lucky. Some of our queer brothers and sisters around the World so have the safety or acceptance we take for granted. It hasn't always been this way. Some friends grew up when it was illegal to be gay. Clause 28 prohibited the "promotion of homosexuality" by local authorities. It's only been ten years same sex couple could get married (17 July 2013). We are still in a place where queer people aren't fully accepted. It is still forbidden for same-sex marriage in the eyes of the Church of England. The pride flag is a statement: we are here, always have been and not going anywhere. We are becoming more visible and not being marginalised anymore.
Who I am - by Leslie.
I never had to choose; it was just who I was always. I had to put up with 'speculative' comments in my early 20s. I was 21 in 1970, just 3 years after the law was changed, so I never had to worry about the police knocking on the door! When I moved to Wolverhampton to be with Alan, my partner for over 40 years, people seemed to accept us as a couple. Our old, literally, friends Ted & Barbara, now deceased, certainly knew, as Barbara used to ask me about 'gay' things openly. I was never 'in the closet' I didn't go around shouting, "I'm gay!" I worked in the Central Library for 28 years, and everyone knew Alan and I were a couple. We had Christmas cards sent to us. Everyone seemed very liberal and laid back, but I remember one colleague, when someone mentioned a local teashop, came out with "It's where all the queers go," which surprised quite a few people.
I hope my unstitched coif embroidery will make people reflect and wonder why I embroidered the design as I did. I hope for an equal world where we can be accepted and celebrated for who we are without prejudice, violence and hatred.
