Day one on the LV21 lightship

Our week long residency on the beautiful LV21 Lightship opened today with magical mermaids enchanting us with the singing deep down in the ship...

We feel so lucky to be in such lovely surroundings. We set up our shop in the radio room, and brooch making in the lookout, and enjoyed amazing views from the end of Gillingham Pier.

We ran a print your own tea towel workshop in the stern where everyone made amazing printed tea towels, from our youngest nautical knot inspired printer...

to our lovely fishy printer...

We set up installations in the boiler rooms and cabins...

and installed our vintage seaside souvenir collection and shop in the control room.

We even have signal flag treasure hunt!

Thank you to everyone that visited today. We are open all day the rest of the week, and on Saturday. Drop in for souvenirs, Seaside Sisters shop, brooch and pennant making and to enjoy this very special ship and some of the hidden treasures we have created for you deep in the engine rooms. We are easy to find, a 10 minute walk from Gillingham station to the Pier or follow the signs to Gillingham Pier, off the A289.

Visit our Souvenir shop this summer...

I'll be joining my Seaside Sisters this summer for two exhibitions celebrating our love of seaside souvenirs, haberdashery and mid-century modern design.


We have an exciting programme of workshops for you as well.

Wednesday 17th August 10am-5pm - Vintage inspired fabric printing summer school - Details and booking here.

Wednesday 17th August 6.30pm-9.30pm - Print your own souvenir tea towel - Details and booking here.

Friday 19th August 6.30pm-9.30pm - Print Gocco cards and notebooks - Details and booking here.

Saturday 3rd September 12noon-3pm - Print Gocco on a lightship! - Details and booking here.

SW Craft Club Summer pop-up

Look forward to seeing you here this weekend - I'll be running a brooch making taster workshop. Make a brooch to match your new Swish & Pout outfits and decorate with your Got Craft buttons, leaving time to try some Tooting Tram raspberry cider and a Ms. Cupcake.

Vintage inspired fabric printing

My love of vintage fabrics has followed me since I first unearthed a pair of 1950s barkcloth curtains at a jumble sale and stitched them up into dress, and then later discovered sweet fifties and sixties cotton print frocks peeking out of the rails of my local ramshackle charity shop. It was pure glee at first sight.

My other passion has been printmaking which I have been lucky enough to explore under the expert tuition of the talented tutors at the City Lit. Last year I combined these to launch vintage inspired fabric printing workshops at my Sprout exhibition.

My vintage inspired fabric printing workshops aim to give people the opportunity to explore and handle vintage fabrics and to delve into my library of mid-century textile designers. Taking inspiration from these, participants can then design their own images for hand printing.

Sneak peek at some of my books

Participants will create lino blocks for printing from their designs and using non-toxic textile inks, create a repeat pattern using their blocks or in combination with readymade printing blocks. At the end of the workshop, everyone will have created their own handprinted vintage inspired fabric suitable for making up into a cushion, bag, lampshade or even a pinny.

If you've been inspired by the recent exhibitions of Lucienne Day's work at the Pallant House Gallery, the Horrockses dresses at the Fashion & Textile Museum and the sixtieth anniversary of the Festival of Britain, vintage inspired fabric printing might be just the thing for you this summer!

Lucienne and Robin Day at Pallant House Gallery

Horrockses display at FTM

Horrockses Display at FTM

No previous experience is needed, and in small groups you will have one-to-one tuition to guide you through each stage. Have a look at my past workshops to see what can be created by people using lino printing for the first time!

The next workshops are in July at CraftyPint North and the We Make London pop-up boutique. At longer workshops, participants can create their own designs and print a large piece of fabric. At the shorter sessions, ready made blocks are available to create your own fifties inspired fabric. I'm really looking forward to seeing what people create at them.

Lucienne Day at Pallant House Gallery

More workshops are planned for my Summer Shows with the Seaside Sisters at Vintage Hemingway, Craft Central and LV21 in late July and August. If you would like to find out about my workshops, please do get in touch by email, leave a comment, or check the events section of this blog.

Museum of '51 at the Southbank

Here comes the sun...

This summer looks to be full of workshops. I've been busy since christmas having a few amazing adventures, which I will tell you about later on. One of these include working with the lovely Louise to set up Handmade in Tooting and Crafty Pint. We will be championing our talented home grown designers as well as encouraging people to shop local and providing affordable workshops in informal settings.

The Crafty Pint brooch making workshop proved so popular, I decided to take it North to the We Make pop-up boutique. And my vintage inspired fabric printing workshop will also be travelling North with a Festival of Britain twist. We also linked up with the fabulous Zoe from SW Craft Club and will be putting on Crafty Pint taster sessions in Tooting and Clapham. Read on for more info about all my workshops this summer...

5 July Fabric brooch making

We Make Summer Boutique, Oak Studios, 8 Perrins Court, London NW3 1QS

Delve into Fabric Nation’s stash of vintage, upcycled and contemporary fabrics to make several pretty styles of flower, all deceptively simple to sew. Use them to brighten clothes or bags, wear as a hair clip or brooch, or make them as gifts for lucky friends. Pair up flowery, polkadot or striped prints, 50s barkcloth and US quilting cottons with vintage buttons, trims and felts to create unique and colourful designs. These flower brooches and hair clips are deceptively simple to make, perfect for the beginner, and offer more experienced participants a chance to explore different techniques and work with a range of different materials.

Gillian will provide step-by-step tuition in different brooch making techniques and one-to-one help for those with little sewing experience. All materials are provided, including home baked cakes. To book a place and for more details visit the We Make Summer Boutique

8 July Vintage inspired fabric printing

We Make Summer Boutique, Oak Studios, 8 Perrins Court, London NW3 1QS

At this all day workshop, Gillian will be sharing her mid-century modern fabric and textile book collection for inspiration and providing tutorials in lino printing and textiles. No previous experience is needed and all materials are provided. By the end of this workshop you will have gained insight into textile design, created your own lino block for printing and will take home your own printed fabric suitable to making up into a cushion, bag or even a pinny. All materials and homemade cakes are included. To book a place and for more details visit the We Make Summer Boutique

16 July Vintage inspired fabric printing

Crafty Pint North, Stapleton Tavern, Stroud Green Road London N4, 2pm-5pm.

Join me for an afternoon of vintage inspired fabric printing at Crafty Pint North. Taking inspiration from my collection of mid-century modern fabrics and textile design books, you will be able to create your own hand printed fabric in the lovely informal surroundings of the Stapleton Pub. All materials and homemade cakes are included, you just need some beer money. Visit Crafty Pint to book a place.

Details of all our Crafty Pint workshops North and South of the river are here.

24 July & 7 August

Tooting Tram & Social, SW17 & The Landor, Clapham

SW Craft Club are hosting two weekends of crafting South-West London style and Fabric Nation will be joining other crafters and makers to showcase all the amazing talent that lies south of the river. Visit SW Craft Club for more details.

16-21 August Seaside Sisters Souvenir Shoppe

Craft Central 33-35 St John’s Square
, London, EC1M 4DS

I'll be joining my Seaside Sisters for our annual exhibition of seaside inspired textiles and prints along with vintage inspired printing and sewing workshops.

29 August - 3rd September Seaside Sisters show on the LV21 Lightship

LV21, Gillingham Pier, Pier Approach Rd, Gillingham Kent ME7 1RX

The Seaside Sisters are being let loose for a week of nautical filled fun and making. Join us to make and create a ship filled of crafty coastal delights.

Visit the LV21 website.

Look forward to seeing you!

Fabric Nation xx

Shiny happy eskimo girl

I've really enjoyed making these. She looks so happy, her smiley, sunshine face makes me smile back. These sweet dolls are made from vintage printed linen. It's nice how they are all different. Sadly, I can't find out who the designer was. We had these on the stall as well and one little girl looked so much like this little eskimo with her bobbed her and big grin, her mum bought one for her. I have just a few left now and have listed them in my Folksy shop.

Handprinted bunting making at Eco Design Fair

We had a lovely time on the first day of the Eco Design Fair. As well as our stall full of print gocco and recycled vintage fabric wares, we have Xtina's fabulous new wrapping paper on offer.

As is usual when the Seaside Sisters get together, we also ran our bunting making workshop. We had a stack of vintage fabrics to choose from and the Xtina printed them up with our chosen messages, images and names.

I choose this sweet xmas tree girl. It was hard to choose from so many lovely images. Here are some of my freshly printed pennants drying on the rack. It only takes about 10-15 minutes to dry so we could run a 'while-u-wait' printing service for shoppers.

I'm really pleased with the finished bunting and can't wait to decorate the house now.


We also printed up lots of cheery xmas messages on lovely tweeds, silks and velvets.

For people too busy to stop, Xtina had her ready-made bunting for sale.

In between printing and chatting to our lovely customers, I managed a little xmas shopping, including a snazzy ring pull clutch bag, a recycled wool rug and a bangle made from sugar tongs. Beautiful and tactile. There are a wonderful array of sellers working with people around the world to create beautifully made and ethically traded original homewares and accessories.

We will be at the Eco Design Fair again all day (10-5pm) on Sunday, so do pop buy for some inspiring xmas shopping and bunting making.