Fundamental to my design ethos is a desire to reflect the world in which we live and celebrate the best of it. Flowers and the seasons are a source of inspiration but this can be hard in the winter months, when our horizons are bleak and leafless. And perhaps because of this, the first glimpse of the humble snowdrop in January is inevitably a big moment in my calendar. Fragile yet mighty, it somehow finds its way through the harshest conditions and evidence of its delicate strength does not fail to offer us hope when we need it most.
With this mind, I travelled to Sri Lanka with the hope of creating a snowdrop range on our hand-painted pottery but representing these white drooping bell shaped flowers was much more involved than I expected. The flower itself required five colours and a great many sponges, as well as free-hand painting to get the delicate arc of the neck just right!
As demand for snowdrop grew, we were encouraged to put it on fabric. Here again, we found it to be a fiddly business, requiring a steady hand and plenty of patience to replicate the motif perfectly across our quilts.
As demand for snowdrop grew, we were encouraged to put it on fabric. Here again, we found it to be a fiddly business, requiring a steady hand and plenty of patience to replicate the motif perfectly across our quilts.
As a designer, you never quite know the individual responses to your products. However, I will never forget receiving one letter from a woman who told me that her snowdrop quilt gave her a ‘reason to get up in the morning.’ That one letter certainly made it all worthwhile and gave me my own reason to do likewise...
