book

Cloth is tactile, cloth is flexible. Cloth doesn't mind how it gets used. If the cloth doesn't mind, neither do we as long as it provides a creative output for those choosing to use it. As such our students, fellow textile artists and friends generate and use cloth for quilts, stitched textiles, textile art, clothing, soft furnishings, interior design, accessories, sculpture and even jewellery.

We formed Committed to Cloth in 2000 as a result of a shared love of textiles - we're both practising artists who also love to teach. One of our key goals is to provide the best tutors in professional, spacious studio environments - but you can find out more about that on the web site. Our skill base and experience spans wet work (dyeing, screen printing etc,), dry work (stitch, construction, textile art etc.) and personal development (composition and design, personal imagery, feedback and critique).

So what is Tray-Dyeing? Essentially it involves packing cloth into a tray of any size, pouring over single or multiple colours of dye and leaving it to work its magic.The resulting cloth is glorious in texture and colour The marks achieved from various forms of manipulation are always fascinating and can range from being graphically crisp and detailed to soft-focus, haloed and gentle.The colour combinations and palettes can range from the serene to the downright bizarre.

How then should you use this book? Any way you like, although we've tried to structure things in a way that builds knowledge, experience and ultimately, understanding. As such, we'd recommend you work in a fairly step-by-step manner However, we do appreciate that people learn in different ways so if you want to, jump around in any way you like! Whatever you do, work consciously, pay atLention to what's happening in front of your eyes, take notes if it helps and above all, take risks. And if things don't work out, try to figure out why and just do them again.

We identify strongly with the words of John Holt, an influential educator:"We learn by doing.There is no other way". It's all about process so we'd encourage you to get stuck in, give it a go, pay attention, experiment, explore and play. Accept that you won't fall in love with every piece of cloth you generate and remember with some further effort, you can often change the 'dogs' to superstars!