June Meeting - by Viv
Claire opened the meeting with her bubbly smile making us all laugh. She advised of Orpington quilters and Beckenham quilters open meetings that we can all attend.
The AGM parts of our evening continued with the Treasurers report and Eileen updating us on our membership. The Jelly roll workshop that was postponed due to Covid19 will now take place in January 2023. Claire will let us have a date nearer the time.
The members of Shirley Quilters agreed that the committee do a brilliant job and they are grateful for all they do.
Jenny Beal then spoke to us about the time that she was an apprentice with the Royal School of Needlework. Jenny told us that she has always loved sewing and was encouraged by her grandma. Jenny took O Level needlecraft at school and showed us her first cushion - very 70’s colours. Jennie then applied to the school of needlework in 1978 and obtained one of the six places allotted for apprenticeship. Jenny explained that this was all hand sewing and that’s the course lasted for two years. She explained that they were taught English traditional hand sewing crafts and any time that they were not in the classroom they would be working to produce items for sale by the School of needlework. Jenny showed us a sample of her smoking that was shown in an American exhibition. Jenny had brought multiple samplers showing her progress through the two years of the training apprenticeship. These included appliqué, blackwork, drawn and pulled thread work, English and Italian quilting, embroidery anglais, ecclesiastical and goldwork. She also showed us some regimental embroidery that she had worked. Both sides of these impressive items were perfect mirror images of each other.
Whilst in the workshop Jenny worked on repairing embroidered chairs, Regimental flags, woven tapestries from Blenheim Palace and a hanging from Longleat house celebrating its 400th anniversary. She encouraged us to go and see The Overlord Embroidery which tells the story of D-Day and the Battle of Normandy in 34 extraordinary hand-stitched panels with a total length of 83 metres.
Jenny was a good speaker and her audience was spell bound.
We finished with a show and tell.