World Lace Honours

It has been my good fortune to be involved with three magnificent venues over the past year, exhibiting with The Adventurous Lacemakers as guests of honour at the World Lace Festival in Slovakia; with MAKE Southwest in Bovey Tracey, Devon, and with Making Dorset at The Sherborne in its newly-restored glory.

Our venue in Slovakia provided a great space to display the 3.35 metres wide Carbon Cloud, made during the pandemic as a reminder that even during lockdown, we still added to carbon levels in the atmosphere. Pierre Fouché’s experience as a gallerist ensured that this could be successfully strung across the room as five TAL mentors enjoyed their first face-to-face meeting, having previously operated on Zoom or met separately.

Matej Pisca had organised national stands, artists’ displays, exhibitions, banquets, traditional song and dance as well as an international ‘lace-in’, during a wonderful weekend which was followed by a comprehensive and inspiring tour of Slovak lace centres over six days, ending at the museums created by Matej and his mother at Krakovany.

It was also my pleasure to collaborate with The Lace Museum in California on an online design workshop. This is something we plan to take further.

Exhibiting with Making Dorset over the winter enabled me to display five banners against sumptuous scarlet damask, and take part in a discussion evening led by Dorset Visual Arts creative director Paul Newman also involving jeweller Sian Evans and glass artists Charlie Macpherson and Amanda Notarianni.

2025 includes a Showcase for MAKE Southwest at their Riverside Mill at Bovey Tracey February 1 – 22, which may open up an opportunity to present in person an introduction to TAL’s innovative ‘Art Lace for Absolute Beginners’ both for those who do, and those who don’t, make lace, later in the year.