Julie Hicks Textile Design

Taking an old unloved piece of furniture and turning it into something beautiful and useful again is another passion of mine. I like the fact an old piece of furniture has a story. I will always remember where I bought a piece and what I did to transform it. It had another life before it made it's way in to our house and will be unique to us. My other half groans when I pull up outside our house with a piece of furniture in the back, bought from the tip shop or charity furniture shop, sometimes a car boot or the local antiques/collectables barn, but he does end up liking most of my finds. Being a sewer I just had to rescue this old sewing machine and give it a purpose. Base looking a bit sad and unloved  I found this at a little antique place near me at a bargain price of £35.00. Someone had  painted the wrought iron base with what looked like white gloss paint so it looked pretty sad and unloved. I bought it not sure where it was going to go in the house and

Been a while since my last post but life takes over sometimes !! As a florist we have had Valentines Day and Mothers Day since my last post. My old lap top died as well and there was no saving it so I've  had to add all my photos again and share this new one at the minute with the other half so having to negotiate user time til I get my own. The Wall Canvas is finished though hurrah !! I wasn't liking the cream calico background so after quite a lot of stitching I decided to cut it all out and try a different background. I used applique to add colour to the background and then had the task of then restitching all the birds and branches back on !  It is now hanging on my kitchen wall and from a distance looks quite abstract but up close is still my bird inspiration from my wall paper. I wasn't going to give up.   Now on to the next project !

         missprint wallpaper                                                      larder cupboard                             sketching and adding colour                                                                      I wanted to add more colour in my new kitchen so decided to take inspiration from my lovely missprint wallaper   www.missprint.co.uk  that I used on the larder cupboard. The print is of  tropical birds and leaves so I sketched out a bird taking inspiration from their design. I considered a colour palette to go with the kitchen and started putting together some fabric samples. fabric sampling from my colourful sketches  ! So this canvas fabric was stitched using free machine embroidery with some hand stitching             added at the end if I feel it needs it. It will then be stretched over a 3ft x 4ft canvas deep edged board and hung in my kitchen. Below is a roughly stapled piece to see how its looking.                                             

Welcome to my blog. This will be a place where I share what i'm up to, what projects I have on the go and what has inspired me that day or week. I am an avid maker and up cycler and love to get stuck into something new. I , like a lot of makers, am easily bored so can skip from one thing to another but will try to see a project through to the bitter end here. This will prove to be a good thing for me and force me to finish "stuff" !  I have a degree in Textile Design specialising in Embroidery so a lot of my work  has stitch added for texture and colour rather than perfect needlepoint which some might expect now !  I am foremost a sewer and nothing excites me more than discovering a new fabric shop to find more fabric to add to my stash . I have been a florist for many years so you may find some flowery inspiration on here too !!     A few samples produced for various projects while studying for my degree