London Pattern Day: Paint! Pattern! Print!

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Having visited the Women in Print, 150 years of Liberty textiles at the William Morris Gallery, I headed to Liberty to see the latest fabrics and bought myself a Merchant & Mills pattern and Liberty Tana Lawn printed fabric as a holiday project, which I can proudly share I have completed and am waiting for warmer weather to show it off!

The primary reason for visiting London at the end of last month was to attend the Private View of the exhibition: Paint! Pattern! Print – The Textiles of Susan Collier and Sarah Campbell at the Fashion and Textile Museum, so I headed to Bermondsey, near London Bridge for the evening. Thanks Sarah for the invite! On arrival at the museum we were greeted by Sarah and much to my amusement she presented me with a pink takeaway fork from her pocket – for my fork collection!

I first met Sarah in London about ten years ago, having got in touch with her via Twitter when that was a nice place to be! Someone had the nerve to copy some of Sarah’s work, so I reached out to offer my sympathy and we decided to meet up the next time I was in London. As an academic I was in the capital for New Designers, the graduate showcase at the Business Design Centre, so we arranged to meet. We spent well over an hour putting the world of pattern in its place and we have stayed in touch ever since, with Sarah judging student awards for me, and joining me on an industry panel I was chairing at New Designers in 2023, having been kind enough to allow me to feature her work in my book, Repeat Printed Pattern for Interiors, published by Bloomsbury in 2023. I was delighted to see this book stocked at the Fashion and Textile Museum – thanks to the Liberty team for taking the picture of me and my book!

On entering the exhibition it was a complete feast for the eyes … with pattern and colour everywhere, appearing from around corners, up above and room after room. This was a true dive into the archives of Collier Campbell textiles over decades of working together, two sisters and a shared vision for joyous textiles. The exhibition included a wide range of items designed by Susan and Sarah, from the drawing and painting tools, to loose sketches and scaled painted designs on paper to lengths of printed fabrics, interior products and dresses. There were examples of Sarah’s more recent collaborations with Magpie and West Elm, alongside press cuttings featuring both Susan and Sarah at home and wielding paint brushes.

As a child growing up in the 1980s the look of home textiles, if not Laura Ashley, was likely to be Collier Campbell. With bolder and colourful brush marks suggesting the joy of Les Fauves artists, Matisse and Derain, rather than the Victorian Gothic tight sprigs Laura Ashley celebrated. I remember visiting the exhibition at London’s National Theatre in 2011, celebrating fifty years of sisters Susan and Sarah designing in 2011, shortly after Susan died. I recall loving the energy in the painting and bold use of colours.

In this current exhibition, as is the legacy of the archives, the patterns are rhythmic in their flow and scale; musical in spirit. Motifs are often geometrics, florals and birds, and famously designs such as Cote d’Azure, evoke summer scenes in Europe as the sisters worked to deadlines only imagining the holiday season. It was wonderful to see the paperwork for this piece, having included it in my book, Repeat … that features an interview with Sarah and images of key pieces by Collier Campbell.

A design new to me that I really enjoyed seeing was Dancing Squares, from 1990 for American company UTICA (Stevens). This huge length of hand printed paper over two and a half metres long features painted squares evolving from dark to light up the design (right hand image below). The design on the left, again one I wasn’t familiar with, was a huge collage of a table of food and drink, in warm reds and oranges complemented by blue and turquoise.

The florals and bird designs were full of life, with painted textures and pattern. It was also good to see the colour chips on the sides of some designs to guide the printers for production, as well as notes for the artworks and printers. The designs have depth as Susan and Sarah played with backgrounds and foregrounds as equal importance. Display cabinets showcased works on paper and coordinating designs alongside their hero prints as large statements on the wall and hanging as lengths.

Everyone was friendly. I chatted to several people during the evening as we shared our joy of the work on show and the speeches by the curator as well as Sarah celebrated the pure joy that pattern, colour and creativity can provide. I was excited to have the opportunity to talk to Zandra Rhodes, the founder of the museum, and who continues to inspire us all, including the students I teach at Norwich.

I have only shared some of the many photographs I took on the evening, but I strongly recommend the show to anyone who loves printed pattern. It is the perfect tonic for the times we are living in, and a beautiful reminder of the joy to be found in painted and printed pattern! Congratulations to Sarah and the curatorial team of Teresa Collenette and Dennis  Nothdruft at the Fashion and Textile Museum.

I sat on the train back to Norwich with my heart filled with excitement for the world of pattern I belong in, energised to support the next generation of designers I am working with at Norwich over the coming months. It was a day of celebrating Sarah and her sister Susan, having seen so many of their designs in the two exhibitions I visited – what a truly impressive legacy to be inspired by!

London pattern day: Liberty / Women in Print

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I spent a busy day in London this week, with focus on print and pattern. It was fabulous! My first destination was the William Morris Gallery, Walthamstow in east London. I can thoroughly recommend the exhibition, Women in Print: 150 years of Liberty Textiles, on until Sunday 21st June 2026, in conjunction with Liberty Fabrics.

The exhibition spread across two floors of the gallery with a number of rooms and corridors showcasing some old favourites of printed textiles and related works on papers, alongside some lesser known pieces and associated garments.

The introductory video for the exhibition gave an insight to the role of women at Liberty with old photographs and recent interviews. I thoroughly enjoyed seeing old favourites throughout the exhibition, with works by Sonia Delaunay, Althea McNish, Jacqueline Groag and Susan Collier & Sarah Campbell as well as being introduced to names I wasn’t aware of, including Mrs Stoneley and Winifred Mold. I hadn’t realised Lucienne Day only designed one design (Fritillary) for Liberty, with it being agreed she would design for Heals while Robert Stewart would design for Liberty!

There was a second video upstairs, filmed in the 1970s that showcased the print and dye work with some rather random models in Liberty clothes wandering in and out of shot, by the print tables and dye vats in swimwear! When I discussed this with Sarah Campbell later that evening she joked it was her and Susan, the design duo behind Collier Campbell – exhibition now on in London’s Fashion and Textile Museum and featured in my next blog post!

The exhibition is free to attend, with donations to the gallery gratefully received.

Congratulations to curators, Rowan Bain and Róisín Inglesby.

Susan Collier & Sarah Campbell, scarf design featuring the Liberty shopfront

Sonia Delaunay scarf design

Liberty swatch

Lucienne Day’s ‘Fritillary’, her only design for Liberty

Sarah Campbell’s notebook, double-spread

Collier Campbell ‘Kazak’ design

Collier Campbell for Liberty, featuring Bauhaus, inspired by Gunta Stolzl, the weave master at the Bauhaus, Germany

sharing my pattern research

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I’ve been busy printing and presenting my ongoing pattern research over the last few months, testing the design and print process, and receiving useful feedback – which may explain the lack of blog posts recently!

Last September I presented my work at the Fashion and Textiles Courses Association conference, Futurescan 6, held at De Montfort University in Leicester, and had a small exhibition of the work in progress during the conference. It was great to formalise my ongoing work at that time, and receive external feedback from the audience. It was useful to consider how I communicate the research, as the principle is simple but the process complex. I have also discussed this research as part of other presentations over the last few months, for colleagues, for undergraduate students as well as the audience of the Costume and Textiles Association’s programme of Heritage Open Week talks at the Forum in Norwich.

Last week I presented this research to the British Association of Paper Historians as part of their Spring Meeting held at St. Bride Foundation, having been invited to do so by the Wallpaper History Society. My fellow presenters covered wide ranging topics, from paper conservation, Japanese paper as cloth, the College of Arms and the current situation of the paper industry in the global context. It was a fascinating day with lots of common ideas and interests, and I received some very positive feedback to keep me on track.

I have further opportunities to share my research in a couple of months, so more news on that in due course!

I am continuing to develop both lino blocks as well as artwork for screen printing, which enables me to test different colour handling and substrate options, for wallpaper and cloth. Colour is an important element of this research and particularly the transparency of colour in the overprinting, so the palettes will continue to evolve as I continue the exploration of primary and secondary colours.

As I gear up to making larger work for an upcoming showcase opportunity I look forward to sharing more of the work in progress.

sketchbook development
pattern development

pottery collaboration: form and mark

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A little over a year ago I started to collaborate with my mum on a very special creative project. My mother has been a potter all of my life and family meals at home would mean eating from hand-thrown stoneware bowls, plates and cups made by her. During the 1970s and early ’80s she exhibited her goods at craft fairs in and around Wymondham, Norfolk and we would hang around watching as mum demonstrated her craft alongside her creative friends. We were lucky enough to have personalised birthday gifts made by mum during our childhood, and when I left home I was given a homemade teapot, cups and bowls that I still have, three decades later! My sister and I used to play at the potter’s wheel and hand build the odd ornament. I vividly remember the smell of burning clay dust on the bar heater and the feeling of dry clay on my hands.

Last winter, as a way to spend time together at a sad time of family loss, I suggested we try collaborating, sharing our skills to see what we could come up with. I made a project sketchbook to outline a few thoughts and approaches to form and visual language, and handed it over for mum to think about what chimed with her. Although I’m a surface pattern designer, I’ve no experience of hand painting on ceramics beyond art school. Mum has switched to hand building her vessels in recent years so this was how we started. After a morning in my studio pressing tools into damp clay, drawing forms and testing colours, the project was underway.

Mum tested a few ways to construct the vessels and I responded to the forms with drawn and painted marks inspired by our mutual appreciation for landscape. I had to learn how to load the brush and use the colour on the clay. I monoprinted texture and marks by painting newspaper with colour then drawing on the back of it on the damp clay. I drew with the ceramics pencil and scratched through shapes of colour with different tools. I’d hold my breath in anticipation as I planned a long line of colour, top to bottom, over the neck and shoulders of the form. We also added buttons as visual and textural interest. We had some gentle discussions about my preference for marks mum was less keen on, and we egged each other on each time we returned to the pottery. I’d receive a message, “Kate darling, I’ve made some more for you!” and soon the weekend arrived and we were nattering away, having our creative fun together again.

We have learned lots about what we have both wanted with the shapes and surface pattern of the pots, and I’ve tried my best to understand slips, engobes and underglazes. Our techniques have been refined, and standards raised during the year. I’ve definitely got better at drawing on three-dimensional forms – I’m even more in awe of Clarice Cliff! There are three series so far, exploring different forms, colourways and surface decoration, with approximately ten flasks in each.

I’ve thoroughly enjoyed the opportunity to work with mum on this project, it genuinely feels an absolute privilege to be able to work in this way. This collaboration has been one of united adventure, sharing each other’s creative decision making and discipline expertise to guide us, learning to make more than we could individually, sitting beside each other in a conversation between clay form and mark making.

I also think we may not be done yet … we shall see! We are looking at options to exhibit them and would very much like to share them with others.

draw, design, cut & print

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I’m currently working on some large scale lino blocks to print floral patterns as part of my continuing pattern research. At the same time I’m also teaching our BA2 group how to create repeating printed patterns, so it’s always nice when there is some parallels between what I’m up to and what the students are doing.

I have been returning to my sketchbook of floral drawings I made from my trip to the Italian Alps, and exploring them again with new paper cutouts as I think about overprinting and block rotation. I’ve not proofed the plate yet, but here’s some work in progress images from the studio.

weaving the timeline

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Dates and anniversaries matter to me, personally and professionally. They record the passing of time, the gaining of experience, the rhythms of life and death. I bemuse my family & friends by remembering apparently irrelevant dates, including the birthday of Roland Rat, (12th March if you are wondering!). 

Seven years ago this week I started working at Norwich University of the Arts as Course Leader of both the Fashion and Textile Design degree courses.  I undertook this role for four years before focusing on the BA Textile Design course for the last three. I am immensely proud of the course and community I lead, with a strong network of colleagues supporting me with the wobbles while celebrating the wins. 

One of my leaving gifts from my colleagues at Birmingham City University back in 2018 was a warped-up 8-shaft Harris loom – it’s important to note I’m a printed textile designer, not a weaver! This week I have finished weaving the warp – over 5 and a half metres of weaving – certainly not a commercially viable rate!  I haven’t committed a huge amount of time, more short bursts over the years when the mood took me. I was surprisingly sad as well as excited that there was no more cloth to weave and I’d be able to see the entirety of the weaving away from the loom.

The completion of the warp coinciding with this work anniversary has made me reflect on these years, there have been highs and lows in both work and life. Learning to weave has given me a process to occupy my head with away from everything else, without any pressure but to play and explore. It has been so helpful for me to have this space and activity. As I cut the warp threads and unwound the length the bands of colour and materials I selected at various times revealed themselves, reminding me of how I was feeling as well as specific experiences. 

In parallel to making this cloth, I’ve developed my role in academia – developing curriculums and strong student experience, achieving the title of Associate Professor in Design, writing a book, and developing my role of advocate for others and the discipline of textiles both in education and industry. It’s nice to have something tangible to mark these years. I’m ready to get stuck into the next chapter of academia but I’ll have to find another hobby or learn how to warp the loom up myself … here’s to the next year of learning and teaching! 

summer travels to Switzerland

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A very overdue post – and while the summer is very definitely behind us, I’m still remembering the hot summer and the family adventures we went on, as the days grow shorter and I reach for the jumper.

This summer we travelled overland to Switzerland, firstly to Geneva, then up into the mountains from Sion to a little village called Arolla where we explored the mountains and glaciers as well as the flower-filled meadows – precipitous paths and all! Back down from the mountains to Sion via the post bus, we then journeyed into Italy and up to a Swiss hilltop village above Locarno, called Intragna. I remember excellent fig ice-cream and cakes from the brilliant bakery and an early morning swim in the river. We ended the trip with a couple of nights in Zurich exploring the city and found time to swim in the lake too, before getting the train back home via Paris.

Switzerland tested my language skills, particularly as we travelled through French speaking Geneva, Italian speaking Locarno and German speaking Zurich, but we did our best. The food was fairly heavy on cheese and potatoes, and I can recommend the Swiss wine that apparently tends to stay in the country rather than being exported. Of course we sampled the chocolate too!


The landscape was beautiful and varied during our holiday, from vineyards to pastures, wide glacial rivers to narrow streets of Geneva. It is sobering to see the pace at which the glaciers are retreating, with dates marked on rocks along the walk up the valley to meet the ice of years gone by. The flowers were stunning and in abundance lower down the mountain passes. We were fortunate with good weather during our time in the mountains so on one day we were able to climb to nearly 3000 metres and lunch at a refuge hut before a rather long decent including steep drops, rickety bridges and large staples to hold on to – via ferrata – some rather scary!

We enjoyed some excellent galleries and museums during our trip including:

Musée Ariana – the Swiss museum for ceramics and glass in Geneva

The Regional Museum for the Centovalli and Terre di Pedemonte in Intragna which also included a climb of the bell tower

Landesmuseum (Swiss National Museum) Zürich – which housed an exhibition on all things Techno, as well as a sizeable collection of Swiss art and design through the ages and an incredible collection of rings of all shapes and sizes

The Pavillon Le Corbusier, also in Zurich, nestled in a park by the lake

A surprise cultural highlight was a festival in Geneva on Swiss National Day (1st August), where we were treated to a performance by Alpenhorn Sound System, as we watched fireworks over Lake Geneva – amazing!

A great holiday, lots of good memories and plenty of inspiration!

print / pattern / cloth

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After a long academic term leading the Textile Degree at Norwich University of the Arts I finally found some time to get in to the workshop and sample some designs on fabrics. I developed the patterns rather a while ago. I love the process of screen printing, from mixing the colours, exposing the screens, pulling the squeegee and of course lifting the screen to see the new print. I even enjoy washing the screens ready for the next time!

I’m not going to share all the outcomes at this point, but here’s a taster of the colours and a glimpse of one of the designs. I was working with transparencies in the pigment and binder to create the extra colours… and I’m really excited about the results!

PLAY prints on show

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I am really pleased to have had two of my most recent works on paper selected to be included in the Print Cromer exhibition this summer, with the Private View on 19th July. This new body of work has been developed as part of my academic practice at Norwich University of the Arts where I have been exploring pattern structures and repeat blocks. I have explored new pattern iterations by rotating the screens to add additional colours of the same artwork, thereby building greater complexity from limited design information. In an age where digital design and the use of Artificial Intelligence provides limitless opportunities, I want to explore the fundamentals of pattern creation to generate new possibilities that are led by the designer, ensuring the creative path is transparent.

The theme of the exhibition is PLAY, and as a result the palette I created feels full of summer carnivals and fairgrounds. The overprinting of inks with differing levels of transparency provides a building of depth and subtlety of harmonious colour.

I created a number of one, two, three and four-colour prints initially, that featured the screen rotation in adding the colours. I then cut strips of the prints and with further rotation of the strips, interwove them into one base print that had been sliced to enable the slotting. I enjoyed bringing back an element of paper engineering from my book art practice into these new pieces.

In designing each piece, I considered the placement of motifs and relationships of colour. The collection provides variation within a collective identity and belonging. Some pieces feature only triangular motifs, while most incorporate the circular and rectangular elements too. My research utilises design thinking by Lewis Foreman Day, and his distribution of elements. This approach results in scattered focal motifs that work across repeating patterns. Although this is not a feature of my new work, I recognise the placement considerations are also useful in this work too.

A number of these pieces will be for sale during the show.

playing with print

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I’ve been enjoying some studio time to explore my print research as works on paper with the hope of exhibiting the work. I enjoy paper engineering and construction (that’ll be the book artist in me!) and have previously tested paper manipulation in relation to this current pattern research. I tend to work in this way, creating drawings or prints to exhibit / sell alongside forming pattern ideas, and it has been useful to see the evolution of the sampling in this way here too.

These new artworks utilise my screens of geometric artwork practically exploring research into motif distribution in printed pattern thinking formalised by Lewis Foreman Day in his book Pattern Design, published in 1901. Having printed the artwork in the first colour, I rotate the screen by 90-degrees and print the second colour, turning the artwork / screen up to four times for maximum complexity. To add a further dimension, I’ve been constructing works on paper that utilise several iterations of the prints to build new compositions by weaving and slotting strips of the printed papers in differing combinations of the four colours in the palette, providing the coherency across the series, and an injection of the spirit of summer fairgrounds through the colour and geometric visual language.

There are two screens of artwork used in this collection, therefore two series of original artwork (PLAY – circles and PLAY – triangles) and I shall continue to evolve the body of work over the coming months. I’d love to know your thoughts on this new work!