Dawn Ireland: My Journey as an Artist

"Fragments"

Harrogate creative stitches were delighted to welcome textile artist Dawn Ireland to speak at our October meeting. Dawn’s talk comprised a slideshow presentation and beautiful artwork on display. Originally from Macclesfield in Cheshire, she always loved art as a girl remembering her Textiles O-Level at school and that her grandmother used to purchase craft supplies for her. She was always inspired by nature and collected found objects and treasures.

In 1988 Dawn began a two year BTEC course in Surface and Pattern Design exploring different techniques. She then went on to study for a BA Hons in Fashion and Textiles at Birmingham University. Dawn started to take sketchbooks out into nature and did a deep dive into mixed media, collage and free machine embroidery, which are still her main stays in her textile work today. Her final year projects included landscapes, painted papers, sketches are monoprints. One of her pieces “Chair” was featured in the Home and Garden Magazine.

BA Hons Fashion & Textiles featuring artwork in Home & Garden Magazine

Dawn’s graduate work was displayed at the New Designers Exhibition in London. Habitat attended the event and commissioned her to produce one-off artwork for their stores in mixed media. In 1994 Dawn moved to Sheffield with her partner where she reminisces that she purchased her first sewing machine, a Benina, that she still uses today! Shortly after the move, Funky Electrica Handmade Cards which supply stores such as John Lewis, Paper Chase and Waterstones approached her to produce some handmade cards. She reflects that many an hour was spent producing the cards that were all hand cut, showing us a photograph of her working away in the studio.

"Funky Electrica Handmade Card" commission and After school art club

During the 1990s, Dawn produced her own artwork to sell to galleries, shops and art markets in Sheffield which consisted of collage, monoprints and mixed media. Moving into the 2000s, Dawn’s work becomes more community based, running an after school art club at a primary school for 19 years! Other projects included creating a beautiful tree art piece in a waiting room for a child mental health service and running art workshops in Sheffield Children’s Hospital.

Working from her home studio and balancing life with young children, Dawn works on personalised commissions and this is where her true style starts to shine through. Commissions included interpretations of people's gardens and houses, keep sake gifts for weddings and anniversaries and many depictions of animals especially birds and cats which are her favourites. Dawn loves the process of sketching nature and incorporating her designs into stitched work such as flower and seed heads. She also enjoys stitching into antique postcards giving a vintage feel.

Garden & Home Commisions

Cats, flowers & seedheads

Just before COVID Dawn moved into a large studio to run workshops in art and embroidery. Fortunately grant funding enabled her to keep the studio going and not letting lockdown stop her, Dawn created a fabric scrap project for her followers to enjoy. She filled their stamped addressed envelopes with colourful scraps to create their own pieces which they were able to share online, creating a sense of community during isolation. Covid also gave Dawn an opportunity to experiment on her own creative practice during which time she wrote tutorials for Love Embroidery Magazine.

"Fabric Scraps" community project during Covid

Dawn continues to sell her artwork at stalls and events, her most recent work comprising of ‘precious fragment’ squares which focus on arranging and composition. Most recently she has appeared on television in an interiors competition on Channel Four called the “Big Interiors Battle 2023”. She featured in the third episode instructing two contestants in free machine embroidery which was filmed at her studio. Her work has also been featured in Homespun Magazine this year where she was interviewed for an article.

Dawn’s warm, free and playful textile artwork really was a delight to see on display at the end of the talk. It is always fascinating to hear the different stories and journeys of the textile artists that visit Harrogate Creative Stitchers and Dawn’s was no exception. It was a really enjoyable afternoon and reminds us why we all love stitch. Until next time.