Oh yes, it is that time of year again as I gear up for Festival of Quilts. The show runs from Thursday 30th July to Sunday 2nd August at the NEC, Birmingham and is the biggest quilt show in Europe.

It is, by some distance, my biggest event of the year. I didn’t take a stand last year because of the house move. I took a stand this year because I expected the house move to be done. It isn’t but that is a whole depressing blog post that you don’t want me to write! So my stand this year is, along with the InStitches stand, adjacent to The Creative Textile Studio which Hazel, Terry and myself run. We’re really grateful to the show organisers for agreeing to put our stands next to the studio. It makes running the studio easier but, more importantly, it extends the demonstrating area as I will be breakdown printing on my stand for the full four days and Hazel / Terry will be using thermal screens and textile inks on theirs.

The most important thing that I’m working on right now is a new book ‘Breakdown Printing’ which I will launch at the show. Details to follow but I’m really excited about it!

Around the book work, I’m getting everything else ready which includes buying in more stock of dyes, chemicals, screens etc. and there have been a couple of changes. The big one, that actually makes me rather sad, is that the UK manufacturer of wood-framed screens that I’ve used for years has closed down. They were the last manufacturer in the UK but struggled with the double hit of increased costs and decreased demand as more schools and colleges replace screen printing with digital printing. The good news, I found a manufacturer in Spain who ships to the UK so I will have lots of screens to sell at Festival. The bad news - a price increase particularly on the smallest sized frame. I’ll set the exact price once they have been delivered and I know the customs / duty / admin fees but I have had quotes from UK manufacturers of metal-framed screens and wood is still cheaper. In the meantime I still have a handful of screens in my online shop from the old supplier………

A small change has been to Soda Ash. I buy all my dyes and chemicals from Kemtex and they have seen interruptions in supply so have had to find a new manufacturer of Soda Ash. The change - the new stuff is significantly denser so if you use by volume (as I do) you will need to reduce how much you use. I used to use 3 heaped tablespoons per litre of water when making soda solution - I now use 2 heaped tablespoons. I’ve added a label to the packets to explain. If you buy from another retailer and it looks different, this is probably why.

And then there are Wonky Print Inspiration Packs and Absolutely Darling Hand Dyed Packs to make, leaflets to get printed, signage to print and laminate, stand ‘stuff’ to check and pack, and a whole bunch of boxes to tick!

If you’re at the show, please stop buy and say hello! (And maybe buy the new book ….)

Beautiful beach on Iona

We’re back from our Highland adventure and it was wonderful. We toured Mull, Iona and Skye with stops in Fortwilliam and Largs on the way up and down. I had intended taking lots and lots of photos but actually too many looked similar and they really didn’t capture the beauty of the landscapes. I loved Fionnphort in Mull and the island of Iona in the sunshine - the beaches were turquoise and crystal clear. We could have been in the Caribbean if it wasn’t for the somewhat cooler weather! And Calgary Beach, Skye, on a cold wet day. We visited potteries, craft shops and distillery shops (Tobermory was very impressive). And found some great places to eat - Penny Gate Lodge Restaurant on Mull and Bog Myrtle on Skye really stood out. We came home with several bottles of gin and whisky, a rather lovely ceramic plate and happy memories.

Not so happy was the house move emotional rollercoaster we’ve had over the last month - good news, bad news, good news, bad news rinse and repeat. In theory we are due to complete mid June but we still haven’t exchanged contracts and it is looking like the date will get pushed out. It is, frankly, infuriating.

But I had one very good piece of news recently - the latest quilt in my Shoreline series has been accepted into SAQA Wide Horizons. Having the time to make art has been a good thing to come out of the whole house move stuff ….

Shoreline V

After a long period of rejection after rejection I’m absolutely delighted to let you know that Shoreline IV (above) has been juried into Quilt Visions 2026! There were 33 pieces selected from 323 entries … which makes it even more special. I did a very happy Happy Dance when I heard! My heartfelt thanks to the jurors Carolyn Ducey, Justin Ming Young and David Van Burkirk.

The early pieces in the Shoreline series were calmer but, as my frustration at the snail like pace of our house sale has grown, the pieces have become striking, more jarring. And no, we still haven’t moved.

If you read my posts regularly you’ll know that I like to keep busy. I thoroughly enjoyed teaching my 3 day Luscious Layers workshop at Little Heath Barn in Bromsgrove a couple of weeks ago. Great students and some amazing work (examples below)! I’ll be teaching the same workshop next year from 30th June to 2nd July. You can’t book online yet but you can find more details and email Liske to register an interest by clicking here.

And finally I gave a talk yesterday to the Scottish Stitch and Textiles Garthering in Perth. I had expected to be making the relatively short drive over from Largs but, because of the retched house sale, I had to make the long drive up from Manchester. So the kind comments after my talk and the sales of lots of my fabric packs were very welcome. I am really hoping that I will be attending next years gathering as a member of a scottish textile group.

So what next …. in May myself, husband and beloved father-in-law are taking a Highland road trip visiting Mull, Iona and Skye and I’m looking forward to walking on lots of stunning beaches, eating well and picking up the odd bottle of locally distilled gin!. Of course we had been expecting to set off from Largs ……ho hum.

Thank you to everyone who stopped by my stand at The Scottish Quilt Show in Glasgow last week. It was lovely to see so many familiar faces and to make some new friends. This show is such a pleasure to do and there are an increasing number of quilts on show and quilt focused traders. And Shoreline III won a prize - 2nd place in the Professional Makers Category!

We still haven’t moved to Largs (bah humbug) but I do expect to start teaching at the Barony Centre in West Kilbride in the late autumn. In the meantime I thought I’d let you know where you can find me ……

15th to 17th April 2026: 3-day Luscious Layers at Littleheath Barn, nr Bromsgrove. The workshop is full but please email Liske if you’d like to be put on the waiting list or would be interested in her re-running the workshop at a later date.

1st to 5th June 2026: 5-day Breakdown Your Palette at InStitches, nr Wokingham. This is my post popular workshop as breakdown printing is truly fabulous! There are places available!

12th to 16th October 2026: 5-day Luscious Layers at InStitches, nr Wokingham. This isn’t on their website yet but if you are interested you could always let them know by contacting Hazel via hazel@InStitchesTextileCourse.co.uk

*NEW* 29th January to 1st February 2027: 3-day residential workshop ‘Simply Screen Printing’ at Higham Hall, nr Cockermouth. I’m very excited about this one as, if it is well attended, I’ll be able to teach at Higham Hall regularly and it is a fabulous venue. The retreat isn’t on their website yet but you can have a look at the range of workshops and the facilities on their website. The workshop is suitable for absolute beginners and will include some breakdown printing. If you are interested please ring them on 017687 76276 to register your interest. They will contact you when bookings are opened.

Luscious Layers: This workshop explores what happens when you combine multiple techniques on a piece of fabric, building layers of colour, mark, texture, line and shape? The results - complex beautiful art cloth; fabric that can simply be framed or hung, fabric that can be enhanced by stitch, fabric that can be used in conjuncture with other fabrics to create spectacular wall art, fabric that can be used to make truly unique clothing. This workshop is aimed at those with experience of using Procion MX dyes to add colour to fabric using a range of techniques such as screen printing, mark making, monoprinting, dyeing etc. It is not suitable for beginners as it assumes prior knowledge of multiple surface design techniques.

Breakdown Your Palette: My most popular workshop combines an in-depth exploration of breakdown printing (free-form screen printing technique where thickened dyes act as temporary resists) and colour to create a palette of beautiful, co-ordinated cloth. Working from their own inspirational images or objects students will extract colours to use as they work with a range of breakdown printing techniques. During the workshop students will also investigate the use of discharge paste in breakdown printing and how printed fabrics can be enhanced by other surface design techniques. The workshop is suitable for absolute beginners and assumes no knowledge of screen printing or working with Procion dyes.

Simply Screen Printing: In this workshop you will learn how to predict and control colour when using Procion dyes before experimenting with a range of simple screen printing techniques to create your own palette of fabric from your own source of inspiration. The techniques covered will include open screening for both clean and streaky colour, working with paper, mesh and string resists, working with masking tape resists and breakdown printing where thickened dyes are used as a temporary resist. You will also have the opportunity to use thermofax screens to add detail to your printed fabrics. The workshop is suitable for beginners and for those who want better control of their screen printing outcomes.

If you have any questions about these workshops and venues please email via admin@leahhiggins.co.uk.

Thank you x

Doesn’t a year go by quickly! I’m very much looking forward to exhibiting at The Scottish Quilting Show at the SEC, Glasgow from Thursday 5th to Saturday 7th March. My stand number is K20 … if you turn left as you enter the show, I am on the furthest aisle opposite the Modern Quilters Guild stand. I will be demonstrating simple screen printing techniques on my stand and am giving a talk on Understanding Colour on Thursday at 2pm and Friday at 3pm. I’ll have my hand printed and dyed fabrics for sale as well as my books, dyes, auxiliary chemicals, screens and squeegees. Best buddy Ruth Brown will be helping out so I hope you can join us!

You know I really thought we would be living in Scotland by now but the house move is still ongoing. It is all very frustrating but I’ve been making good use of my studio whilst I still have it. I’m exhibiting a new Shoreline quilt in the professional makers category at the show ……..

Inspired by the North Ayrshire coast Shoreline III is an abstract interpretation of the colours and textures of the sea, the land and the sky. Shoreline IV is also complete but I can’t share yet and numbers V and VI are well on there way. The quiet joy that I get from making has done a great deal to keep me sane over the last few months! I’ve also spent time on my next book which I expect to publish in the summer. I’ve finished printing all the samples so should we, by some miracle, actually move house before then I will only need my laptop to finish it!

Hope to see some of you in Glasgow x.

This time last year I was busy getting the house and studio ready to sell and looking forward to a positive year. Selling the house and moving to Scotland was bound to be stressful but it would be worth it! I was going to spend as much time as possible in my studio before the house (and studio) sold and had an ambitious plan to produce a significant body of work. And I was really looking forward to teaching in the US in the autumn.

Didn’t quite go as planned. If you are a regular reader you will know the negatives. Still living in Manchester, couldn’t get a visa to go to the US and lost weeks to Lyme disease. With life being ‘challenging’ I’ve struggled with motivation and haven’t produced as many new works as I would have liked which is very frustrating.

But there have been positives and as I list them I think that it wasn’t such a bad year after all.

• I finished the first three pieces in a series I’ve called Shoreline and have nearly finished a fourth piece.

• I made five new pieces for my exhibition in Telluride.

• 14 square metres in finished art is pretty good actually.

• Artefact 2 won 1st prize in the Professional Makers category at The Scottish Quilt show.

• Shoreline I won 2nd prize in the Art category at Festival of Quilts.

• I had a solo exhibition at the AhHaa School for the Arts which ran from the beginning of September to the end of November. The exhibition was well received and I sold work.

• I delivered an online workshop for TextileArtist.org which was a really challenging as it had to include hand stitched samples! Yep, completely outside my comfort zone.

• I taught workshops at InStitches and Little Heath Barn and am looking forward to doing so in 2026.

• I survived (and enjoyed) my first workshop as a student since 2013. And I would recommend it - TEXTure with Claire Benn. Watch this space to see where I go with using text as texture!

• And I’ve started work on my next book.

And, as always, I’m grateful to all of you for reading this post and specially those who have taken time to get in touch. Your support helps.

This time next year I will be walking by the sea in Largs x

If you are a regular reader you will know that I get a great deal of happiness and comfort from all stages in my creative process but I especially love printing. Taking a white piece of fabric and adding colour, mark, texture, line and shape is just joyful. And occasionally I print a piece a piece of fabric that puts a great big smile on my face. Yes even after all these years!

And it doesn’t have to be a piece of fabric that I’m printing for my art. It could be a demonstration piece from a workshop or show. It could be a piece that I print for inclusion in my Wonky Print packs. But this week it was a piece of fabric that I printed for inclusion in my next book. It is a piece of breakdown printed fabric (of course!) where I applied thickened dye to my screen and stood the screen upright so the dye could flow before drying. When I look back at my original breakdown printing book, the sample made using the same technique looks so basic; it doesn’t have the depth that comes from printing multiple layers. The piece I printed this week reminds me just how much I have learnt and continue to learn. It makes my heart sing!

We’re coming up to my favourite day of the year - Boxing Day. Maybe it is the calm after the storm (I’m not a big fan of Christmas) but mostly it is because it is one of the few days of the year when I am truly ‘off the clock’. When the kids were still young it was always hectic - visiting family, visiting the wretched Trafford Centre if they had xmas money burning a hole in their pockets, putting together the toys they had been given and finding there was a part missing etc. But these days I can get up when I want, I can eat leftovers when I want, I can do what I want …. which is usually to sit and stitch. The family have been well trained - they know where the fridge is! No emails, no shopping, no housework, no deadlines, no expectations Blissful!

Whether you are on your own, with friends and family, wherever you are and whatever your plans are I hope you have a Wonderful Boxing Day and a Print Filled New Year x

…. is the sentence I used throughout last weeks workshop with Claire Benn. I could spout some arty bollyards and say that it was about the weight of the domestic burden on womens empowerment but actually it came from a very happy conversation with my friend, and fellow student, Ruth Brown. Yes it was that conversation about how you always end up with a miss match of tupperware containers and lids. So not a deep and meaningful sentence but one that made me smile all week!

The first day of the workshop progressed at a fast pace with exercise after exercise using pens on copy paper to get us beyond using our usual handwriting style. I really struggled with it and, being honest, felt a bit useless compared with some of the other students. But there were some exercises that acieved what I wanted - completely illegible words and interesting patterns.

On day 2 we moved onto indian ink on heavy weight paper and so another steep learning curve for me. Some stuff I liked but I ended the day feeling frustrated and with a heavy dose of imposter syndrome. Nothing to do with Claires teaching which was inspiring and enabling. Just me. Overnight I remembered that something similar happened when I learnt to screen print all those years ago - hopping from one thing to the next isn’t how I learn. I learn by identifying those techniques that interest me most and focussing on them. After all this is what I did with breakdown printing.

And so the rest of the week went better. I listened to all of Claires demos but didn’t attempt more than a few. The notes she provided were incredibly detailed so I know that I can always refer to them when I’m ready.

Importantly there was ‘enough’ interesting stuff that I’m going to continue studying in my own studio. I’m not seeing a way to combine text as texture with my breakdown printing yet but if I put in the hours / days / weeks / months mastering my newly learnt techniques those ideas will come. Or maybe I’ll create art in a different way, who knows?

Claire will be delivering this workshop for Fibre Arts Take Two next year and I would whole heartedly recommend it. I didn’t make a beautiful, balanced piece of art like some of the students during my five days with Claire but I did find a world of new possibilities.

It’s been a while since I posted. Life has been plodding along …. I’ve spent some time working on quilts, I’ve spent some time working on my next book, I’ve spent some time working on jigsaws and I’ve probably more time than is healthy binge watching stuff (Stranger Things was totally amazballs as the young people in my life say!). But mostly I’ve been hanging about waiting for our house move to, well, actually move. Fingers crossed for January.

Next week however I’m doing something really positive and I’m rather excited. I am going to be a student in a workshop for the first time in 12 years. My last workshop was Working with Intent with Claire Benn and it proved to be a major turning point in my life. Next weeks workshop is TEXTure with Claire Benn at the InStitches studio near Workingham.

So why a 12 year delay? Back in 2013 I was becoming more and more emotionally involved in making art but didn’t feel like anything I made was uniquely me and I certainly wasn’t feeling confident enough to call myself an Artist with a capital A. The combination of Claires mentoring with time away from the demands of home and work enabled me to make a decision. A decision to get serious. A decision to start putting in the hours. A decision to give my art an equal standing in my life to home and work (henceforth known as the day job). A decision to cut out all distractions including workshops. A decision to focus, really focus. And I did.

Trial and error, lots of badly printed fabric, a fair few quilts discarded along the way, but in later 2014 everything just seemed to click and out popped Ruins 1. And the rest as they say is history. Because I have always had other demands on my time I have had to stay focused, even when I stopped working in industry and started working full time in my studio. When it comes to all things art I only spend time / money on stuff that directly contributes to my art.

So why a workshop now? The big house move will give me much more time to make art moving forward so its time for me to tackle something that has eluded me so far …. making smaller, more affordable art that is something more than a miniature version of one of my big quilts. I also want to include text in my work but in a way that the words are hidden. Hence a workshop on using text as texture that will, hopefully, allow me to create marks on a smaller scale and in a more controlled way than can be achieved through breakdown printing.

I’ll admit to being a little anxious at the idea of being a student after years of being the teacher. And concerned that performance anxiety, mild dyslexia and arthritic fingers will stop me achieving what I hope to achieve. But there is only one way to find out ….. wish me luck!