Textiles report from Canada

I didn't come across much in the way of textile art in Canada and I didn't have the opportunity to seek it out, it just wasn't that sort of holiday. I did quite a bit of stitching on my discharged gridy piece whilst I was travelling, including on the plane going out. I have stitched on planes before but I have always felt slightly guilty and half expected the air stewards to confiscate my needle. However, when I checked the BAA web site, prior to going, I noticed that you could take sharp instruments if the blades they were 6 cm or less. So this time I stitched on the plane with a clear conscious.

I did see a really nice yarn shop in Victoria, Vancouver Island...unfortunately only 5 minutes before it closed! It was going to need a lot more time than that and there was opportunity to go back.

I enjoyed our visit to Granville Island, Vancouver. There are a lot of arts and crafts shops to enjoy although the exchange rate made many things seem very expensive to us. Not just there but throughout Canada.

I did buy this silk yarn though. The nearer yarn is more bronzey than it appears in the photograph and no matter what settings I changed on my camera I could not replicate the true colour.

And I hope to knit this scarf. .

But I think it'll have to stay in the bag for a while yet as I need to finish a few other projects first.

I also enjoyed the Maiwa shops at Granville Island and they are organising a textile symposium later this year that looked very interesting. I would like to explore the pod casts on the Maiwa web site but haven't had chance yet. The shop has lots of textile supplies for sale and I was pleased to see that their book shelves included many British textile Artists, including my Tutors Janet Edmonds and Leslie Morgan & Claire Benn (Committed to Cloth).

I can only assume there  must be a thriving textile community over there, which unfortunately there wasn't time to tap into. But then you can't have everything can you?