One of the things I love most about working in a library is the immediate access to books and other media that help me learn how to do things. The O’Reilly Database is a fantastic place to find scientific, technical, and computer skills resources, like the Canva Cookbook, which can teach me how to make better use of a tool I already use for creativity in my work place as well as at home. But even walking the nonfiction stacks at the Central library offers such a wealth of information and learning that I am almost overwhelmed with the possibilities.
As such, I tend to have a pretty narrow focus when I enter the stacks, hunting for specific books on my favorite use of time: crafting. I enjoy trying all kinds of new crafts, so much so that I find myself able to do a little bit of a lot of different things, but nothing exceptionally well. I decided it was time to change that this year, and rather than trying a bunch of new things that strike my fancy at any given time, I would dive deep into learning the skills of a few chosen crafts, namely embroidery, crochet, and appliqué.
Embroidery is a very old hand-craft, and as such, many of the skills and stitches are timeless, making a book on designs from the late 1700s and early 1800s published in 1971 just as relevant as Emillie Ferris’s stunning 2022 book, Paint with Thread. Jennifer Clouston’s Foolproof Flower Embroidery and Sharon Boggon’s Creative Stitches for Contemporary Embroidery offer technical inspiration for stitching the designs found in a 1951 German embroidery design book. And that is one of the beauties of hand-crafts: many have been around for centuries with incredible histories and uses over the years. Books such as Alex Langland’s Cræft: An Inquiry Into the Origins and True Meaning of Traditional Craft, or Women’s Work: The First 20,000 Years by Elizabeth Wayland Barber, or Craft: An American History by Glenn Adamson connect modern makers to those fascinating and long lineages of crafters.
In a time where it feels too easy to slip into the rushed flow of ever increasing progress/productivity of a capitalist culture that demands instant gratification, it feels necessary to me this year to spend time making things by hand, whether it’s a gift for someone else, for myself, or just because it’s beautiful.
~posted by V.
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