The Margo Selby X Love Welcomes Patchwork Blanket Project launches for International Women’s Day. Both our studios are all-women teams.
Textile artist and designer Margo Selby is working with refugee social enterprise Love Welcomes to launch a new project. We have donated our extensive archive of remnants to Love Welcomes for their recently opened workshop employing women from a refugee background based in London. Margo has worked closely with these women to make individual textile artworks that can be used as hangings or for practical purposes.
Each blanket is a unique composition of beautifully juxtaposed Margo Selby textiles. Colour blocks and patterns of varying scales are constructed and stitched together with an instinctive and freeform approach; each piece is an abstract artwork. They are one-offs, each one never-to-be repeated; an idiosyncratic archive of Margo Selby woven textile design (the last examples in some cases), filtered through the sensibilities of the makers and the collaborative process. This initial series comprises 25 individual patchwork art blankets.
The materials for the project have been collected over many years – the remnants of our accessory production and bespoke projects. It is the nature of our work that we generate offcuts and oddments and they gather in piles; for reasons of both frugality and sustainability, we don’t throw anything away. We wanted to find a thoughtful way to reuse and recycle these precious treasures.
Quilting is a traditional textile practice, certainly for thrift, long-before environmental concerns – but primarily as an expression of love – to keep your family warm. ‘Art Quilting’ elevates the craft and, since second-wave feminist artists of the 1970s it has become a vital and politicised artform. This is a language that on-the-move global women can speak – 9 different countries are represented in our first cohort of makers. Most importantly though, the sewing circle is a safe space for women to work together creatively, and share their stories. The rich eclecticism of the compositions represents the lives and journeys of these women and their experiences. Patchworking is a process of piecing things together.
A Margo Selby X Love Welcomes Patchwork Art Blanket is a statement of support for the refugee community – to be displayed proudly in your home, as a decorative throw across a bed or sofa – or installed on a wall as a gallery art piece.
“This year’s International Women’s Day has a focus on breaking the bias. At Love Welcomes we do not believe that anyone from a refugee background should be thought of as a ‘problem’. We believe that by giving a loving welcome to people we enable them to be an asset to our community and to enable their own self-empowerment. Margo and her team generously enable this, as do all our supporters and customers. We are so grateful.”
– Abi Hewitt, Love Welcomes.
The first series of 25 unique blankets launched in February 2022, sign-up to the Love Welcomes or Margo Selby email newsletter to be the first to find out about new releases. Each blanket is issued with a letter of authenticity signed by Margo Selby.
www.lovewelcomes.org
