Festival of Stuff: Morning Session – Weaving with Wire

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Join Stella Harding to make a small random weave basket using a variety of wires. Stella makes three-dimensional woven structures in a wide variety of materials using techniques derived from traditional basketry. She is fascinated by the underlying mathematical nature of basketry and is particularly drawn to the highly ordered, geometric, tri-axial weaves found in Far Eastern plaiting techniques, which combine well with one of her favourite materials – metal tape measures.

Although Stella finds inspiration in the universal forms and patterns found in nature, as a city dweller she is also excited by the ways in which the natural and the urban interweave in unexpected ways - each leaving its mark upon the fabric of the other. She often combines organic with synthetic materials and her work highlights the ways in which different materials interact, age, decay and change over time. Foraging is a key part of her creative process and Stella is keen to exploit the rich harvest of discarded materials that abound on the city streets, ripe for recycling and repurposing.