Nearly there!

There hasn't been much in the way of sewing going on in my little corner of blogland this month sadly. So, this month's New to Me link party will be a stitch free zone!

The main reason for this sewing hiatus is this!

So, the good news is that work has finally started on fitting out my sewing room but, as you can see, the bad news is that it is nowhere near finished :(

Hopefully, next month I will have a lovely new, organised sewing space to show you!

We have been somewhere new recently though. It was our wedding anniversary a couple of weeks ago so we took the opportunity to celebrate with a trip to Dundee to, amongst other things, visit the brand new V&A Dundee museum.

The building which, apparently, has no straight, external walls is pretty stunning even on a grey, misty morning. The permanent Scottish Design exhibition was really inspiring too, but I left the building feeling rather underwhelmed to be honest. There was a lot of press coverage of the lead-in to the museum opening and it was (and is) very much touted as a must see destination, but even although I normally love grand gestures in public art (and this is a very grand gesture!) the museum itself seemed more empty space than anything. It probably didn't help that the big ticket, temporary exhibition Videogames : Design/Play/Disrupt didn't appeal.

Much more to my taste was the Verdant Works museum we visited the next day.

We were given a personalised tour of the Jute Mill, which told the story of the Jute industry, a mainstay of Dundee between 1790 and 1890.

Lethal looking machines like these were turned on to help explain the many processes that raw jute went through before becoming the product that was exported around the world, bringing much needed wealth to the city.

I wonder if the early settlers travelling in their waggon trains across America knew that the fabric for their sacks and waggons came from a city on the coast of Scotland? I definitely didn't know that :)

 When we visited there was an exhibition of printed textiles by the local photographer/artist Kit Martin.

 Kit's beautiful photographs of pollinators and wildflowers are digitally printed onto jute fabric and exhibited here in embroidery hoops. They were much more my style :)

If you ever find yourself in or near Dundee I would definitely recommend that you make the time to visit the Verdant Works museum, it is really well laid out and every member of staff that we encountered was a treasure trove of information. The coffee (with Dundee cake naturally!) was good too :



That's my New to Me this month and now it is your turn to share anything that you have tried/experienced for the first time this June. As ever the link party will remain open until the end of the month so there is plenty of time to get off that fence and have a go at something new! Also, as ever, we keep it real here so celebrate the successes and the failures regardless of which side of that fence you fell :)

I would love it if you mentioned the link party in your post and would really love it if you also visited the brave linkers, who deserve a (virtual) pat on the back for their efforts!

You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter