The Textile World Is Changing – and Learning Needs to Change With It

There is something I hear surprisingly often:

“I’d love to come to that workshop, but…”

And what follows can be almost anything.

The date doesn’t work. It is too far to travel. Work gets in the way. There are family commitments. Driving home after an evening workshop isn’t practical. Someone would love to learn a particular technique, but they simply cannot justify a whole day away from home.

None of those things mean that person has stopped wanting to stitch, experiment or learn.

In fact, looking at what is happening in the textile world at the moment, quite the opposite seems to be true.

People still want to learn

September is currently London Textile Month, with workshops, exhibitions, talks and events taking place throughout the month. The programme covers everything from embroidery and appliqué to print, knitting, weaving and textile history.

Some of those workshops have sold out. A Victorian Crazy Quilt workshop at the Museum of the Home sold out at £50, while a banner-making workshop priced at £100 also sold out.

So perhaps the problem isn’t that people have suddenly stopped wanting creative experiences.

The desire to make is very much there.

But the way we live has changed.

Money is tighter for many households. Travelling costs money. Giving up an entire day can be difficult. People work different hours, care for relatives, look after grandchildren or simply have busy lives.

Sometimes the workshop you desperately want to attend happens on the one day you absolutely cannot be there.

Those of us organising workshops see the other side of this too. People ask for particular subjects, dates and sessions, but when the workshop appears, circumstances may have changed and they cannot book after all.

That creates a difficult situation for both makers and tutors.

This isn’t only happening here

The Creative Lives Monitor 2026, which looks at grassroots creativity across the UK and Ireland, paints an interesting picture.

It reports that demand for creative activity is high and that creative groups have a significant social impact. But it also describes groups as financially fragile, with rising costs, fluctuating income and access to creative activity not being equally available to everyone.

That really struck me.

Because it describes something many of us involved in creative groups and workshops are experiencing.

People want creativity.

They want to learn.

They want other creative people around them.

But attending something at a particular building, at a particular time, on a particular day isn't always possible.

Perhaps, then, the answer isn't to stop offering workshops.

It is to offer another doorway.

Online doesn't have to mean learning alone

For a long time I was slightly wary of online creative learning.

Textiles are tactile.

We want to touch fabrics, rummage through threads, look closely at samples and ask, “What happens if I do this?”

And there is nothing quite like sitting around a table with other people while everyone is creating something different.

I don't think that should disappear.

But online textile communities are becoming an established part of our creative world too.

The Online Guild of Weavers, Spinners and Dyers, for example, was originally created specifically for textile artists who were unable to take part in their local guilds. It now has members around the world learning and sharing online.

TextileArtist.org's Stitch Club has also built its model around a workshop library combined with a worldwide creative community, allowing members to work through techniques in their own time rather than worrying about falling behind.

So this isn't really about choosing between online and in person anymore.

They can do different jobs.

Which brings me to Skool

This is one of the reasons I have started building our own community on Skool.

I don't want it to replace Eau Brink Studio workshops.

Far from it.

If you can come into the studio, spend a few hours experimenting, use the equipment, talk to other makers, drink tea, eat cake and go home with something you have created, I still think that is a wonderful way to learn.

But I also know there are people who follow Eau Brink Studio who live nowhere near Norfolk.

There are people who would like to come but cannot make the dates.

And there are people who may want to experiment with something at 8 o'clock on a Sunday evening rather than 10 o'clock on a Wednesday morning.

Skool gives us somewhere to put those things.

It gives me a place where I can gradually build up information about materials, threads, fabrics, needles, stabilisers, colour, textile techniques and all those little bits of knowledge that we normally end up discussing around the studio table.

There can be videos.

There can be demonstrations.

There can be discussions.

You can ask questions.

You can share what you are working on.

And importantly, you don't have to be in West Norfolk to take part.

Making creative learning more flexible

I think flexibility is going to become increasingly important in our textile world.

Interestingly, even major craft organisations are combining physical and digital activity. The Crafts Council's current programme includes exhibitions and practical events around the country alongside online talks, while London Textile Month itself includes both physical events and online activity.

It doesn't mean we all want to sit permanently in front of a screen.

I certainly don't.

It means we can use technology to support the part that really matters:

making things.

Perhaps you watch a short demonstration and then disappear into your sewing room to try it.

Perhaps someone posts a question about stabiliser and another member has already discovered exactly what works.

Perhaps you see somebody else's experiment and it sends your own work in a completely different direction.

That is the bit I find exciting.

Not the platform itself.

The possibilities it gives us.

There is still something special about being in the room

I don't believe an online community can completely recreate an in-person creative day.

Nor should it try.

Some techniques need equipment. Sometimes you need somebody standing beside you to see why your machine is misbehaving. And sometimes what we really need is a day away from everything else, sitting with people who understand why we can get ridiculously excited over a piece of fabric or a particularly beautiful thread.

Those days matter.

But they can't work for everybody, every time.

So perhaps the future of textile learning isn't about choosing one or the other.

Maybe it is about creating a larger creative table.

Some people will be sitting around it here at Eau Brink Studio.

Others might be joining us from their sewing room fifty, a hundred or even a thousand miles away.

They are still part of the conversation.

And that is what I want to build

Our Skool community is still very new, and I will be adding to it as it develops.

I don't want to fill it with endless content simply for the sake of having content.

I want it to become somewhere useful.

A place to dip into when you need an answer.

A place to discover a technique you haven't tried.

A place to ask a question without worrying that everyone else already knows the answer.

And perhaps most importantly, somewhere to keep that connection with other creative people when getting to an actual workshop simply isn't possible.

Because judging by what is happening across our textile world at the moment, the desire to make certainly hasn't gone away.

We may just need to make it easier for people to join in.

 

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