Handmade Tales Exhibition

Yesterday I went to the Handmade Tales Exhibition, which was very interesting. It was all about women and domestic crafts and focused especially on war time creations. I've taken a few pics especially to share with those not living near London and therefore unable to visit this. I took many more but uploading here takes forever so I picked out the best ones.

This was actually part of the Footnotes Exhibition but it was certainly a good start :)

A real Pearly Queen coat. Pearly people wear clothing covered in buttons. It's a real English thing and I dont know much about it, but if you want to know more, just try this link.

This was an unfinished quilt from the late 1800s. It had paper backing as that was done at the time for extra stability and to recycle the paper they had. The pieces in this thing were tiny!

Mid 19th century pockets. These are actually a great idea, even to make these days. You know how pockets always tear? So why not just create slits and wear these underneath?

Sewing machines of the ages. I really want one of those old Singers one day to put somewhere.

Knitting needles of all sizes

Post-war mixer. I just had to take this as I think this is an early version of Kitchenaid ;) Hihi, no it wasnt Kitchenaid brand exactly but something similar. Hahaha, I love my shiny purple Kitchenaid even more now ;)

Pink gathered pillow. Really old and really nice actually (despite the colour). This was handed down through generations and sad as it may sound, I can see that this doesnt fit everyone's style. But very pretty to look at.

Then I spotted the 'have a go' room, with these. Arent they the coolest!!

Of course I had to try them! It actually was quite alright :) And no, I dont knit this way but I wanted to show the size of these kneedles, arent they amazing!

Since I am really quite bad at knitting, the experts had a go also :) It already looked better!

There was also a giant Knitting Nancy which caused much laughter. I so want this!

And just in case anyone is interested, this is the website ;)

I went to this exhibition with the Sewing Meetup Group and was a little confused when they all started talking about knitting all the time LOL. But no, it really was the SEWING group. Hihi! But I met some lovely new people which is always nice. After the exhibition I went to a Firefly/Serenity night with some people from the Buffy group which was also great fun. Sadly that resulted in me being really tired today so I have only cut the fabric for the bathrobe, but hopefully I will be able to sew it all together this week. At least the exhibition inspired me :)

For now, I will go to bed and enjoy some lovely sleep :) I will post the winner of the yoga bag giveaway tomorrow so you still have a few hours to enter if you like!