My name’s Rachel, I’m from East Grinstead in West Sussex and I make knitwear.
I’m inspired mostly by tradition and the way things were done before things lost their human touch. It doesn’t have to be textile related, anything from hand-rolled pasta to glassblowing. Roaming around an arts and crafts house usually relieves any creative blockage.
My super fluffy sheepskin slippers. Standing at my knitting machine used to give me leg and back pain, not anymore.
Paratha flatbread, runny omelettie egg, spring onion, sriracha. Chef kiss!
I think I’d have to say the Gower Peninsular in South Wales. It’s a place I’m always wanting to revisit again and again. Whiteford beach and Weobley castle are two standout places.
Self comparison to other designers. Left unchecked it can be quite the beast that can crush my drive. The antidote for me is to just knit something – it may be good, it may not be, but worse is to stagnate.
I’d love to learn tufting. It looks so satisfying. I’d end up tufting everything including the shower curtain, no doubt.
A few pints of Guinness with my good mates in a cosy pub. The Pineapple in Kentish Town, London is my favourite.
I’m revisiting a lot of music I loved a while back. Foxygen’s album ‘We Are the 21st Century Ambassadors of Peace & Magic’ hits the same way it always did.
Seeing my baby, Wren, growing into an actual person! Well chuffed I’ve met her.
Non emosh answer would be: washing up straight after dinner and making tea, rather than leaving it till morning.. it’s the small things.