Textile Talk

Today Gail is joined by Holly Jackson, a mixed media textile artist based on a tiny island in the Chesapeake Bay, living and working from a fisherman’s cottage dating back to 1870.
Holly combines traditional stumpwork techniques with contemporary narratives and an interest in lost people and places. Her work has been featured on Fiber Talk, Stitchery Stories, and in All Stitched Up, and she exhibits regularly along the east coast of the United States.
Already an exhibiting artist, Holly chose to undertake Stumpwork Stage 2 with the School of Stitched Textiles and is now progressing through our Master Practitioner programme.
In this episode, we explore what structured, assessed study looks like from an American perspective — particularly given that City & Guilds qualifications are not a typical pathway for textile artists in the US.
We talk about:
• why she chose formal study when she was already exhibiting
• what assessment and tutor feedback actually feel like
• how her work evolved through the programme
• whether studying remotely from the US presents any real barriers
• and what she would say to other American textile artists who are curious but unsure.
Links
IG: @flossinginthemoonlight
Website: https://flossinginthemoonlight.com
School of Stitched Textiles https://www.sofst.org/

“Making my art allows me to tap into levels of perception, becoming more aware, more conscious, & more grateful. I’ve loved photography my entire life. This brings a tender sensitivity to one’s surroundings. I make the art then the art makes me.”
New England’s internationally recognized artist, Wen Redmond’s fascination with photography finds expression through printing original manipulated photographs directly onto created mixed media substrates, and specially treated natural fibers to craft unique photographic textural constructions. Imaginative presentations add to the pioneering innovations and giving her work edge. Every work generates an artistic tension, followed by the excitement of the actual creation of the work. A dialogue is started, and the work becomes real. She calls this work, Digital Mixed Media. Redmond’s work has been exhibited in major internationally recognized exhibitions, including Quilt National, Visions Museum CA, SAQA’s International Exhibit’s, Fiberart International, Fantastic Fibers, Quilts=Art=Quilts, Intersect Chicago, Excellence In Fibers, San Jose Museum of Quilts & Textiles, Art Quilt Elements, New Legacies, World of Threads, CA among other juried, invitational and solo exhibitions. Her work has won awards at New Legacies CO, Fiber Arts IX, Sebastopol, CA, Maryland Federation of Art, Maria V. Howard Arts Center, Rocky Mount, NC , Fantastic Fibers and Visions Art Museum’s Quilt Japan Award among others. She has appeared on Quilting Arts TV, produced Interweave DVD Workshops and made an appearance on The Quilt Show with Alex Anderson and Ricky Tims in 2025. Her work has traveled the US, UK, Europe, Japan, and Australia, and is part of the permanent collections of Marbaum at San Jose Museum of Quilts & Textiles, CA, Maria V. Howard Arts Center, Rocky Mount, NC, New England Quilt Museum, and private collections. She has been featured in numerous magazines and books including her own published books, Digital Fiber Art and Mixed Media Masterpiece and Explorations with Collage- Merging Photographs, Paper and Fiber with Schiffer Publishing. She currently splits her time between North Carolina and New Hampshire.
School of Stitched Textiles' website https://www.sofst.org/
Wen's Site and contact details.
Website http://www.wenredmond.com/
BOOKS- Explorations with Collage! Merging Photographs, Paper & Fiber and Digital Fiber Art: Combine Photos & Fabric - Create Your Own Mixed-Media Masterpiece DVD- Digital Imagery in Fiber Art: Using Textured Backgrounds for a Painterly Effect https://www.interweave.com/store/digital-imagery-in-fiber-art-download-in-hd
FaceBook- https://www.facebook.com/greymooncove
Instagram- https://www.instagram.com/wenredmond/?hl=en
Etsy UpLIFTmeNTs Shop- https://www.etsy.com/shop/WenRedmondArt
U-Tube channel- https://www.youtube.com/user/wenredmond/videos
Artful Home- https://www.artfulhome.com/navigate?searchTerm=redmond
Professional Member of SAQA- https://www.saqa.com/art/juried-artists/wen-redmond
Surface Design Org https://www.surfacedesign.org/members/premium-gallery/?sauthor=wen%20redmond
Fine Art America- https://fineartamerica.com/featured/whispers-of-the-positive-wen-redmond.html
New Hampshire Art Association- https://www.nhartassociation.org/member-directory League of NH Craftsmen si

Cassandra was born in Santa Barbara, California in 1985, and has been creating art since she was old enough to pick up a crayon and put it to paper. She started her self-taught embroidery journey in January 2020 with a bag of vintage DMC thread and quickly became passionate about the mindful work of creating her landscape hoops, developing her style over the following months during the pandemic lockdown. Her work has since been reviewed on Colossal, My Modern Met, and School of Stitched Textiles. She has been featured in print in Love Embroidery Magazine, The Montecito Journal, and Studio Visit Book, Vol. 3 by Arts To Hearts Project. She also taught an online workshop for members of The Stitch Club on TextileArtist.org and presented live with Creative Spark Online Learning. Her work was selected to be included in the group exhibition, Open Call: All Media 2025, at Studio Channel Islands in Camarillo, California. And, most recently, she wrote her first book, Richly Stitched Landscape Embroidery: Mastering Thread Painted Scenes, scheduled to be released on April 28, 2026.
Cassandra lives and works in Camarillo, California, where she continues to produce original art pieces, and shares her love of hand embroidery on her social pages.
School of Stitched Textiles https://www.sofst.org/
Cassandra's Links:
- Website: https://www.cassandramdias.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/cassiemdias
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@cassiemdias
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/cassiemdias
- Pre-Order Richly Stitched Landscape Embroidery: https://rstyle.me/+vPmLRLQK7zZWBsXXrgvZjg
- My Favorite Embroidery Products: https://www.shopltk.com/explore/Cassiemdias/productsets/11eec2ff5596b721968b0242ac110003

Kandy G Lopez was born in 1985 in New Jersey, USA and is a multidisciplinary artist exploring cultural identity, representation, and power through fiber art, portraiture, painting, and mixed media. Born to Dominican parents, she draws from her experience navigating multiple cultural landscapes.
Lopez holds a BFA in Painting and a BS in Marketing/Management from the University of South Florida and earned her MFA in Painting from Florida Atlantic University in 2014. Her background in both fine arts and business informs her meticulous material investigations and strategic engagement with art institutions. She is currently an Associate Professor in the Department of Communication, Media, and Arts at Nova Southeastern University, where she integrates critical theory with hands-on material practice.
Website: kandyglopez.com
Instagram: @kandyglopez
School of Stitched Textiles

Carolyn Forster is a quilt designer, teacher and author from Tunbridge Wells in Kent. Since self-publishing her first book, “Quilting On the Go” in 2007 Carolyn has gone on to write many more patchwork and quilting books with Search Press in the UK and Landauer Publishing in the USA.
She has been a regular project contributor for magazines in the UK, including Todays Quilter, as well as abroad.
Carolyn's quilts are an eclectic mix of fabrics, a posh way to say she makes scrappy quilts, and they always have their roots from some point in the past, being inspired by quilt makers who have gone before us. Accessibility is Carolyn’s key philosophy with her teaching, demystifying techniques to allow every quilter to discover their own voice.
Carolyn combines her passion for travel and teaching, having been a regular teacher at Quilt Festival Houston, as well as for The American Quilters Society. She continues teaching in the UK exploring new areas and meeting new quilters both at home and abroad and is a textiles tutor for the craft holiday company Stitchtopia.
Carolyn's website is https://www.carolynforster.co.uk/
Instagram is @quiltingonthego
School of Stitched Textiles www.sofst.org