Masey Kaplan - Loose Ends [NX150]

I know that I've, because I've done a few sort of craftivism projects in the past.

I did one called Stitch for Syria once where we invited people to cross stitch a small design.

It was just a little square.

It was kind of Lebanese design and we assembled those into wall hangings.

Actually, we ended up taking to Lebanon And we gifted them to, it's kind of like a refuge.

It was a place where Syrian refugees and Lebanese women could come and they could do needlework.

And there was a creche there.

And it was just an opportunity for them to commune, if you like, to make things for some of them to not have to think about everything else that was going on around them at the time.

And I was struck with that and a couple of other projects I've done that with crafters, if you give them a good reason, then they go for it.

You know, everybody has a reason.

But the minute it's something like this, like the project you're talking about is such a profound and such a lovely thing to do.

You can't not want to participate in.

Yeah, crafters in general are, I feel, generous and clever and creative and want to give to community somehow.

We're one, your project was one, we are one, but there are so many ways people can give their time and their skill for their communities, whether it's to hospitals or, you know, We have knitted knockers here.

They do breast cancer prosthetics that are knitted.

We have knit the rain, but there's so many places where people can stitch to support someone else.

So I had a hunch people would... be interested but we didn't know for sure and then we found out we didn't find out the hard way but we found out really quickly that we needed to kind of grow to catch up to what people needed us to be.

I wonder sometimes as well whether there's something like for me you know the reason I got into cross-stitching in the first place was to do with like the meditativeness of it and how I observed it made my soul feel without recently being too woo-woo about it but it was always that thing it was the slowness and I mean I've got this thesis particularly with cross stitch as well.

You know, when you meditate, your mind wanders and you're supposed to come back to center, whether it's doing breath work or whatever.

And when you do cross stitch in particular, you're looking to put your needle through the fabric at least once a second.

So you're coming back to center at least once a second.

So it turns out to be super meditative.

And I know that knitting and crochet, you can be a little bit more absent-minded if you like, because some of it's just sort of automatic muscle memory and those things.

But I feel like when you've got slow crafts like this and people spend that time in that space, Again, you give them a good reason.

You give them a reason.