Wendy Poole Handmade
DRESSMAKING, KNITTING AND CROCHET
About
Ever since a small child I have always been making things. My first memories of knitting are of when I was about four years old sitting on my Mother's lap, with a pair of red plastic children’s knitting needles and some green wool making little square shapes.
By the time I was eight, I was making doll's clothes, I’d learnt to crochet and from there my love for sewing, knitting and crochet developed and has played a major role throughout my life ever since.
On leaving school, I studied Fashion in London and qualified in Design, Pattern Cutting, Garment Production and Textiles. I also gained a lifelong love for historical costume and I’ve since qualified in Millinery.
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I then worked for Berman's and Nathan's, who were at the time the largest film, TV and theatrical costumiers in the world. I worked on costumes for films, theatrical productions and made replica-historical costumes and corsets. I’ve also worked in pattern-cutting and size grading for Wallis (ladies fashion) before working for both Elna Sewing Machines and Brother Sewing Machines and Knitting Machines. There I gained an in-depth knowledge and understanding of sewing machines and at the time ended up with 3 knitting machines myself as well!!
Throughout the years of bringing up my family, dressmaking and sewing has taken me along various paths, depending on the current trends at the time and knitting and crochet has remained a hobby and part of my life throughout.
The main focus of my work in the 1980's was bridal gowns and bridesmaids. By the 1990's the Laura Ashley trend had hit the UK and I was continually making Austrian blinds, festoon blinds and swags and tails. After the millennium, the noughties was then a period where I made a lot of historical costume for re-enactment, theatre and living history, some of which was worn at Stately Homes, National Trust Properties and Museums.
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I eventually started teaching workshops which then led to a period of regular guest presenting on a couple of the major TV Shopping Channels, where I co-hosted knitting, crochet, sewing machine, embroidery machine and knitting machine shows and produced my own "Learn to Crochet' DVD which was sold through the TV channel. I also demonstrated at the Knitting and Stitching Show at both Alexandra Palace and Olympia, London.
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I then moved down the South-West of the UK and am now based in Mid Cornwall, where I have still continued to teach workshops.
Creating things will always be a part of me and the satisfaction of creating a finished article from an assortment of materials has never left me. Whether it be a garment that has taken hours of work or simply a cake I've baked, is still the same - I made it. . . .