Sunday 16 April 2023: Online Talk “Aurifil-osophy” – It’s all about the thread!

Nicholas Ball & Karen Miller - Sunday 16 April 2023 - 7.00pm to 9.00pm (GMT)

Online Interactive Talk: 'Aurifil-osophy - It's All About The Thread!'

As well as hosting educational and interactive classes here on our Zoom platform, our desire has always been to provide you with some very interesting Online Talks from some great experts in their crafting fields. The online talks give you a chance to grab a glass of wine or cup of tea, sit back and relax as our experts talk about their areas of expertise or their passions. As always you will be able to ask your questions and be very much involved in the Talks; it's almost as if you were all in one room, but of course the beauty is that you don't have to leave your house or jump on a plane! Simply buy a ticket, press a button, sit back and reeeeeeeelax!...

For our third talk of 2023 we're absolutely thrilled to welcome Nicholas Ball and Karen Miller to the CraftyMonkies spotlight. This 'talk' costs only £15.00 for a couple of hours and we think this represents exceptional value for a thoroughly enjoyable evening!...

Nicholas Ball has this to say:-

"Hi CraftyMonkies! I'm so excited to be working alongside Karen (a fellow Aurifilosopher!) When I began quilting I had no idea that the thread you used could have such an effect on the finish and successful outcome of your project. After making do with whatever was to hand at the time, I was given my first spool of Aurifil at a quilting retreat in 2014 and I've never looked back since! I could spend hours waxing lyrical about why I love Aurifil, yet if I only had a few seconds to convince someone to try it, I would say the quality and versatility of the product is what sold it for me. We invest so much time in our cult making, why would you want to compromise that by using an inferior thread? Aurifil has been my choice for almost 9 years now. It's strong, produces very little lint and comes in that oh so important wide range of colours. There can be an attitude that "thread is thread", but I speak from experience when I say "that is simply not true"!  For this reason I'm so excited to offer the Aurifilosophy lecture in collaboration with my friend and fellow educator Karen Miller. Karen is passionate about Aurifil as I am and I personally have learned so much from her. My journey from Aurifil artisan and Aurifil designer to Aurifilosopher has opened my eyes to the wealth of creative opportunities the thread offers. I hope with this talk to inspire not only quilters but sewists and textile artists. Aurifil has a wide product range. There is a weight for every project, which not everyone is familiar with and will share many examples of my work to show you the differences, as well as taking you through some of my personal fave as showcased in my two thread collections Inspiring Improv and Use and Ornament. Together Karen and I will be taking you behind the scenes and share all our top tips to get the most out of this wonderful thread."

Karen Miller has this to say:-

"Greetings quilty monkies!!  I’m Karen Miller of Redbird Quilt Co.  As an Aurifilosopher and Master Educator for Aurifil USA I find sharing my passion for thread comes pretty easy and I couldn’t be more excited about joining forces with the wildly talented and inspiring UK creator and fellow Aurifilosopher Nicholas Ball to present “Aurifil-osophy” – It’s all about the thread!  Together, Nicholas and I will share a wealth of knowledge gained while working with the best cotton thread on earth! As Nicholas explained, thread is incredibly important to our creative journey – it’s literally “the fiber that hold our creations together”.  Over the years, through experience and experimentation we’ve both found Aurifil thread to be the highest quality with the largest selection of colours and weights – and let’s not overlook oh !  that beautiful natural cotton sheen."

We’ll begin our chat with a little history on this family owned business based in Milano, Italy and talk too about some fine details that set Aurifil thread apart from other cotton threads.  Folded into our chat we’re going to share some inspiring quilts and projects from designers across the globe – encouraging YOU to step outside of your creative comfort zone and use these luscious threads in ways you have yet to consider.

Pair that with tips, tricks and details on weights, ply, spool positioning, needles, tension settings and more  -- at the end of our time together you’ll be running to your machine to create with brilliant results.

Finally, Nicholas and I are both thrilled to share our own quilts with you – providing even more inspiration and education on using all the weights of Aurifil threads.  Honestly – I can’t wait to hear Nicholas talk about and show some of his favourites.  He is so darned talented.  It’s an honour to spend this time with him and YOU!

Let’s get started – this is going to be so much fun!

This CraftyMonkies Online Interactive chat is being broadcast from the United Kingdom and the time given is based on GMT (Greenwich Meantime). We advise you check via Google Search (or similar) to see corresponding start-time in YOUR location! Here's a great world time zone reference:-

https://www.worldtimebuddy.com/

IMPORTANT!

This class is a live Zoom-chat ONLY and as such we are sadly NOT able to offer a recorded Pay-On-Demand video for sale after this event.