Saori

Opposite Lidl’s on Bangor’s main street is a small gravelly square with a couple of wooden sheds. One of these is Rosie’s Saori Workshop where my sister and I had booked a morning’s tuition.
Saori is both a type of loom and also a set of key ideas to do with creativity, joy and self expression, developed in Japan. We spent a happy time choosing from the selection of coloured yarns and it was fun to see a piece of fabric forming so quickly before our eyes. Hanging up around the workshop were examples of how the art could be developed further, using different fibres, made into clothing, wall hangings, cushions and appliqued onto other fabrics. It was an inspiration – but like so many things – when would you have time to do it regularly?
In the afternoon we drove over to South Stack on Holy Island. The sun was only just showing through a haze of cloud and the lighthouse was flashing its beacon out.  Birds of ill-omen were skimming and nosediving about like black rags on the rising wind – until we realised that they were choughs – and suddenly the gloomy afternoon brightened considerably.
It was nice to be able to weave them into the pattern of our day.