Writing & Blogging
I've kept various incarnations of an online journal since 2002, mostly as a photographic record of my sewing and design work. I also write reviews of books, products and events that have interested me, and I love to share information about things that I've learned through my own practical work and theoretical research. My blog is called The Eternal Magpie, a reference to the fact that I write on a number of different subjects, and am constantly looking out for the next shiny flash of inspiration.
The most widely read pages on my blog are the tutorials I’ve written for various sewing projects. The internet is a great way of sharing information for craft techniques which are no longer widely practiced, and online tutorials are invaluable in this. My long-term aim is to produce a book of simple sewing and craft tutorials.
I have also written a number of pieces about fashion history and its place in contemporary culture. As part of various art and design courses I've written at length about Pop Art, the Pre-Raphaelites and Robert Mapplethorpe. I'm interested in a great many different forms of art, music and fashion, and how they interrelate. My essay about the BBC programme Pop Britannia was featured on the BBC4 website, and I was recently interviewed by Kate Davies for the first issue of her magazine Textisles.
If you'd like to use anything I've written on my blog for publication elsewhere, or would like to commission me to write something new, please send an email to claire@designbyclaire.co.uk and we can work something out.