INSPIRATION INSIDE

drjanmartin
Jan 15
2 min read

ScrapHappy January 2026

by Jan

One activity that has become increasingly popular in the past couple of years is slow stitching, also known as stitch meditation. The idea is to make something in order to enjoy the process of sewing, and incidentally produce something lovely at the end. Not only that, but it's a great way to use up all sorts of scraps of fabric and embellishments.

Whilst our house is full of scraps, not everyone is so lucky. With this in mind, in the shop we sell boxes specially curated for slow stitching. I love putting them together and they really do have "inspiration inside".

Sometimes we need something to spark our creativity, so I'm currently working on some projects to show what can be made - some slow stitching inspiration - my first is a bookmark. In addition to what was in the box I also used a scrap of wadding and a piece of scrap card, a glue stick, some pins and a needle. I used the glue for keeping the wadding and fabric in place against the card, but the fabric was secured with stitching and all the embellishments were stitched in place.

Denim fabric with lace, colorful ribbon, and a glue stick on a light surface. Includes cardboard, white fabric, and navy thread spool.

I simply played around with various bits from the box to get a layout I liked on a piece of denim from the inspiration box, which I cut to fit round the card. I pinned then stitched all the bits in place with some of the embroidery thread, before adding some fancy embroidery stitches, including some blanket stitching around the edge. Finally, I glued the wadding to the card, lightly glued the decorated fabric in place, then wrapped the fabric round, pinned it tight and slip-stitched it all closed.

In fact I only used a few of the scraps from the box I chose for this particular make, so there's lots of potential for future makes (watch this space). What would you make with the contents from a box like this?