Repair with Celia Pym Atelier

Repair is a workshop that explores the issues surrounding textile repair, including how and why fabrics are repaired, patched and mended. This workshop looks at the qualities of tenderness and care inherent in the act of repair. 

The aim of the workshop is to practice different techniques. You will learn and develop skills in weaving and knitting, the Japanese Boro technique and patching. It will also be an opportunity to work on repairing any worn clothing you may have. Please bring any damaged garments that you would like to discuss repair options. Patching materials will be provided to participants. However, if you have old sheets or worn out shirts, fabrics that are no longer in use and you would be happy to cut them up, bring them! No previous experience of darning, knitting or sewing is required. 

Celia Pym has been exploring repair since 2007, with extensive experience of the ‘little everyday holes’ in heels, elbows and pockets, as well as the more dramatic degradation caused by water, animal nesting or moths. Celia’s interests lie in the traces of these degradations – through repair, you look closely at the precise place where garments and fabrics have become worn or weakened. In clothing, wear and tear is often related to the way the body moves. Celia Pym “likes repair to be a small act of care and focus on where things are fraying and wearing.”

By inviting Celia Pym to lead the Repair workshop, the NMNM is launching a series of meetings, screenings and workshops entitled Care & Repair, which will explore the notions of restoration, reconstruction and repair, while engaging in an ambitious reflection on the present and, above all, the future of collections. Textile restorer Noémie Margotteau, a close collaborator of the NMNM team, will participate in the workshop and share her own restoration techniques.

Celia Pym is an artist living and working in London. Recently her work has been exhibited at the New National Museum, Monaco, Royal Festival Hall, Southbank Center and Pump House Gallery, London. She was shortlisted for the inaugural Loewe Craft Prize, COAM, Madrid, Chamber Gallery, NY and 21_21 Gallery, Tokyo and Woman’s Hour Craft Prize, V&A Museum in 2017. She is currently a visiting lecturer in textiles at the Royal College of Art.

Noémie Margotteau, textile heritage restorer, has been working for 8 years as a freelancer in various public and private institutions. Her work in restoration, preventive conservation and management of works of art allows her to work on various types of objects, ranging from hangings and flat tapestries to costumes and accessories in volume, or even textile furniture, mixing various materials.