Nancy Nagle works with various fiber art techniques to create one of a kind art-to-wear. Nancy dyes, spins, sews, knits, crochets, and - last but certainly not least - weaves colorful and inspired pieces that make the wearer and the viewer smile. Everything is created with a passion for color and a love of pattern and flow.
“My friends call me the Fiber Whisperer. I love the magic that happens when you bring together colors and textures in unexpected ways.”
Nancy came to fiber arts via freeform crochet, and was encouraged to move forward in the fiber arts by following her heart. Her advice to those considering weaving: “Just start with something, even if it’s small, and try it and see how it feels, and you know right away when something feels compelling to you… Listen to your intuition and honor that! That’s your next step, what your inner guidance is telling you to do.”
Her freeform roots inspire her weaving as she loves to experiment and play and doesn't like to produce the same thing twice: “I just wanted to see what would happen, which is kind of what happens with most of my weaving, I just want to see what happens!” This love of discovery and experimentation also led her to shibori. She especially enjoys the serendipity that happens with this Japanese style of dyeing:
Nancy loves dyeing spinning fiber and locks too, creating yarns filled with maximum color and texture. She also uses spinning to relax, such as when confronted with a weaving problem that takes time and consideration to solve. Weaving and its various challenges has taught her to be patient and positive-minded. “There’s often a solution that you’re just not seeing - and this is a thing that comes back again and again in my life - sometimes you just have to look at it from a different perspective, and then there’s the solution!”
She often combines dyeing and weaving to create unique combinations of colors and patterns, and her color sense is perhaps influenced by her Miami childhood. Now living in Philadelphia, Nancy's studio currently has three 8-shaft looms and a 40-shaft AVL Compu-Dobby along with a spinning wheel, spinning tools, and a separate area for dyeing. The AVL loom has allowed her to pursue her love of sacred geometry, using Fiberworks weaving software to design patterns made with the "flower of life."
This NYGH Membership Spotlight interview is infused with the joy that Nancy puts into everything she makes, and her advice is both positive and practical: “Enjoy the journey… enjoy each aspect of it. How many weavers do you know that say I love to weave but I hate to warp? And I’ve learned you have to train yourself to enjoy the journey, embrace the parts that are challenging or time-consuming.”
Enjoy Nancy's interview here:
Links to People, Places and Groups mentioned in the video:
Prudence Mapstone - https://www.knotjustknitting.com/
Margaret Hubert - https://www.quarto.com/authors/Margaret-Hubert/
Sacred Geometry https://blogs.uoregon.edu/celeah/what-is-sacred-geometry/
Nancy’s mandala coloring book: Sacred Harmonies Coloring Book for Adults
Margaret Coe https://coeweaves.com/
Philadelphia Guild of Handweavers pghw.org
Handweavers of Bucks County https://www.hwbcguild.org/
Kathrin Weber Blazing Shuttles https://www.blazingshuttles.com/
Hedy Lyles https://www.hedylylesdesigns.com/
Denise Kovnat https://www.denisekovnat.com/
Daryl Lancaster https://www.daryllancaster.com/
Fiberworks weaving design software http://www.fiberworks-pcw.com/
Saori weaving https://loopoftheloom.com/weaving
Marianne Kinzel lace knitting https://books.google.com.na/books?id=RrR3BavzJaAC&printsec=frontcover&source=gbs_atb#v=onepage&q&f=false
The Berryhill Farm - Leicester Longwool https://www.facebook.com/TheBerryhillFarm
Rambouillet (French Merino sheep) https://breeds.okstate.edu/sheep/rambouillet-sheep.html
Shibori https://shibori.org/
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