S5, E8 Holly Searle | The Subversive Stitcher

In this episode, we meet Holly Searle - the creative force behind The Subversive Stitcher, whose textile-based practice turns embroidery into protest. Born in Central London and shaped by the “make do and mend” generation, Holly rediscovered her artistic voice after a striking encounter with a Victorian sampler at the Wellcome Collection.

Her acclaimed Subverted Vintage Tea Towel Series, launched during the pandemic, boldly reimagines domestic textiles with commentary on women’s rights, mental health, and social justice. Through slow craft and radical messaging, Holly stitches a lineage of feminist resistance.

From community-led Subverted Stitching Workshops to private commissions, Holly’s work invites reflection, connection, and activism — one thread at a time.

Episode recorded on 10 July 2025

Explore more: thesubversivestitcher.com
Instagram: @the_subversive_stitcher | @dameprudeewench | @iamwomanproject22

Podcast details:
Podcast email: artiststalespodcast@gmail.com
Website: www.artiststales.net
Instagram: @artists_tales_podcast
Threads: @artists_tales_podcast

Transcript

Welcome to Artist Tales, the podcast that features and celebrates artists from different walks of life. I'm your host, Heather Martin, and this episode is threaded with rebellion, resilience, and a whole lot of needle and thread. My guest is Holly Searle, also known as the Subversive Stitcher. Holly is an award-winning textile artist based in London.

Who uses embroidery, not just as a craft, but as a form of protest. In 2020, Holly launched her subverted vintage tea towel series, transforming the Humble Tea Towel into powerful canvases for social commentary. Her journey began long before that with a childhood steeped in the make do and mend ethos and a life-changing encounter in an exhibition at the Welcome Collection in London, which featured a Victorian sampler stitched by a woman's silence by society.

Welcome, Holly. Oh, it's really nice to be here. Heather, how are you this evening? I'm good. How are you? Great. Yeah. Brilliant. Yeah. Lovely to talk to you. Thank you for inviting me to be on your podcast. Well, thanks for being a guest. It's lovely having you as well. So I've obviously sort of talked a little bit about you and what you do, but tell me, tell us a little bit about yourself.

Okay, so I am from a, I guess my creativity stems from the fact that I come from quite a creative family, but also I'm from an analog sort of generation, and I feel quite fortunate to have been part of that because we kind of had less back then, but we made more of it, if that makes sense. And also, I'm quite fortunate that I, I.

I'm a Londoner. I was born in the middle of London. My parents are, you know, they, we lived in like Soho when I was a kid. Well I was born, I was born just after they lived in Soho. So we lived all over London in various different locations. So maybe that kind of adds something to your, like the way you kind of look at the world and everything and then, um.

I didn't get on so well at school because I had lots of sort of difficulties with things there. And also we were always moving a lot. So that was quite difficult to maintain like a level sort of creativity or not a level, I mean a level of, a good level of education and everything. But then when I got to.

Be like, um, an older kid, like a teenager, and I went to like secondary school. We always had, um, I was always good at doing the art classes. Always good at doing the, you know, the making classes like needle work, which is what it was called then. And I used to enjoy doing that. And I also was fascinated with how my mom was so clever at being able to, to make things while she kind of like watched television and she used to knit sweaters and, and I begged her to sort of show me how to do all of these things.

So I was really lucky. I mean, my, my grandma used to be a seamstress and so I have this whole lineage of like, the women in my family have always been like. I guess fabric conscious, I suppose, or yarn conscious or very good with all those things, and I was very lucky that I, I got to be a part of that really, because I think nowadays kids are probably more, you know, more adverse to being, having relationships with their phones or technology, whereas that's what I mean about coming from an analog time.

So that's who I am. Really. I'm just kind of someone who enjoys making things. I've always found that a really great way to express who I am in the world and just to, you know, find a voice. And even before we had all this, um, recognized sort of status about mindfulness and everything, it would be a great way to.

Just go and be quiet and just be by yourself and just kind of use that time to make something to express yourself to where in my life I was having, especially when I was growing up, no, I wasn't getting a lot of support with some things. It's, it kind of like gives you a platform of your own support, if that makes sense.

So that's who I'm, and then when I grew up, I had a lot of things to do with my own life and I became a, a mother and I looked after my kids on my own. And that was quite difficult sometimes because. Again, I had to be quite self-supportive as well as being in the position of sort of taking care of other people and everything.

Um, which I don't regret for one minute. I'm just saying that it's really, there's a strange pattern going on here about lack of support and everything. And then I think I got to a certain point where I became. More freed up. But also I have this like real crossroad in my life where lots of things kind of all kind of smashed into each other at the same time, uh, at work, at home, and in my personal life.

And I realized that there was no, um, there was no color in my life. Everything was completely gray, and there was no kind of outlet really for me to recognize who I was anymore. So I took some time out and I kind of realized in that space that I wanted to, you know, sort of, sort of not, I don't think I ever really done anything where I kind of like purposely did everything.

I've always kind of stumbled across it. So I kind of took that time to just sort of have some time for me and to, and I found in that space that when I started making things again. I found my voice again and I also rediscovered who I was. And that's, you're probably talking about maybe about 10 years ago now, 15 years ago that happened, that sort of realization.

And then probably within the last sort of a good 10 years of that time, I've been sort of making sort of things and expressing myself through the, that medium of like using a needle and thread. Yeah, so that's who I am really, and how I kind of use creativity to found, find myself again. I think it's a wonderful thing to be able to have, to have found that so late in life.

You know, I think, you know, a lot of artists, you know, will evolve even if they discover it fairly early on or come to it fairly early on. But you know, I've talked to other artists and they do come to art later in life, or they do start expressing themselves through art later in life. And it sounds like you've had a really rich life and, and such a journey in different things.

Has that kind of influenced you in terms of, you know, what you do and how you do it? Yeah, a hundred percent. I mean, I think that when I actually just talking about it now, it makes me feel quite emotional to be honest, because I'm realizing a lot of things later in life that I wish I'd had the opportunity to.

Like turn around when I was a lot younger. But then having said that, life's really funny. It's like those kind of sliding doors, moments because if you hadn't have experienced all of the things that you've gone through on your own, sort of like path in your life, all the chapters that you wrote during your life, then you wouldn't be the person you are currently, you know, in your life like so.

I think all of those things had a, had a a, a tiny effect, a massive effect. You know, the way you relate to people, the friendships you make, how those friendships pan out, what happens with you, how you grow as a person. And also I think it's really important. One of the big lessons I learned in life was that.

For a long time during my life, I always used to kind of try to please other people by, you know, I guess not being sort of passive, but it was kind of being passive, uh, or I'd overlook my own feelings in the situation just to accommodate those of other people. Which is really nice. It's nice to be kind of like thoughtful and you know, to, to take your time to sort of like make sure that whoever you are spending time with, you are being considerate of them.

But there comes a point with me that I found that I, I kind of over tipped into that a lot during my, I guess, formative years. And it's, so, I don't even know how that happened. I mean. Get me an analyst sort of thing. But as you get older, you kind of realize that you need to take more care of yourself and you need to have that kind of check in with yourself more regularly because that, that, I think maybe that's what wisdom is.

I think that probably is what it is. You know, I was gonna say too, that I think there's probably a number of factors here. You know. Experiences, you know, or distances or hindsight is 2020. Yeah, absolutely. You do have that sort of time to reflect, but I think too, you know that what you've said about some, you know, wanting to please.

I do wonder whether there's at least a couple of elements to it in terms of both being a woman and, and also being young. And I think it's not necessarily a, a woman thing, but often it can, the expectation is women are supposed to please, but I think even with, you know, younger people, there is a, you know, because you're young, you experience, you wanna make a good impression sometimes, or quite often.

I wonder if it's kind of age and, and gender. Yeah. No, no. I definitely think it's got a lot to do with, it's not got a lot to do with being a woman, but it's got a lot to do with being a woman in society at particular time. Like I'll give you an example there. It's the 40th anniversary of like a live eight K.

And I remember like when, it's really interesting when you watch that documentary about that, that even though realistically Paula Yates, who was then Bob Geldof's wife. Was the person who kind of came up with that idea when you see them recording this video for like Feed the World and everything. All of the bands are just men.

It's all men, you know? And it's like, and it really, and like you say, hindsight is a, is a wonderful thing because when you watch it, you suddenly think, oh my goodness, there's no women in this apart from, you know, Paul Yates and a few other people and Banana Armor, who are like the token sort of girl. So why I'm telling you that is because when you see it now, it's quite shocking.

'cause when you watch Glastonbury or something and now you see all these incredible women artists, you know, and they've always existed, they've just never been given platforms to, to vocalize who they are and everything. And so. But why am I'm bringing that up as a, as a thing is because during the eighties and everything, that's the time that I grew up.

So as a woman in society, you, you kind of like knew your place. I know it wasn't the fifties or the forties, but like, even if you think about the me too movement. Okay. Now I can, there were, I can't tell you hand on heart. There is a one woman that exists on this planet that probably hasn't had some sort of kind of, you know, weird happening on a train late at night or been followed or worried about all these things.

It's just intrinsic in women to sort of, to have that instinct, you know? It is, it's, it's really peculiar, but it's kind of like, it's our own survival mode, but we all have it because we've all been in those situations. So. To say all those things about being a people pleaser and everything. It's kind of, I think all that is part of being a woman during a particular time, and now we live in a time which is much more lenient.

Let's kind of call it like a leniency to, to a being, having an opinion about something, which is, which is great, you know, because. You. It's not so much about, you know, who you are as a person. It's more, well, no. It is more about who you are as a person, but it's less about your position in society. Does that make sense?

It does. Yeah. No, things move on and change. Yeah, and I think this kind of leads nicely into my next question I was gonna ask you about, so in my introduction I mentioned there was the exhibition at the Welcome collection in London, and there was that sort of artwork or that piece that you saw that really influenced you or really, you know, struck you.

Could you tell us a bit more about that? Yeah, absolutely. I mean, that was just, that was when people talk about like having epiphanies. I don't wanna, you know, come over too, sort of strong and everything. But realistically, I'd been going through a lot of stuff in my life and one of those things was like having mental health issues and all the things.

I'd been under huge amount of stress at work. I'd been bullied at work and where I was living, there were all these antisocial behavior things going on that was affecting my family directly. So I have this. So I was really frazzled at that time and I remember I'd taken to knit, uh, sewing again because I wanted to sort of like have a way of safeguarding myself, but also expressing my upset to all these things.

I didn't know that at the time. Like you say, like looking back, it's so much easier to sort of identify these key moments in who you are and everything. But during that time, the welcome collection, they were, they were having, um, an exhibition about mental health and it was to do with bedlam and everything.

And I, I went along to that. It was a fabulous exhibition and I really wasn't prepared for what I was gonna see. So I'm going around the exhibition now all through my life. When I said to you earlier about learning to sew an embroider through my mom and my auntie, and my, my granny and stuff, for my nan, it was like.

I'd always made samplers where I'd have kind of put your archetypal thing of home, sweet home and things like this. I'd never, ever, ever thought about using words, which for a long time were my sort of enemy, uh, or a needle and a thread in a way to sort of protest about things. So I go around this exhibition and there I come across these two samplers by this lady called Mary Francis Heaton.

Now she was a person in history. Like there's lots of women in history like her. Um, for example, like Mary Ning, who was a person who sup supported her family, who kind of got like, you know, screwed over a bit by the establishment, which were men at that time. You know, she was, wasn't accredited for finding dinosaur bones till very much later.

But I see this, these two samples by Mary, um, sorry, by Mary Francis Heaton, and I'm thinking, oh my God, I never, ever, ever thought that you could use. Needle work in a way to have a platform. And she had been incarcerated because she dared to ask the local vicar whose, whose children she had been tutoring, if she could have the money because she was, that money was supporting her family.

And what do you do with a woman who comes to you and basically publicly shames you, is what people would call that now, but quite rightly so. You put them in a mentor institute and she was locked up in a mentor institute 41 years in Wakefield Asylum, and that's where she lived, her whole existence, the, the good part of her life was spent in this asylum.

And she didn't have a way, she didn't have Twitter or ex, or Instagram or any of these things that people have now when they have a grievance about something. So she used a needle and thread, which is what she had. Very cleverly I might add to si to petition Queen Victoria about her plight being locked up in the asylum.

Now I have no historical references as to whether Queen Victoria ever saw those or whether she was ever aware of um, Mary Francis Heaton being locked in Wakefield Asylum for all those years. But I'm so glad that somebody somewhere kept those samplers. A as a point of reference about her life. I mean, that person's a genius, aren't they?

And it's like, so when I saw those, I cried and I just thought, oh my God, this really just like opened up this whole new experience for me to do with needle work and to do with how I could use that. Because I, I felt, I, I'm really fortunate I haven't been locked up in this island for 41 years, but I kind of felt that kind of epiphany where I felt like I could really relate to what she was talking about and everything.

Because I'd had so many experiences in my life where I felt like no one was listening to me or nobody was hearing me. And a lot of that was to do with being a woman. A lot of it was to do with lots of other things I'd experienced in my life. And so here was someone who was literally calling me from history and saying, look what I did.

You know, you, you, you know that you want to do something similar. You must do, you must do. This is the way to do it. This is the way to be heard. And that's how. I then like changed, you know, that relatable experience like that, it almost seems like it was a spark for you to, to see that and, and to kind of think, actually this is something I can do, you know?

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, if you think about that Billy Joel song, we didn't Start The Fire. It's like probably that moment that I, I probably had all the tools and everything I needed in that moment, but that definitely would've been a lyric, you know, in a song like that. So. So, as I mentioned in the introduction, you know, you launched the Subverted Vintage T Detail series in 2020.

So 2020, you know, five years ago. We're in 2025 now. You know, we're, we had just gone, I presume it was kind of lockdown and that sort of thing. So I guess the, the question I'm having is a two parter really. So you're known as a subversive Stitcher and the Subverted Vintage tea towel series. So how did that come about?

Because you know, although we are kind of talking about the spark, you know, the spark you saw or that kind of spark, um, you know, you had at the welcome collection exhibition. What kind of took you into that, in that direction of being kind of subversive? Well, I think all my work before that was very subversive.

All the work I did was very subversive because I was kind of calling out very uncomfortable things that I wanted to discuss in my work. So I, I'd had actually accumulated like quite a lot even though I was working on a particular piece when I saw that that kind of lit this touch paper for all the things that followed on for it and all those things were very uncomfortable things that, that I wanted to talk about in embroidery and I.

I won a, I won an award for that. I had a solo show and then, and then lockdown happened, and so we go into lockdown and, but you see all the things that might have. I had encountered in like, I guess in society with my friends, listen to a TV show or like listen to a radio show, sorry, or listen to a podcast or something.

All these things were suddenly just about COVID. So there was no, there was nothing that gave me any incentive and I, I wasn't thinking about me retrospectively. I was thinking about the future. Then I was thinking about. Am I gonna, what's happening? Are we all gonna die? I mean, it was really, really scary at the beginning of COVID.

Do you remember? It was like, we had all this news about Italy and we were like, oh, that's there. It can't be here. And then all of a sudden it was here, you know? And it was just, it's making me like the hair's on my, the back of my arms stand up now because it was so terrifying at the beginning. And we were all kind of like.

Oh my God. Like, what's gonna happen? Are we all gonna die? You know, and it's just, it was just terrifying. So needle work and being subversive wasn't the first thing that was on the top of my mind anyway. So I'm sharing a house with my, my children and my grandchildren during that time. And it was a really quiet summer because all the planes had stopped flying.

Nobody was going anywhere. And I couldn't, I couldn't think of anything to do. I wasn't really, because then my brain kind of switched into a more relaxed mode because we didn't all die suddenly. There weren't zombies coming. It wasn't, we all weren't all gonna have to sort of like, you know, put planks on the window or anything and get a bunker to live in.

So it kind of, I came a bit more relaxed then. So. In that kind of relaxed mode, I started to just sort of like think, oh, I've got that itch again. I really wanna, I really wanna make something I, 'cause I'm not getting that gratification because the, the amount ofor for me that you get from, you know, creating work well I find is just incredible.

You know, it really kind of sets me up and everything. So I start thinking, oh well I can't think of anything 'cause everything is COVID. So I start doing. Just looking online and I'm looking on eBay and I'm looking at vintage textiles and I go down this long, long path of like Alice in Wonderland and I end up falling down a rabbit hole and end up looking at at tee towels and I suddenly thought, oh my God, tee towels.

I can't, I can't remember the last time I had a tea towel and these, and they were so evocative of the past of like my childhood, my. You know, my, my granny, my, you know, going to my grandma's house and things like this. And also they were very kind of like, it's like there, there's that museum in London, the museum of the brands, which is fantastic.

But, so then I started to recognize things on them that I hadn't seen for years. So it was bringing back all, so all of this started, my creative juices flowing and I suddenly thought, oh, these are just like really beautiful. And I, I call them little domestic works of art 'cause I just think they're so stunningly beautiful and they just belong to like, me, like being analog.

Like I'm, they belong to a different time. So I decided to get a few of them and see if I could do something with them. And I thought, and I was doing a lot of work with felt, I had been doing a lot of work with felt, and I thought I had these like fridge magnets. So you've got two unconscious domestic things here.

Fridge magnets, which you teach people things with, but I didn't, this isn't, I'm not thinking this intelligently at the time when I'm doing it. And I, so I get loads of these tea towels and I just use them as a canvas on which to, to have a say about something. So I thought, so here I am again in the same position where I'm using a different methodology to just raise awareness about something or something that I wanna say.

And I've always had this kind of like. Point of view about the work I do. I don't ever really do work to sort of make other people like that people pleaser thing I was talking about. I don't do that with my work because the only person I'm pleasing when I'm doing it is myself, which makes it so gratifying for me to achieve that.

So when I started doing the subverted details, I thought, oh, I'll do a few of these and maybe I'll do a hundred. And it was like, then they started showing like Grayson's Art Club on Channel four. I dunno if you can remember that. And it was like, I do, that was quite inspirational because people were making art at home and I was thinking, oh, that's what I'm doing.

I'm doing it with tea towels and stuff, you know, all is not lost. I'm, I'm being creative again. And, and it just went from there really. So they became a nice little project, 'cause I do lots of different projects, but they became a little project that I never would've thought. Five years into the future, one we all wouldn't be in COVID, um, you know, worrying about the zombie apocalypse.

And I would have shown them at lots of different locations and lots of people come and I, at that point, it's really weird because the Clark Kents are part of me, which is Holly Sell and the, the, the superhero part of me, which is the subversive Stitcher. Kind of like, I'm actually quite an introverted extrovert and it's like, it's very difficult for me in those situations because I'm like, oh my God, people are gonna come and I probably don't look like what they think.

The person who made these details will look like. So that's quite weird, but they've, um, but people always get so much from seeing them and it's just such a, it's a real trip. Like when you see that, you know, that people, you get that and you get that feedback. It's really, it's really, ICI don't think I'll ever get used to that.

I don't think I ever will at all. So that's how they came about. They were just something that I rather wonderfully kind of fell down a hole. And I, I rather wonderfully discovered them and they, they all came back into my life and, and I. A bit like things from the past calling you like Mary France Heaton.

And you know, with all due respect to her, I suddenly thought, well, maybe I can say things about things that are going on in the contemporary world now that I can raise awareness often give them a bit of a, a soap box on which to, to, to call out to the world sort of thing. So each of them have a individual title and they each have a context.

Which is all listed on my website and everything. So, and now there's a hundred and I'm just about to do 183 actually. Wow. Yeah, so it's quite a lot. Um, so yeah, I dunno what I'm gonna do with them. I dunno where they go. They, they keep me company and they keep my brain agile, I think, to, to think about things I wanna say.

Yeah. It's kind of your canvas really in, in many ways. Would you like the kind of collection to stay together or would you, you know, would you sell individual pieces? I've had a on, on this like long sort of journey I've had with them where I've shown them. It is really funny 'cause I was just thinking I'm, they're on display at the moment and I was thinking, oh, it's really funny.

I can see where I stopped when I, where I was at the last exhibition and where I was at, the one before that. So they're, they're great. It's growing all the time and I often, I get people that come to all the shows and they ask me if they're for sale, can I buy that one? Can I do this one? I mean, people can get prints of some of them.

They're not all photographed because it's just like, you know, just because you are someone who's an artist, you don't, you don't have huge amounts of money and all, being an artist is an incredibly costly life to live, you know, you have to get all your materials, you don't have regular income and everything.

So people do ask me if individual ones are for sale, but I try, I've tried to keep them all together because. I just wanna see how far I can go with them really so people can get prints of different ones. But I dunno what the objective is. I think maybe I'd like to do a book eventually of them. I think that would be a great thing to do.

But yeah. But I'd like to just, I dunno if I was ever gonna sell them, I, I would like to sell them as one body because they're actually a diary of events that have, that have expanded the last five years. And I think that's a really interesting perspective to look at. It is, and as you're talking and, and I have looked at your website and, and a number of the te detailss, you know what, what I'm hearing and what I'm seeing is almost like it's your social commentary of what you've been through, what you've seen, you know, that sort of thing.

But also you've mentioned earlier, you know, it's very, the tetel is very domestic. And it's also made me think of other kind of projects like the Age Quilt project or the, the Grenville Memorial Quilt. So Grenville was the tower block that burned down a number of years ago, and they're think this year in 2025, they're looking to dismantle it at some stage 'cause it's become apparently unsafe.

But it's kind of those community projects, or potentially community projects or what potentially turned into a community project. But in a very, as you, you know what we tend to think about quilts and and t towels and other things, and stitching is very domestic, but in a very powerful way that delivers quite a.

Powerful message with such impact. Yeah, no, absolutely. Yeah, definitely. And I think for, it's really interesting you say all of those things because it's really funny. 'cause sometimes in my head I think it's like my own Twitter feed when I'm doing it, you know? And it's like each one of them says something about something, but I'm not, but, but there's, you know, and then I guess on Instagram, people say things if it resonates with them, but I, it's really interesting to talk about community like that because.

I'm just like, I went to see recently, I was really lucky that I got to the Tate to see the, the AIDS quilts, like the ones that were made in the uk. They're only there for like a really brief time, the week for a weekend, and they were just like, again, all these things are really evocative of a time. Like if you were around in the eighties, then you would've had.

You would've had the echo, you would know what the echo of what that experience was like for people that got HIV and it was called aids and what happened to them and how they were boycotted by society and things like this. So all of these social things really resonate with me. I've like, I've lived through a lot of things that.

Are really important in our existence, you know? And I think with the things like Grenville, that is so fantastic. Um, I went, I went and met with them because I'm, I, I kind of met, I don't wanna say I know Tuesday really well, but she's such a incredible force of nature that she was putting that together.

But again, all of these kind of, like you say, domestic. Is it domestic? I mean, are we kind of like thinking it's domestic? 'cause women are associated with domesticity and you know, there's a lot of, there's a lot of people who are guys that do a lot of stitching as well, aren't they? Mm-hmm. But I suppose it's like.

I've got my own theory about like the art world where people, it's like a, there's a class system within the art world about what people think perceive as art. And it's like where, whereas there's loads of art and creativity going on all over the place, but it's just what people recognize, you know, like a Ruben or something and they just sort of, they, they would always think of that as art.

There's, oh, I know so many. I've met so many people on my own experience of being an artist who are just such incredible people who've all got this, you know, this whole thing going on about society and what they want to do. And you know, they're just amazing. You know, and it's, um, yeah. So it's a community.

It's a really good community to be a part of. It's so wonderful. It really is. No, definitely. And I think to your point about whether or not it's domestic. I think in some circles, you know, could be seen as domestic, but really I think what people are doing are using materials or using things that are available to them and you know, maybe.

You know, when they've started or at certain times in society, it's seen as domestic because it's seen as women's work, let's say, or you know, not proper art, but they are art because those are the materials that people had. And they expressed themselves, didn't they? Yeah, absolutely. And it's interesting what you say about that.

'cause I went to see, um, uh, I went to see Grace and Perry's like. Delusions of grandeur exhibition at the W at the Wallace Collection last week. And he does that. He does, like I list, I had the audio thing when I was going around looking at it, but he was like, he was such a huge amount of work there that had gone into that exhibition, but that's what he said.

He said, you know, I used all these things. I had lying around my house and everything, and it's like. And that's so fantastic. But yeah, e exactly. I think the, you know, people, you, that is creativity. It's like, which is a strange irony because we live in a society now where with one click. You can order something from a well-known online site and it'll be at your door the next day, and we just have too much stuff now.

But all the stuff that we have, the creativity that you can amass from reusing, and. I dunno. I, I find we live in a world now where a lot of that doesn't exist with a lot of people, whereas a lot of people will just replace, replace, replace things. They don't think about that kind of reusable way that you can use things.

And that's what the, where, that's where the clever comes in, doesn't it? That people are able to repurpose something for another, another effective thing. And that's exactly what people do when they make quilts. That's exactly what people do when they. Yeah, when they all band together to create a project and it's always things that you reuse.

It's never you Rare, I rarely ever get new things to, to use in my work. No, definitely. And I think it's, you know, it's kind of repurposing as you say. Just going back to you mentioning you've been in some exhibitions and, and people are really engaged with the work and that's, I find that quite interesting.

So you describe yourself as coming from an analog era. And which in all honesty isn't that long ago, you know? Yeah, no, I know. Yeah. Yeah. Like we're talking kind of the nineties was the tipping point. But you know, it, it's interesting that, you know, and to we, we can make assumptions about today, and people are really into the digital, which I think is, there's truth to that, but also I think there's a culture of engaging with the analog and, and that can be your stitch.

You know, you're stitching your knitting. It's almost like revival of some of these things that the stitching, the knitting, you know, analog photography, analog film, those sorts of things that it's almost like in some ways a counterculture. I mean, you said you've had some really good engagement and you know, could you tell me a little bit about that?

About how people react to your work? Yeah, I mean, people, uh, well, one thing that always amazes me, like I said, they each have a, each of the details has its own title and it all has it, it has its own context, but it's always really interesting that people. Immediately kind of bring their own, their own context to it when they see the work.

And so I find that really interesting when people come along. And then I had, um, I showed them at the Knitting and Stitching show last year. It was just phenomenal, the space that they were, they were on show in. And so when you walked into Alexandra Palace, which is in, which is this massive venue in North London.

They were in the, they were in the, the atrium as you came in, which I couldn't have asked for, for a better place for them to be shown. So people that would were coming in there just got this massive burst of color when they came in and. Yeah, it was just fantastic and, and very often the, the negativity I get comes from the place that is maybe hosting them because they're afraid of a backlash because a few of them have seriously, like a handful of them probably have swear words on them, but I don't use the swear words on purpose to make you annoyed, or I'm just using a swear word.

There is a context behind that. Also, what I found interesting from my perspective was that the ones that they asked me to to, they said, oh, you, we are gonna have to get these ones taken down because they've got swear words. So I was thinking, okay, so I used that to my advantage and I created a caution line.

So I had all those tee details facing a wall, and then people that came, they could see them if they wanted to see them. So I thought, well, I'm not gonna, you know, and the people that were. You know, looking after the space said, yeah, that's okay, as long as we can't see them. But the interesting thing was all of the, some of them have really interesting dark content, which doesn't have a swear word in.

And all of those ones were still left up, but then I had. Kids coming to that show not to see me, but coming to knitting siting show and they'd see these things and they were like blown away by them. They were going, this is so awesome. And so, like you say, going back to that point about analog digital, it's kind of like, it's so.

I find that really such a buzz that people are coming, like younger people are coming and they're seeing that and they're really getting a lot from that. But then the, the best thing about that show was I had a lady who'd brought her mom with her and her mom is like 99 years old and her mom was just so brilliant and she.

She said to her daughter, you have to take me round this so I can go and talk to Holly because I wanna, I wanna go and speak to her and tell her how wonderful I think these are. So, so there you go. I mean, that's just, I really have that kind of ethos that you, people are either drawn to things or they're not.

And I think if you don't. If you're not, it's not your thing, that's fine. Then you don't have to engage with that. There is a negative side, which, which I don't know whether to take that as a compliment, but I've had a few pieces go missing as well, which I've had to kind of like, you know, deal with that, which has been quite uncomfortable because that really upsets me.

I mean, nobody would sort of like, um, you know, people it, because, and that's really a word as well, because you sort of think, do people not know that this is like, I've. I've put so much work into this and people are just like deciding they're gonna take something home with them just like it's that they can, and it's, and that just really upsets me sometimes.

So, but anyway, that all kind of turned out all right in the end, so that's another story, but. But Yeah, but positivity, I think people are always very, they love them, they think they're great and they just, um, they get a lot from them. Yeah. Which is fantastic. There's not, as a person who makes things and creates things and not really much more, you could, you could want from something, you know?

No, it sounds really positive. And I'm just thinking too, like, it sounds like it's been very positive in terms of the engagement and feedback and it sort of sounds like the subversive Stitcher really has taken off. Did you get much kind of engagement or did you do much, you know, many exhibitions or shows before you became the kind of known as the subversive Stitcher?

No, I've only ever had that. I've only ever engaged in having shows or as that person, as my sort of alter Eco Monica, really the subversive stitches. So. Sometimes I sort of think, oh, I don't wanna be the subversive Stitcher, but that's who I, who that person is sort of thing. So, so it's still, it's still like who I am, but you know, Holly at home is like very quiet and, you know, I like to potter about and do things like everybody, I mean, everyone does that, don't they?

I mean, I think that's part of creativity. You just have to have a, you have to have a mind space for yourself to. To work out what you are doing. And sometimes that means that you are just hoovering your living room or something, or you know, cleaning your windows, I dunno. Or just stroking the cat or something.

And it's like, you suddenly think, oh actually that's made me think about this. You know? And that's how creativity grows, how you, you find a space for it by making a space for yourself. Yeah. So that, that, so both are, I just have to accept that both those things are a part of who I'm really. And I think that's probably true for many artists as well.

Now I did look at your website and it, you do have a couple of other projects. One is I Am Woman Project and the other is Surly Queen Suit. Yes. So do, could you tell us a little bit more about those two? Okay, so I have with, uh, my surly queen suit because my name is s and cel means armorer in, um, which is quite interesting.

So I guess that's where the term you are being surly comes from. Okay. And, um, I've always had this fascination with pearly kings and queens, and my dad was a proper East stander. He was born just off the Roman Road. It was like, so I kind of, I don't even know how I started doing that. I thought it was like I set myself little tests and I thought if I, like, I try and do things properly as well, like take my term and do them properly.

I don't, because I have a tendency to rush things as well and I, and then you don't always enjoy, it's like eating really fast or something. So I thought, oh, I'd love to like, um, do something like that. And then one night my friend sent me, my friend Chris sent me this picture of someone she'd encountered at a party wearing a pearly queen jacket.

And I thought, right, that's it. The challenge is on because I'm quite competitive as well, so. So I, I kind of thought, well, what am I gonna put on my surly queen jacket? So it started with a jacket and I thought, well, what do they, what are the tropes that purdy kings and queens have? You know, it's all about where they're from and things like this.

So those were the kind of, and then I had all these little, um, motifs that meant something to me and motifs that were kind of classic pearly kings and queens things. And I, so I did the jacket. I absolutely loved it. I wish I could show it to you, Heather, because it's like the clink of it is so heavy because the, the, the mother of pearl buttons are just, they just weigh so much, but they really swishes and stuff when you walk.

And then I, I made it into a suit because then I made a, it took me ages to find the right skirt to go with the jacket and everything. Yeah. So I did that and then I did, uh, I always remember like watching those old sort of films, um, and there was a guy called Terry Thomas and he used to go Ding dong like that.

And I thought, I really wanna put that on the back of my skirt. So there was like a lot of me in that. So it was all about me, that suit, about the surly queen. So it was like, you know, Holly sell the surly queen sort of thing. And that was, I was really fortunate because that was shown in, um. In an exhibition as well.

And I, and I was really blown away by that. So I, I love it. It's like, um, it's one of my favorite pieces that I've ever done. I'll be doing more pearl button work as well because I really love to engage, to do that. Uh, it's very effective. It's like, it just looks so good. It's really effective when you see it.

And like I said, it's so tangible as well, like the way it feels and everything. With the I Am Woman Project. That was something I'd been to see a Louise Bourgeois exhibition at South Bank, and I just thought I was just blown away by like, her work is just so incredible and there's not, it's like being an artist like you, like a lot of artwork, but you don't always relate to it.

It's not all of it is relatable, but you know, like Louise Bois, I just thought, oh my God, I, it's like. Watching a film and you, you don't have to watch the subtitles because you know what she's talking about. Just through all the medium of the things she's creating. And she had all these like floating women figures and I thought, wow.

And that kind of like stayed in my head for a while because this is how ideas of generate in my head and everything. And I went away and I was like thinking, God, that's really, that's really stuck with me. It'd be so cool to like do something like that. And then I was thinking. Oh, wouldn't it be interesting to make a woman out of all the experiences of other women?

So that's how that project came about. So I just did a, uh, a call out on Instagram and I invited people to. Send me like a, a piece of, uh, fabric or a piece of paper, something. You didn't have to be a Stitcher, but you know, majoritively, all the ones that got given to me were people that could stitch and everything.

And then I, it was an all female thing, so I had like, the, the duvet I used was given to me by my friend Betina. Then I got my daughter to, to lay on the, the thing, and I drew round her. And then I just filled it all in with all these experiences. But it was such a emotional collaborative project because what I found about, uh, about other women's experiences was that we all genuinely experienced quite a lot, unfortunately, of the same experiences like sexual harassment and.

You know, being overlooked in the workplace. And that just goes back to the conversation we were having earlier, about a different time and a place and a women's role in society at a particular time and everything. And it was really emotionally upsetting a lot of the things that I got sent, but it was also incredibly empowering for all the women that had contributed because some of those women had never ever told those stories before.

So I felt a real honor and a privilege that I was able to, to share that, you know, it was quite overwhelming. That sounds really interesting, those two projects. Now my last question is, I mean, it sounds like you've had such an amazing, I don't know if career is the right word, but probably journey in terms of an artist.

What's next? I mean, where, where do you see yourself going with what you're doing? Oh, where do I see myself going? That's a really hard question to answer because I never really, I've been so fortunate. I've kind of just like ended up in, in situations. I think it's really important to say yes to a lot of things because you just meet your circle of acquaintances, of people that you meet and get so much, it's like a, a ripple on the pond.

It's like you then end up meeting someone else or, and you just put yourself out there and you meet other people, but me. Where I see all of these things going, it's very difficult when you kind of work for yourself as it were, because you are always, you know, you are your manager, you are your own HR person, all these sort of various things, and you are the person who's doing all the work at the same time.

So. I learn a lot of things because I learned that where my work works and where it doesn't. Like, for example, last year, I sort of put some time into just having like some market time, like in a market store to see what that would be like. And um, even though that didn't kind of work out in a way because it wasn't the right space for me.

I was contacted by someone and then I did a project this year, which was really fantastic, the Wendy Project over in Croydon with the arts team there, and that was just absolutely phenomenal doing that for International Women's Day. So, I dunno, I think in the future there's, there seems to be a lot more things coming up now where people are approaching me and asking me if they, if I'd like to be a part of something or if I'd like to be involved in something.

Ultimately, I think I just, I'm really enjoying just being who I am and just, I don't really plan anything. But yeah, so I just kind of keep going. To be honest, Heather, I had, um, I dunno if you're aware that I was in, I wasn't very well a couple of years ago. I had, I was diagnosed with breast cancer as well.

It's seven years actually this year that I'm kind of now in remission. But it's like, I think when something like that happens to you as well. So all the other things I told you that happened prior to me having that, because that happened while I've been on my sort of art experience sort of thing. So I'm just really grateful.

Like everything that happens to me, I feel really fortunate and I feel really like, sorry, I don't wanna sound all evangelical or anything like that. But what I mean is it's like I just try and I do as much as I can. I love doing my subversive T detail workshops. I do those quite regularly at fashion and textile, and I meet a lot of people like that.

Ultimately, I'd love to keep exhibiting the T Tower series because I, I think it's just a, I love showing it and it's like having a, a, it's like being proud of your other child sort of thing that's achieved so much and it's so lovely to sort of like meet people and engage with them. And what would I do like to do?

I like to do, I've got like little rotations of projects that I work on, some things I've never shown to people. I like working with old black and white photographs as well, and in putting, um, embellishing them with sequins and things like that to sort of make a different statement about things. I like doing a lot of, um, wall tapestry work.

I like subverting old tapestries. I work with those sometimes. I'm always willing to try something different. Because sometimes it's like one, all other creatives will know this. You get, if you just, if you stick to one thing all the time, you become so incredibly bored, it becomes like a chore. So I always call it like my artistic crop rotation in my head because I start.

Doing something. And I think, yeah, I'm a bit bored of that now, so I just wanna do something else. And then I think, oh, I'm really missing that. So that's why I love doing the Detailss because I, they're so easy for me to do and it's like, you know, they're so accessible and everything, and so sometimes when I.

I talked about that dopamine here, it's like so nice that you can suddenly go, oh, that's a really good idea. I really want to say something about that. And I get a really good feedback from it straight away, like chemically and my body sort of thing. So I don't really know. I'm not really saying anything.

So I don't really know what I'm, where I'm going or what I'm doing, but. I'm always open to things and yeah, it'd be great if, uh, I mean, it'd be great if there was some kind of like character in the art world. He went, oh my God, these are great. I want to give you a million pounds. And I'll go, yep, that's great.

Now I can get my pink house that I've always wanted and put my owl door knocker on the, um, on the front door and just carry on making things well. And I think sometimes it's great just not to have a plan. Let's go with Absolutely. Yeah. Go with life. Yeah. Well, great. Well thank you. It's been lovely having you as a guest on on the podcast.

Oh, thank you so much for having me, Heather. I've had a really lovely time and I've had a really lovely time chatting with you as well, so thank you. Thanks for tuning into my conversation with Holly Searle, the subversive Stitcher. I hope embroideredprovocations and playful defiance lefty, thinking differently about the power of thread, domesticity and protest.

Holly's work reminds us that even the quietest materials can carry the loudest messages. If you enjoyed this episode. Be sure to check out Holly's website and social media handles. Links are in the show notes, and if this episode resonated with you, please share it with friends. Leave a review or help spread the word.

Your support keeps these stories alive. In the next episode, I'll be speaking with Jane Thakoordin. Are participatory artists of British and Guyanese heritage, whose textile based practice weaves together threads of activism, mental health, and community care. Jane's work is deeply rooted in co-creation and trauma-informed engagement.

Lending her background in social work with her passion for art, to create spaces for healing, protest, and connection from protest banners to collaborative quilts. Her pieces are as muchabout collective voice as they're about personal expression.