Sharp Notions (Essays from the Stitching Life)

A wide-ranging anthology of personal essays from diverse voices about their relationships to the fibre arts.

Sometimes, the reliability of a knit stitch, the steady rocking of a quilting needle, the solid structure of a loom, is all you have. During the pandemic, fiber arts newbies discovered and lapsed crafters rediscovered that picking up some sticks and string or a needle and thread was the perfect way to reduce stress, quell anxiety, and foster creativity, an antidote to endless hours of doom-scrolling.

Chances are you or someone close to you is currently in an ecstatic relationship with yarn, thread, or fabric. As we struggle with the pressures, anxieties, and impacts of daily life, fiber arts—knitting, crocheting, embroidery, weaving, beading, sewing, quilting, textiles—can be an antidote, a mirror and a metaphor for so many of life’s challenges. Part time machine, part meditation app, the simple act of working with one’s hands instantly reduces the overwhelming scope of living to a human scale and the present moment.

In this nonfiction anthology, writers and artists from different backgrounds explore their complex relationships to fiber arts and the intersection of creative practice and identity, technology, climate change, trauma, politics, chronic illness, and disability. 

In answer to the mainstream craft space’s tendency to centre the perspectives and careers of white women, Sharp Notions showcases Black, Indigenous, South-Asian, Chinese, and queer artists and makers and the cultural traditions of craft in diasporic communities.

 Accompanied by full-colour photographs throughout, these powerful essays challenge the traditional view of crafting and examine the role, purpose, joy, and necessity of craft amid the alienation of contemporary life.