A 3-hour CPD workshop for secondary school teachers, with a focus on drawing, mark making, yarn and fabric making
Themes of experimentation, sustainability, accessibility and process-driven creativity. Duration:
3 hours (2 sessions of 90 minutes with a shorter lunch break)
Overview:
This hands-on CPD workshop introduces secondary school teachers to playful and sustainable approaches to textile design, inspired by practices on the BA Textile Design course at Central Saint Martins. Focusing on process over perfection, the session explores accessible and experimental ways to engage students with drawing, mark making, and material exploration using upcycled and everyday materials. Participants will leave with practical skills, adaptable techniques, and inspiration to take back into their own classrooms.
Introduction
I’m Romany I am a HPL on the BA Textiles Knit programme at Central Saint Martins I also work at WSA. My practice and research explore inclusive, process-led approaches to textile education, with a focus on accessibility, sustainability, and challenging traditional creative norms.
This workshop is designed to give you hands-on experience with playful, sustainable, and accessible approaches to drawing and textile making. Over the next three hours, we’ll focus on process rather than perfection, experimenting with marks, patterns, and materials in ways that can be adapted for the classroom.
You’ll be exploring how drawing can evolve into surface and textile design, using low-cost and everyday materials to spark creativity. We’ll look at how experimentation can reduce fear of failure, build student confidence, and open up new approaches to teaching.
By the end of the session, you’ll leave with practical techniques, new ideas for embedding sustainability in your projects, and inspiration drawn from the ethos of Central Saint Martins’ BA Textile Design course. Most importantly, you’ll have a set of approaches you can take back to your students to encourage curiosity, play, and process-led making.
Let’s begin by loosening up with some experimental drawing and mark-making.So less emphasis on instructions and examples and more on ‘play’ and experimentation
Session 1: Drawing & Mark Making (70 minutes)
Focus: Observation, intuition, experimentation, pattern, and texture
Activities:
– Warm-up: Responsive Drawing Exercises & Drawing without looking (faces) 5 mins
-Mark making- Using sticks, string, feathers, or found objects dipped in natural or recycled inks to draw plants, textures, or abstract forms. Emphasis on loosening up and embracing imperfection.
15mins
– Texture & Layering Techniques (Collage)
Drawing with resist (e.g., wax, tape), rubbing surfaces, blind contour, and mark making with non-traditional tools (sponges, forks, old brushes).
20mins
– Pattern Translation
Extracting motifs from drawings to develop repeat or abstract patterns. Quick exercises in enlarging, rotating, and deconstructing.
25mins
– Group Reflection
Sharing different marks and discussing how drawing can inform textile processes and stimulate classroom creativity.
LUNCH
Session 2: Making Yarns, Surfaces and fabrics (60 minutes)
Focus: Transformation of materials, tactile making, sustainable practices
Activities:
– Making Experimental Yarns
Twisting, knotting, wrapping, and binding scrap fabric, plastic bags, string, and paper to create yarns with varied texture and colour.
– Surface/Fabric Building
Using handweaving, knotting, looping, and layering techniques on card looms or grids. Exploring ways to turn the drawn patterns or yarns into textile-inspired pieces.
– Material Conversations
Encouraging awareness of waste materials and how to rethink their potential in textile contexts — linked to circular and sustainable design thinking.
– Closing Reflection
Group sharing of outcomes, and discussion of how these processes might translate to classroom activities with limited resources.
Learning Outcomes:
– Experience low-cost, accessible techniques for textile experimentation
– Explore the value of process-led making and how to encourage student confidence through play and material curiosity
– Understand how drawing can connect to textile design and material creation
– Gain insight into the ethos of BA Textile Design at CSM, particularly in relation to sustainability and innovation