All the friends I ate with in October
AUTUMN 2022 ︎︎︎ All the friends I ate with in October
Over a series of meals in October, we invited fifteen friends to use an autumn leaf as a starting point to print designs onto a square of scrap fabric using a mordant – almost like an invisible ink. The squares were then naturally dyed in batches using some of the food waste left over from the meals. The revealed designs have been patchworked together into a tablecloth over which future meals can be shared.
I’ve found it difficult to feel connected to people over the last few years. In some ways for obvious reasons, but in other ways it feels like a second coming of age into my individual self. As a teenager and a student all I wanted was to fit in and be a part of something. More recently I feel myself pulling at the seams of my attachment to people, wanting to be different – more myself.
Over the summer months we spent a lot of time thinking about the idea of the table. I was feeling more and more drawn to exploring food and eating as a means for transformation, and as we considered our connection to people we realised that around our table it was often just the two of us. It feels safe to be known by someone, to share food in the intimacy of our own home. To make something together felt vulnerable, but to invite friends and visitors to partake in a project of our own imagining felt strangely warm.
The tablecloth started as a simple idea to get people around our table and get us feeling inspired again.
Over the summer months we spent a lot of time thinking about the idea of the table. I was feeling more and more drawn to exploring food and eating as a means for transformation, and as we considered our connection to people we realised that around our table it was often just the two of us. It feels safe to be known by someone, to share food in the intimacy of our own home. To make something together felt vulnerable, but to invite friends and visitors to partake in a project of our own imagining felt strangely warm.
The tablecloth started as a simple idea to get people around our table and get us feeling inspired again.
I thought it would be easy to talk to people I know well about the things I was thinking about – my senses, simplicity, food and justice, waste and our connection to the earth. But it took me opening up to repeatedly explain the activity as connected to the ground, our tables and one another.
Over a series of meals in October, we invited fifteen friends to use an autumn leaf as a starting point to print designs onto a square of scrap fabric using a mordant – almost like an invisible ink. Later on I naturally dyed them in batches using some of the food waste leftover from the meals. Each combination of fabric, pattern and dye came out subtly different. The revealed designs have been patchworked together into a tablecloth over which future meals can be shared.
Each square is different, but sewn together as one.
Words by Josie Jones
Over a series of meals in October, we invited fifteen friends to use an autumn leaf as a starting point to print designs onto a square of scrap fabric using a mordant – almost like an invisible ink. Later on I naturally dyed them in batches using some of the food waste leftover from the meals. Each combination of fabric, pattern and dye came out subtly different. The revealed designs have been patchworked together into a tablecloth over which future meals can be shared.
Each square is different, but sewn together as one.
Words by Josie Jones
