SARAH LLOYD

Sarah Lloyd is a South East London based hand weaver, musician and educator whose weaving practice and love for textiles draws on her Welsh roots and travels in India and South East Asia. Her interest goes beyond the tactile and practical to the sense of place and identity conveyed in textiles and the history embedded in the cloth. Sarah works in natural fibres inspired by the actual process of hand weaving, sampling and on-loom design development.  Her work encompasses scarves personalised for friends and family and cloth destined for garments.

Taught as a child to knit and sew by her mother, aunts and great aunt, the demands of Sarah’s successful career in inner city London schools meant that many years went by before she was able to tackle the 4 shaft table loom her mother had given her. In 2009 Sarah completed the Introduction to Weaving at Handweavers Studio and Gallery. On retirement and after completing an MA in the Traditional Music of the British Isles in 2016, Sarah was able to join a weekly class and really start to progress.  Sarah now weaves on an 8 shaft Ashford table loom and an 8 shaft Leclerc Compact floor loom. Completing the Handweavers Diploma in 2024 Sarah’s final project contrasted the use of utilitarian Welsh Plains cloth, used as clothing for enslaved Africans and the glorious Kente cloth from Ghana creating a robe reflecting this hidden history.

Sarah has shown her work annually at the Nunhead Art Trail, demonstrating weaving and encouraging visitors to have a go. A member of the London Guild of Weavers Spinners and Dyers, Sarah continues her learning journey attending a weekly weaving class as well as short courses focusing on specific structures or techniques. As weaving is an essentially solitary practice Sarah find it sustaining to learn and develop her practice in the inspirational community of hand weavers.