If I could save one place it would be my mother’s 1970’s kitchen.

Every day as a small child I shared the morning tea table with the women in the street. What was ordinary in the 1970’s has become extraordinary in my memories - the glass milk bottle with the foil lid, the tinkering of the teaspoons stirring in the cup, my favourite ginger nut biscuits, a crocheted tea cosy, damask tablecloth and the whistle of the kettle. The kettle was plastic, the teapot was aluminium or the teacups were sometimes chipped, but in my memories these objects are priceless.

In this work I wanted to explore the extraordinary in the ordinary- making life size tapestries of those kitchen objects and adding some sparkle, to evoke my memories of that time, the specialness of that plain kitchen and the friendship of the women. Now this little kettle has the status of an heirloom treasure. It is lush and pretty and it shimmers. It is jewel-like. A damask pattern plays across its surface picking up the lights and I can hear my mother’s laughter woven into its surface.