April 2025

Marijke Van Welzen

The Artist:

Textiles are Marijke’s passion as they lend themselves to infinite possibilities of expression. Marijke has a BA in Textile Art and English and has worked part-time as a middle school teacher for 40 years. She is from the Neatherlands. 

Marijke has been making wearable art since 2000. She loves making coats with a story to tell.  Her colorful coats and jackets are true eye-catchers, wowing the viewer with the lavish decoration and the richness of details. She likes to work around a theme, such as a fairy tale or story, a country, flora and fauna, a certain piece of fabric, or a color.

Marijke’s favorite technique is textile collage. Marijke starts with many tiny pieces of fabric, felt and yarn, and with colorful machine-threads and, working intuitively, she ‘paints’ her designs. She likes to combine this with surface design techniques like stenciling, stamping and needle felting. Her work constantly evolves as she finds new images in her imagination and develops the techniques to create them in cloth. Her coats and quilts have won several awards and traveled to exhibitions all over the world.

Guild Meeting/Program: The Sky is the Limit

Marijke will discuss how she became a textile artist and her inspirations and techniques. She will share photos and stories about highlights of her Art2Wear career.

Date/Time: April 12, 2025 10:30 AM (following Guild meeting)

Location: St. James Episcopal Church, 11815 Seven Locks Rd, Potomac, MD 20854

Mini Workshop: Flower Collage

In this workshop we are going to make a flower collage using commercially printed fabrics with flower and leaf prints. You will put together your own unique “bouquet.” You can choose to work by hand or by machine or a combination of these two. For free machine stitching you need a (simple) sewing machine with a darning or free-motion foot.

Date/Time: April 12, 2025 1:00 to 4:00 PM

Location: St. James Episcopal Church, 11815 Seven Locks Rd, Potomac, MD 20854

Mini Workshop Fee: Members: $35.00 Non-Members: $50.00

Student’s Materials Fee: $25

Student Supply List:

• Fabrics (fat quarters): at least 5 different fabrics with prints of flowers and leaves that can be cut out. (motifs should be 1 to 3 inches) 
• Assortment of fabrics: quilt fabrics, interior decor, old clothes, etc.
• Add a couple of butterflies, a bird or any other animal you like.
• Base material 16 x 16 inches fusible interfacing (medium weight )
• Fabric scissors
• Fusible web, wonder under or similar
• Glue stick
• Baking paper – 2 sheets
• Pins
• Embroidery floss, thick machine-thread, thin crochet thread etc.
• Needles with a sharp point
• Optional:
  • beads, charms etc.
  • Sewing machine with darning foot, machine threads, needles etc

Extended Workshop: Jacket with a Story to Tell

Bring your own unlined jacket to embellish with textile collage.

Marijke will provide you with expert guidance and help you work more intuitively and push your boundaries. Attention will be paid to the use of color, shape and composition.

Participants will choose their own theme or a story, myth, fairy-tale, etc. You will bring fabric with prints that fit your chosen theme as well as notions, charms, beads, embroidery thread–anything fitting the theme.

The first day you will start with a fabric collage around your chosen theme. Then you will continue to work on the piece and discuss placement of the collages on the jacket and options for finishing edges and collars.

Date/Time: April 13 – 15, 2025 10am – 4pm

Location: PFAG Studio: 11810 Parklawn Dr Suite 204 #11, Rockville, MD 20852

Workshop Fee: Members: $240.00 Non-Members: $330.00

Student Supply List:

Choose a Theme, for example: flowers, the sea, in the forest, a landscape, etc.

• (Denim or similar) UNLINED JACKET (or other garment)
• Make sure is washed (to avoid shrinkage and possibly working with paint)
• Fabrics: 10 (or more) different fat quarters or fabric scraps with a print around your personal theme, from which you can cut the printed motifs. The motifs should be approximately 1 to 3 inches.
• Fusible Interfacing, medium weight, 1 yard
• Assorted machine threads, cotton, polyester, variegated etc.
• Sewing machine needles, (Standard size 80, Topstitch, metallic if you want to use those)
• Pen, pencil, notebook
• A piece of paper-backed Fusible web, e.g. Wonder Under
• Small sharp scissors
• Fabric scissors
• Lots of pins
• Glue stick
• Two sheets of baking paper
• SEWING MACHINE with DARNING FOOT or FREE MACHINE EMBROIDERY FOOT
  • (It’s ok if the feed dogs cannot be lowered)
    please place the foot on the sewing machine in advance and try it out.
  • Also bring the pedal, electric cord, basic sewing foot, extra bobbins etc. and the manual for the machine.
• Optional:
  • scraps e.g. plain fabric, abstract print, grunge, batiks, silk, shimmer, gloss, velvet or other interesting fabrics (fitting your theme fabrics)
  • Hand-sewing materials
  • Beads, buttons, charms
  • Fabric paint, inktense pencils, paint sticks, stencils (fitting your theme), brushes etc. to add accents