Fabrication at Brampton Halt

I had hoped to make some up-cycled china delights on the station platform at Brampton Halt during the Jubilee Weekend 

but the rain put paid to that idea, instead I decided that simple fabric corsages would be easy for all ages and skills, quick and would use some of the many scraps of vintage fabric I have been gifted from  friends and friends mums!

I reasoned that if my kit was small and portable I could easily set up shop inside the train and catch participants as they waited for the journey to begin.

This approach worked well 

and soon children, parents and grandparents 

were working together

in spite of some initial shyness.

It was lovely to see people sharing and enjoying a such simple but pleasurable activity 

whilst the lush, damp Northamptonshire countryside rattled by.

I also spent some time in the Buffet car and met people who had travelled from Scotland to spend some time at the station. You can see some of the creators, creations and sterling NLR volunteers showing off their up-cycled finery!

I couldn't resist adding this picture of one of the NLR team tucking into a feast known as The Engineers Special - it seemed to have every element of a tradition English breakfast barring the egg!

Upcycle a Fabric Corsage at Brampton Halt

All aboard! Back To Books artist Carole Miles be at Northamton & Lamport Railway from 11 - 2  Sunday June 2nd riding the rails & upcycling fabric! Upcycling a fabric corsage with Carole is free - but she will be on one of the trains - catch her while you can!

Train tickets 

Adults £4.60  Child under 2 years: FREE

Senior Citizens and Children (10-15 years) £3.60

Family (2+2) £14.60

All ticket types above are "Day Rover" tickets, valid on all services.

Platform Ticket 50p

Northampton and Lamport Line map

Directions

A Tales on the Rails

Our first On the Right Track Story Telling event took place early in December at Northampton and Lamport Railway Station with a party of children from Priory Lower School in Bedford. Carole has worked with the school for seven years and was keen to bring the children out to explore the Northamptonshire countryside. Some of the children were wearing their very first pair of wellies and were soon to discover the delight of puddle jumping.

The first task of the day was to take a brisk walk, there had been rain earlier but barring the odd grey cloud the day way fine and the countryside still looked autumnal rather than wintery

A party of NLRS volunteers were working on the line

Someone found a ladybird hotel and the children decided to take it back to their Bug House at school

Here are some of the things the children asked Carole to photograph

After the walk we headed back to our toasty warm railway carriage

Where Allan began a tale that had everyone in the 

carriage joining in with sound effects and laughter.

Philippa checking her notebook

and playing with sock caterpillars 

Allan Davies

Gordon Titmuss - our Station Master for the day

and a man of many keys!

Just before lunch Carole produced socks and stuffing, pipe cleaners and fluffy pompoms

and everyone made their own caterpillar.

After a bit of a tidying up everyone put on their hats, scarves, gloves and coats the brave the chilly station platform. Before leaving, Philippa told us a fantastic story and many of the children were roped in to help.

You can see a clip of the story here

Thank you to everyone who helped to make it such a special day!

You can find out more about A Word in Edgeways here

On The Right Track Upcycling Projects October / November

Recycled fabrics were used for this sweet little project with Year 4 children who created Christmas inspired stencils to screen print onto vintage Horrocks flannelette fabric. There is a different image on each side, which has been embellished with sequins, sewn together and given a ribbon tie in order to make a gift bag. The bags are going to be filled with something home made and will be given to members of the audience when the children sing carols at a home for the elderly. The fabric had been given to Carole by a friend's mother, there is always something satisfying about giving something someone might have thrown away a new lease of life and fabrics have such a power to connect us with people, time and place.

Another winter project was to create a story sack inspired by the The Very Hungry Caterpillar book by Eric Carle, once again most of the fabrics were recycled - Carole has a lot of tiny scraps of fabric kept for projects like these and the calico bags were from a local scrap recycling store. They have printing on one side but applying a fabric panel over this soon disappears the problem areas. As some people had no experience with textiles and were worried about using pins at home with small children around, Carole suggested using small dots of fabric glue to keep things in place before sewing. Once the bags were completed participants could find other online resources to use in conjunction with their Very Hungry Caterpillar books. Link 1 , Link 2, Link 3, Link4, Link 5

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