enough about you, let’s talk about me….

My relationship with Facebook is complicated.
I was strongly FB-phobic for many years until a mate gave me his password as a Christmas present so I could nosey on my friends and not miss any invitations to parties. I spent an obsessive  few days delving into every crevice of everyone I knows activity/photos/friends/friends photos/friends of friends photos etc etc until I thought my head would burst.
I was more convinced than ever that I didn’t want to join, and then on a whim, I thought, I wonder if anyone I know from the craft fairs is on Facebook?  I typed in the name of a crafter who  seemed to be on the ball with new technology (she had a fancy phone that took photos !). Lo and behold her  business page appeared just as  she was posting photos of her new collection of jewellery, lots of people were liking  and oohing and ahhing over it. In that moment it dawned on me that I could use Facebook to share my work, and not just photos of my cat (that I don’t have). Dagnammit, I thought, I’m going to have to join Facebook.
I had to join as myself (Fran Harkes) in order to create a business/artists page (McAnaraks) but I decided that I would not use my personal page and to this day I still don’t have a single friend on Facebook (Franny-no-mates) but I somehow have managed to accumulate  30000 “likers” on my McAnaraks page.

I share my own work and lots of other artists work on my page, most of who I have discovered on Facebook. If I see something that makes me smile/laugh/say wow then I share it on my page and my likers see it and and might do the same. It can get a bit lonely working from  home with just the I.T/technical/packaging/transport/maintenance/research and development/opening stiff jars Department (Steve) for company, and I enjoy having interaction with the people in my laptop (you lot, that is).
Then I discovered that there were FB “groups”  for different interests , and I joined a textile art group, lurked for a while, then with some trepidation shared a photo of my work. As it turned out my trep was right to be idated, the administrator of the group deleted my photo and told me that this was a “textile art group, not a craft group”.
I left in a huff.
Luckily the next one I joined was much friendlier, more  inclusive and supportive, just lots of textile art enthusiasts sharing their work, and things they had come across that they thought  might be of interest.
I had found my people.
Since then I’ve joined many textile/sewing/embroidery groups and through them I’ve taken part in swaps, challenges and I’ve even organised some collaborative projects. I really enjoy hanging out with like minded people , seeing some interesting work, learning new stuff, and sharing my own work, not with the intention of selling it, but just for the love of textiles.
This is a very long winded way of saying that last night I was interviewed  by someone I met in one of those groups.
Sewing the Tina Givens, Lagenlook and Boho Styles
De Yong is a very talented sewer, and interviewer, and here is what she wrote……..

“Today, our member in the news is Fran Harkes, and she comes to us from the Highlands of Scotland in a village near Inverness. I really need to figure out how to do these interviews in person!

Fran told me that she experienced the same start to sewing that so many of us have. A terrible school teacher that turned her away from it. She didn’t sew again until she was about fifteen years old when “punk rock arrived in Aberdeen (Scotland)” Fran said that the only way she could have “drainpipe” trousers was to take them in herself. She would go to visit her older sister who had a sewing machine and work on her trousers.

Later, Fran lived in a flat with a friend and while she was on holiday, her friend washed the velvet curtains. When she came home, her friend said “I washed them and they fell to pieces” Fran said she handed her a lovely piece of “beautifully soft, rust colored velvet”. Her first thought was,”I want to wear this”. She bought a pattern for a hooded sweatshirt and went to visit her sister to ask if she could borrow her sewing machine. She made a jacket from the velvet, but didn’t have a zipper for it so she found some horn toggle buttons in a charity shop and a tartan skirt to line the hood. One of Fran’s friends saw the jacket and asked about it. After hearing that it was made from the curtains, the friend gave Fran curtains to make her a jacket as well. Later they wore them into a small shop in Aberdeen and the owner inquired about the jackets. When Fran said she made them from curtains, he asked her to make more for him to sell in his shop. That was 30 years ago and she has been sewing for a living ever since.

For about the first 15 years Fran bought fabric from charity shops. Curtains, bed linens and other interesting fabrics. She made the jackets from scratch. When a woolen mill went out of business, she bought a large amount of wool tweed fabric. This appealed to a different clientele. The more affluent ladies seemed to like the tweed jackets because they were traditional with a twist. Fran went to India once a year to buy embroidered and woven fabrics to mix with the tweed. Her partner, Steve made huge resin buttons for her jackets but she refused to just sell the buttons. She was reserving them for her jackets only.

About 15 years ago, Fran bought a jacket in a charity shop, but it didn’t fit her. She added some bits and changed the buttons. The she put it on her rail at a craft show and it sold right away. It was much cheaper than the jackets she was making from scratch and she realized that it was also more fun to make. She could be creative without having to do all of the construction work. This brought up a lot of questions for Fran. Why was she making more clothing to add to the huge amounts already in existence? There were a lot of quality garments in the charity shops. So Fran decided to reuse garments rather than make more.

Around that time, she could see that the very large buttons that she had been using weren’t suitable for the new jackets. So Steve began making smaller buttons and Fran began decorating them. They put some for sale at craft fairs and they were quite popular. The button business grew to where it is now more than half of their income. Together, with Steve’s expertise in managing large quantities, they can make about 200 buttons per day.

I asked Fran if she did felting since she lives in Scotland, where wool is plentiful. She has not tried felting and she doesn’t knit, either. Fran does do some fiber art, in addition to making jackets, brooches, buttons, scarves and textile accessories for the home. In addition to all of this, she customizes jackets for people using their own jacket. She explained to me that selling a jacket online always comes with a size issue. There is no way to try it on. But if she customizes a jacket that is already owned by the purchaser, that solves the problem of fit. She talks to the customer and they decide together how the finished jacket will look. Fran does sell a lot of her goods and buttons on her website: www.mcanaraks.com where she also has a blog. In addition, much of her work can be seen on Facebook at
https://www.facebook.com/ButtonsbyMcAnaraks/ She also ships her products worldwide. A lot of buttons are sold to people who make their own clothes or just change the buttons on their shop bought items. She says that nice buttons have the ability to transform a garment.

Fran told me that she considers herself extremely lucky to be able to make a living doing something that she loves. She realizes that it is a great luxury to wake up in the morning and think, “Now, what will I do today?”.

Many thanks to Fran Harkes for taking the time to share a bit of her life with us.”