West Dean Tapestry Studio recently had the pleasure of collaborating with seminal feminist artist, Linder Sterling, on the costume for a major new performance work, A kind of glamour about me.  The performance will debut at Mount Stewart on 14 June, before opening at Edinburgh Art Festival in August 2025.

Co-commissioned by Edinburgh Art Festival, and made in collaboration with choreographer Holly Blakey, composer Maxwell Sterling, fashion designer Ashish Gupta and crafted by the master weavers of West Dean Tapestry Studio including Studio Leader, Philip Sanderson, the performance will highlight the transcendent power of the creative arts in a person’s identity and social mobility.

During visits to the Tapestry Studio, Linder and Ashish immersed themselves in the Surrealist history of West Dean College, weaving its influence into the design. The tapestry will appear as a physical and performative manifestation of Linder’s distinctive photomontage practice: woven fragments, shaped as body parts and bodily adornments from armour to epaulettes, are worn, wrapped and rearranged in a continuous act of assembly and disassembly by the performers.

The woven epaulettes fuse the historic craft of hand-woven tapestry with pioneering contemporary art. The College’s Founder, Edward James, was a forward-thinking patron of the arts, often supporting artists who combined craft skill with radical imagery. References to artworks commissioned and owned by James are central to the design of the costumes, from the black fringe on Salvador Dali’s iconic ‘Mae West Lips Sofa’ to a sequined portrait of Charles Henri-Ford created by the artist Pavel Tchelitchew. Linder’s engagement with West Dean has revealed an often hidden queer history, referencing James’ closeted bi-sexuality, and locating points at which it might emerge through his collecting, writing, and interior design. 

Edward James went on to found West Dean College in 1971. His ambition was always to support the creation of pioneering new work whilst maintaining the excellence of craft. The Tapestry Studio was established early on, in 1976, and has gone on to build a reputation as one of the world’s leading tapestry studios. Particularly regarded for its collaborations with artists, from Henry Moore, Tracey Emin, Eva Rothschild, and Michael Armitage, the Studio has worked in-dialogue with a range of creative voices to push the boundaries of hand-woven tapestry. The Studio also supports the College’s academic programmes, with West Dean being one of the few places teaching tapestry weaving, from Foundation to Postgraduate level study. 

Tapestry Subject Tutor & Studio Leader, Philip Sanderson comments “The collaboration with Linder, Ashish and Holly has propelled the studio into new territory; working with the concept of tapestry weaving as clothing or costume disrupts pre-conceived notions of tapestry as a ‘static’ material.  Strands of research from Coptic weaving to depictions of costume in medieval and early renaissance tapestries have all fed into the development of the pieces the studio is making for this collaborative performance.”

The radicality of the work created by West Dean Tapestry studio will be revealed when it premieres at Mount Stewart this June, ahead of its performance at the Edinburgh Art Festival in A kind of glamour about me. The collaboration marks another milestone in West Dean’s rich history of artist led collaboration ahead of the Tapestry Studio's 50th anniversary in 2026.