Quilted Colour from the Ground Up with Elli Beaven, Wholecloth Studio
Somewhere in rural Galicia, plants are being harvested for their colour. Weld, perhaps, or the onion skins gathered through winter, the bramble leaves cut in autumn. In Elli Beaven's studio, dyeing is where everything begins.
Glimmer in Lilac and Green quilt (detail), by Elli Beaven.
Beaven works as a textile artist and quilt maker under the name Wholecloth Studio, and her practice is bound up, quite literally, with the land around her. The fabrics she works with are salvaged offcuts from garment makers, deadstock, reworked clothing — and it is often the plant dyes she grows or forages locally that bring these disparate scraps into conversation with one another. The resulting palette is neither designed nor predicted. It arrives, as the best colours do, from patience and place.
Quilted wall art and blanket by Elli Beaven
Her route to Galicia was an unlikely one. A PhD on women artists and domesticity in interwar Germany led not to a lectureship but to a needle and thread, and a three-and-a-half year voyage by sailing boat from the Mediterranean to the Pacific. Something about that slower rhythm stuck. Hand stitching is at the centre of everything she makes, from wall hangings, bed quilts, patchwork compositions that sit somewhere between fine art and functional object.
The stitch itself is never incidental: it is where texture and decision accumulate, where the work becomes unmistakably hers. In 2021 she gathered this approach into Conscious Crafts: Quilting, twenty modern makes rooted in the traditions of hand quilting and shot through with her conviction that making things by hand — slowly, carefully, with materials that carry their own histories — is a form of good living.
Naturally dyed and quilted artworks by Elli Beaven
She also shares her practice more directly: through workshops online and in person, through naturally dyed fabric and thread kits, and through PDF patterns that invite other makers into her way of working. She sells work and runs workshops across the UK and Europe, and is a familiar face at Selvedge Fairs. This June, she will be joining us and presenting her practice at the Selvedge Quilt Jamboree, part of the Museum of Home's 'What the Folk?' Festival on 19 June — a day that feels very much in her spirit.
Ahead of the event, we spoke to Elli as part of our ‘Five Minutes with a Friend’ series:
Ellie Beaven, Founder of Wholecloth Studio
Portrait of Elli Beaven by Alun Callender
Elli, what is your earliest memory of a textile?
This question brought to mind a duvet cover that I loved as a child. It had lines of zigzags and geometric print in shades of navy blue, rust and ochre - very typical of prints that my mum loved. It felt so sophisticated and grown up but importantly it was also mine - at least, I remember thinking like it was mine, which felt extra special in a busy household full of kids.
How would you describe what draws you to textiles and the world of quilting and natural dyes?
I really just want to say everything about them! The infinite variety to textures and colours. The soothing tactile qualities of each textile and how this is amplified by stitching them together, and then stitching over them in the patchwork and quilt making process. The way textiles have memories, stories and meaning woven through them. It really is a privilege to be able to add my own layers of colour and meaning to these textiles before sending them out to collect more stories.
Where do you feel most inspired to work?
My daily morning walk in the beautiful countryside that surrounds my studio here in Galicia is where I process ideas, get inspired to make new things, and also where I discover new plants for dyeing. Then I take this inspiration into the part of the studio needed to put these ideas into motion.
Experiments with plant dyed wool by Elli Beaven
What has sparked your imagination or inspired you recently?
I’m working on a new piece using textiles dyed only with plants from my garden. I’m excited to play with this somewhat limited colour palette but equally find myself exploring every corner of the garden looking for new plants to test in the dye studio.
What is your most treasured textile, and what story does it carry?
I have a special collection of domestic textiles and textile pieces that tell a story of domestic labour and care. It includes some of my great grandmothers numbered and monogramed tea towels and hand towels, made for her trousseau in the early 20th century. Her family were hoteliers and each time they ordered new linens for the hotel they would add a set for their daughter. Alongside these I’ve saved pieces of the tablecloths and bed linens that I’ve sourced over the years to dye and stitch, specifically the parts with embroidered monograms or areas that have been carefully mended, that more explicitly tell the story of their lives as treasured and cared for components in domestic worlds.
"Glimmer" and "Flock" quilted artworks by Elli Beaven
Where did you first learn your craft, and who shaped your early approach to making?
I went to a school that really emphasised art and craft and I always loved all kinds of creative making. When I was 13 my dad taught me to use his sewing machine and I started making fabulously ill-fitting clothes out of old bed sheets. I’ve always been someone who dives straight into the doing, rather than learning or reading instructions first, and that was how I later approached quilt making. A friend made me a beautiful quilt when my daughter was born and I decided I wanted to make one for a friend’s baby too - so I did. I fell in love with the process and in the 15 years since then I have gained most of my knowledge through experimenting and doing.
Is there a piece of music you return to while you work, that sets the rhythm of your making?
Since becoming a parent, and especially now with a house of teens and pre-teens, silence really feels like the ultimate luxury so I rarely listen to anything while I work - though if it’s a very mundane task I might listen to a podcast, preferably one about art or craft, such as The Great Women Artists or Haptic and Hue.
Texture study II, 2025, by Elli Beaven
What material or technique are you currently experimenting with or curious to explore further?
I’m currently taking a year long course on painting and printing with natural dyes. It’s only a few months in, but I’m already feeling so excited about playing with all the new techniques we’ve covered so far.
If you could collaborate with any maker—past or present—who would it be, and why?
For my PhD thesis I studied the lives and work of women artists active during Germany’s Weimar Republic (1918-1933). It was a period of tumultuous social, political and economic changes but also the first time female students we allowed to study in the art academies. That generation of women artists produced some truly exciting work under difficult conditions - I don’t think I could pick one but I would love to be able to go back in time and talk to them about their work.
"Passage of Time" (detail), by Elli Beaven
What does a perfect day of making look like for you?
Ideally it’ll be spring or early summer, my favourite time of year. I’ll have the day to myself, no demands, no parent taxi jobs, no meals to cook. I’ll spend the whole day moving as my mood takes me between my attic studio for some stitching, the dye studio to explore the colour possibilities of a given plant, or out into the garden to tend to the dye plants and vegetables. I tend to get very focused on work when I don’t have interruptions, but maybe I’d remember to take a break and read my book in the hammock for a bit.
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Further Information:
The Selvedge Quilt Jamboree takes place on Friday 19 June 2026 at Museum of the Home, London. Find out more and book your ticket HERE.
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Image Credits:
Lead: Quilted art by Elli Beaven.
All further images as credited in photo captions.