A hooked yarn art project depicts flora and fauna native to the region in pieces representing every letter of the alphabet
Regina crafter Shelly Nicolle-Phillips’ A, B, Cs are three-flowered avens, bison or buffalo, and crocus — with each letter and its corresponding subject created in hooked yarn.
Over the past two years, Nicolle-Phillips has used her creativity and rug hooking skills in her Prairie Alphabet Project. For each letter of the alphabet, she has designed a piece, including a letter and flora and fauna native to the Canadian Prairies.
“My inspiration came from a desire to learn more about the native prairie or grassland ecosystem and the plants and animals that depend on it,” she is quoted on her website, Hooked on the Prairies.
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Nicolle-Phillips is not native to the Prairies, growing up on Prince Edward Island. She moved to Regina in 2002 but during a family visit home in 2015 she bought a kit and learned to rug hook. She now believes it might be in her blood, as her paternal grandmother was a skilled rug hooker.
“It’s a much bigger craft in the Maritimes. It’s a big part of the tradition there.”
Her desire to honour her new environment through her art also sprang from a sense of wanting to protect native prairie and grasslands because the ecosystems are at risk of disappearing.
Nicolle-Phillips said the grasslands hold cultural, spiritual, recreational, environmental and economic significance. Her 26 unique pieces reflect her high regard for the prairie landscape and the life it supports.
She said she used the advice of naturalists, read field guides and conducted online research to identify the subjects for each of her pieces. For example, the yellowheaded blackbird, or Xanthocephalus, is shown with the letter X, and Z features the flower Zizia Aptera, or heart-leaved golden Alexanders.
Nicolle-Phillips primarily uses natural fibre in her rug hooking work and sometimes includes recycled wool.
Each piece in the Prairie Alphabet Project is 10 by 14 inches and she said the full display takes up a space of six by 12 feet.
“It ends up being a really big display.”
She is expected to show the project at the Manitoba Fibre Festival at Red River Exhibition Place in Winnipeg. The festival runs Sept. 8-9.
Nicolle-Phillips said she plans to be on hand to talk to festival goers and is also running a rug-hooking workshop.
Anna Hunter owns Long Way Homestead, a sheep farm and wool mill, in Ste. Genevieve, Man., and is an agricultural education co-ordinator for this year’s fibre festival. She and other fibre producers plan to share their knowledge with guests through a series of short educational talks called Fibre Farmer Chats on topics such as sheep basics, raising angora rabbits and making linen from flax.
“That’s an exciting new venture for us,” Hunter said, adding it will help strengthen the relationship between fibre producers and those who use natural fibre for knitting, crocheting, weaving, felting and other crafts.
She said the festival is moving the agricultural demonstrations, sheep shearing and Hall of Breeds into an adjacent building this year to allow more space for the fleece show and sale, and educational programming.
For more information on the Manitoba Fibre Festival, see www.manitobafibrefestival.com.
