Not so very long ago (as in just a few hours), I did have a different idea about what to blog on than semi-random work-related stuff, but it has miraculously evaporated from my brain. Which is, at the moment, a tiny little bit addled by having heard construction-type noise for all of this week, with the extra serving (as in: in close proximity to me) yesterday afternoon and today. (We're getting new windows set in, which is lovely and very nice, but obviously connected to some work being done.)

In work-related news, I will be hunting for evidence of medieval furniture in England. Also: preparing for two short on-event workshops that will take place when I am in Herzberg, and I'm very much looking forward to this. Also on my list of things (exciting and nice things) to do: get an overview about our paper and workshop/practical session offers for the Textile Forum and update the website. I have been drooling over some pictures already this morning, and I can tell you - I'm really, really psyched about this.

Finally, and also Forum-related: You can actually pre-order our first volume, "Ancient Textiles - Modern Science", aka the European Textile Forum Proceedings. It's a collection volume of the last years, and not every paper given is in there, but it's a very nice variety and a good spread over times, materials and techniques. We hope that it will be successful enough to lead the way to a second volume in the future.

Somehow, the last few days, my schedule has been all over the place, and I'm not even sure why. I know that I slept way longer than usual today, and I all blame it on my furry biological alarm clock (aka the cat) - instead of insisting to get her morning treats, food, and being let outside, this morning she cuddled up to me for another almost two hours of sleep. No wonder this morning is so short, and this blog so late...

But on to things that might actually interest you. The first registrations for the Forum are in, and it looks like we'll have an in-detail look at some of the decorations on the Lengberg finds as well.Yay for decorated medieval bras!

Speaking of underwear, you are probably familiar with the Dove advertisements and their "real beauty" campaign? Here's an article about "the Problem with Dove". TL;DR: Dove is a part of Unilever, a company that is not about accepting different forms of beauty, and seen together with other stuff Unilever promotes, the campaign seems quite... weird.

After a long chain of delays, finally everything is figured out and the registration for the Textile Forum is now open. My testing of the submission/registration form works, so I hope it will also work for everybody else (in my next life, I will learn how to do proper php and pearl programming!)

The Forum will take place September 2 to September 8 in Mayen, Germany, with the focus topic "Decorative Elements in Textiles". We have changed our concept slightly and moved the paper session to the morning hours, when everyone will be more awake - and after each paper session, we plan to have an afternoon workshop, demonstration, or other practically oriented afternoon session about the same item or topic.

Sabine and I are very excited about this, and we hope it will be a roaring success. If you would like to take part in the Forum, you can register here - we'd be very happy to see you in September!

Firstly, the proceedings of the Textile Forum are coming along nicely - the proofs have been proof-read by our very diligent editor, and currently the cover is being tweaked. Soon, very soon our little Textile Forum will have something more to its name than the website and the conference!

Speaking of which - we will have a meeting for planning our next Forum this April, and after that we hope to be able to get the Call for Papers out. Our Forum date and focus topic is already settled upon: Decoration on Textiles - dye, print, embroidery and paint. For more information, as always, go to our Forum homepage.

Now on to more proceedings: There were two sessions titled "Dressing the Part: Textiles as Propaganda in the Middle Ages" in the College Art Association 98th Annual Conference that took place in Chicago, IL, in February 2010. Not only is the conference programme still available on their website, they are also offering an MP3-recording of the second session for download (it costs 25 USD). It's a pity they are not offering the first session, which would have been much more interesting for me.

And there is a volume coming out this summer:

Dimitrova, Kate ; Margaret Goehring (eds.).
 Dressing the Part: Textiles as Propaganda in the
Middle Ages. Turnhout: Brepols, (June 2013).
28cm., pbk., ca. 350pp., 32 color, 150 b&w illus,
210 x 275 mm. English text. ISBN-13 9782503536767 ISBN-10 250353676X
They are approximating the price at about 100 €, but it looks as if it's not really fixed yet. More info available via the publisher's website.

When we started out with the idea of making the very first Textile Forum, we had just a limited number of goals - we wanted to make the Spinning Experiment possible, and we wanted to try if it's possible to get people from different backgrounds together to exchange knowledge, and practical knowledge.

After the absolute success of that first Forum in 2009, we decided to try making it a regular fixture. This was just four years ago, so it's not a real long-standing full-fledged tradition yet. Quite on the contrary, we are still finding how to make the Forum even better, to get better connection between the academic and the practical side, and how to establish it as a true long-term thing.

What I did not expect back then, or dared to dream of back then, is that we would have our own publication one day. But largely thanks to one person taking the stick and running with it (and gently hitting the contributors, including me, when appropriate, with said stick to keep them working) and doing all the editing work, we will have one. And now, since the proofs are in my inbox and our editor is waiting for the feedback, it suddenly feels much, much more real than before.

I will keep you updated once we have a firm publication date - and I am so looking forward to this!

I'm back from two weeks full of exciting things to do and new things to learn and wonderful people to meet, and accordingly I spent most of yesterday asleep, catching up on the hours lost to discussions and work.

We had a small, but very intense and very successful Textile Forum in Mayen, with a dyeing experiment that surprised us all with the outcome. After the Forum, I got to spend some more time with friends that had come to the Forum from Netherlands, Germany, England and Sweden, visiting Maria Laach in lovely weather.

After this, I went to see the new abode of my friends from the Wollschmiede and helped them a little bit with their renovation. It's a lovely old house that now has a new roof and will soon be their home and workplace, with much better opportunities for both dyer and blacksmith than the old apartment could offer.

And to top off all of this, I then was part of the programme for the opening of LEA in Mayen this last weekend, demonstrating wool preparation and spinning techniques to a very interested public. We had immense luck with the weather - it rained on Friday evening and night, and it was a little cool on Saturday morning, but then the sun came out and we had a wonderful time both Saturday and Sunday.

And now I'm looking forward to a few days here to reorganise myself and catch my breath before going to the traditional season's end market - Tannenberg. This year, however, I'll have to go without the most patient of all husbands, who ruptured his Achilles tendon last Saturday and now moves around on crutches... and those are not very compatible to the uneven and possibly muddy Tannenberg grounds.

I'm at the Textile Forum this week, and thus there will be no blogging. Since I will be away from home for a few more days after that, blog as normal will resume on September 25.

Meanwhile:

The Textile Forum is from today to Sunday, September 16; the programme is here. Day passes are available, so please drop by to meet other textile persons!

On the weekend after that, there's the official opening of LEA, where I will be showing wool preparation and spinning techniques.

There are still some places left for the embroidery workshop in Erlangen on the 27th of October and the 28th of October 2012. Here's the link for more information and booking.

And finally, Maney Publishing offers free access to its Journal of the Month, the European Journal of Archaeology, until October 15. All articles from the last three years are available.

Enjoy!