The Fruit of Her Hands | Tzipporah Johnston

Designing the Mantle

Happy New Year! I thought it was about time I shared an update on how the Fruit of Her Hands project is coming along. After a couple of...

A Bit More About the Origins of Neuk Collective

As many of you know already, earlier this year I received a small grant from Creative Scotland’s Create:Inclusion funding stream to do a...

The ties that bind (the Torah scroll)

Along with the Torah mantle, I will be making a binder. The Torah binder is a kind of band or belt that goes around the middle of the...

Dressing the Torah

It’s a halachic requirement to keep the Torah scroll respectfully covered when not in use, but each Jewish ethnic group has its own...

Can you make a Torah mantle using scrap fabric?

This post is a bit of a niche one, so if you’re not into halacha (Jewish law), you might want to skip it. As I explained in my first...

Notes on the Title, and a Bibliography

A note about the project title: ‘The Fruit of Her Hands’ comes from Proverbs 31, which describes the woman of valour (Hebrew: eishet...

The Fruit of Her Hands - About the Project

I was just beginning a career as a textile artist when Covid-19 hit. I’ve sewn, felted, knitted and embroidered since I was in college,...