Empress Wu Designs started off as a hobby and it now brings me joy to create and teach others to find their own creative expression. I call my art works “handmade treasures” which are inspired by people, places, heritage and literature, and are influenced by an eclectic range of media and approaches.

I can’t boast of a childhood interest in creating art, unless designing paper clothes for paper cut out dolls counts! After University when I married and lived in small isolated country towns, I joined spinning, weaving, macramé and pottery craft groups and sewed, knitted and crocheted clothes for myself and our children. My interest in textiles remained a hobby while I followed a career in English and Drama teaching. Cloth doll making, embroidery and beading alleviated the everyday work stress of being a high school principal, a job which also gave me great joy and satisfaction.

Not being a “retiring” type, when I finished full time work in 2005, I began to teach beading and art doll making, gave birth to Empress Wu Designs, volunteered with a village project in Papua New Guinea and became an accredited Contemporary Clay Instructor (polymer clay and precious metal clay – silver).

My current work is a coalescence of both past and newly acquired skills, techniques and ideas and explores different directions in textiles and mixed media.