History and Creative Practice: 25 Embroideries 

This first part of this blog post has been written by Catherine Clarke, Director of the IHR’s Centre for the History of People, Place and Community and author of A History of England in 25 Poems. In the second part of the blog, we hear from Jane Mayhew, who is creating a beautiful series of 25 embroideries, inspired by these poems.

Telling the history of England in 25 embroideries 

Catherine Clarke

What happens when history and creative practice are in dialogue? In my role as Director of the IHR’s Centre for the History of People, Place and Community, I’ve been involved in many exciting initiatives bringing together history and creativity. My own recent book, A History of England in 25 Poems, explores how we might tell England’s story differently if we use poems, written between the 8th century and today, as our ways in—an approach which centres imagination, craft, and empathy. And then, this summer, an unexpected encounter at the Chalke History Festival began a wonderful new conversation, opening up new insights into how history and creative practice can speak to each other. 

Jane Mayhew, a hugely talented embroiderer, is currently creating a series of 25 embroideries, each inspired by a poem—and historical moment—in A History of England in 25 Poems. From our first encounter at Chalke, I’ve had the privilege of watching Jane’s project develop: each embroidery in a different style, shaped by the poem and its period, and by Jane’s deeply sensitive and insightful reading.  

Writing this, in autumn 2026, with the Bayeux Tapestry on its visit to the British Museum, I can’t help feeling that it’s timely to be reflecting on an embroidered history of England (and, yes, there’s a bit of Bayeux inspiration in one of Jane’s designs!). I’ve marvelled to see England’s story take shape through needlework and stitching, giving me rich new perspectives on the history and poems I know so well. 

This is one of the most brilliant things ever to come out of my work as a historian: unexpected, moving, illuminating and joyful. Most of all, of course, Jane’s creative vision is responding to the poems themselves, speaking in new ways of their meanings, their vividness and vitality, and their power to connect us directly with people and their stories in the past. Here, Jane generously shares some of this creative journey in her own words. I can’t thank Jane enough for the gift of this experience. 

If you’re interested in exploring history and creative practice, you’re warmly invited to join us at the IHR for short courses, online training, and in our MA History Place and Community.  

Twenty-five embroideries 

Jane Mayhew 

I first came across Catherine’s book through her readings on Radio 4 last year. The selection of poems intrigued me, the variety of individual voices conjured, with their range of moods, messages and subject matter, all elucidated and given historical context in the text. The right hints were dropped about this must-have Christmas present. Unexpectedly, I then spent New Year in the book’s compelling company, in hospital after a Boxing Day accident. I am a keen amateur embroiderer and I had already seen that here were the seeds of many and various possible embroideries to illustrate and celebrate the marvels of these voices and stories. By the end of my hospital week, the seeds had taken undeniable root.  

My project is still in progress. Apart from size (approximately 6½’ square), I have set myself no rules of uniformity and have followed no particular order. I have revelled in variety. Each poem makes different demands and presents different possibilities. Decisions have to be made about the style of embroidery and the type of imagery. In some instances, these decisions have made themselves. How could the Battle of Maldon in 991 possibly be depicted otherwise than in the style of the Bayeux Tapestry—particularly in 2026? And Elizabeth Barrett Browning’s ‘The Cry of the Children’ called unambiguously for a Victorian-style sampler—anodyne medium for disturbing content. 

Some of the poems contain irresistible imagery. Given the opportunity, how could anyone not want to set a ‘sceptred isle’ in a ‘silver sea’? And Auden’s ‘Stop all the Clocks’ conjures the fantastic image of ‘crepe bows round the white necks of the public doves’. This set off an immediate search for just the right black ribbon.  

Not all imagery translates so easily. One poem in particular, Pearl, contains visual riches to overwhelm; there are jewels, the earth’s regeneration, a summer garden, a river, heaven. Where to start? But an even louder call than this profusion of imagery came from the mood and setting—an awful grief for the loss of a child. This could not be short-changed and I have responded to it with imagery at something of a tangent from the poem’s—a tiny goldwork cradle (the poem’s lost jewel) and a snowdrop rising out from bulb and roots—into a bleak winter dawn, rather than a summer garden.  

Some poems are not primarily visual. The pull of Grace Nichols’ ‘Hurricane hits England’ is aural, even incantatory. I have taken a more abstract approach here, using kantha quilting to pulse the hurricane across the Atlantic. 

In other cases, I have left to one side any directly visual imagery in the poem, preferring to try for a metaphor to apply to the poem and its context as a whole. Mary Leapor’s ‘Crumble-Hall’ is represented as a dolls’ house cum dilapidated theatre set. The protestant martyr Anne Askew calls upon her God from within a lighted candle. The criteria put forward by the Wife of Bath for picking mates are colour-coded on a wheel of chance (or choice—take your pick).  

Another aspect of my project has been an attempt to include certain embroidery styles and techniques that are characteristically English, or come in distinctively English flavours, in some cases connected with particular periods of history. Not all the poems laid instant claim to style or technique in the manner of The Battle of Maldon or Elizabeth Barrett Browning. Blackwork has made an appearance, and I have in mind a crewelwork ship to illustrate Dryden’s Annus Mirabilis. Stumpwork is particular to the 17th century, but I have taken liberties; stumpwork techniques are scattered about, but I have not, so far, included the characteristic use of needle-lace to represent clothing. Perhaps a battle-tattered bowman from Agincourt will yet be dressed in this way. What else might still be to come? How about a virtuoso piece for Tennyson’s In Memoriam, using some of the medieval techniques of opus anglicanum—a pre-Raphaelite touch? One can dream; it might even happen.  

This has been a personal project that keeps me in a constant state of excited planning and execution. As in all such enterprises, I am proud of some of the results and, in other cases, conscious that ambition can outstrip performance. I have, in short, been having a truly wonderful time with Catherine’s book, to which I am still in mid-project thrall and for which I am extraordinarily grateful. 

Jane Mayhew began to embroider in earnest some 20 years ago, working on a City and Guilds course over the first four years after an early retirement. Her interests in history include vernacular architecture, and she has been a volunteer for the Wiltshire Buildings Record.

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