So often, when we think of woven textiles, we imagine chunky autumnal knits, cozy and warm sweaters in shades of olive green and ember. But Alexandra Jean Auger creates differently. Her festive summery tapestries, with their creative shapes and bright colors, are woven on looms (sometimes of her own shaping), setting her apart from many fibre artists. Meet this tremendous talent and delight in her beautiful work.

How did your love for textiles begin, and when did you start attempting to learn weaving for yourself? 

Who knows how long textiles have been floating around my subconscious, but it was in 2014/2015-ish that I began to take notice of more and more textiles, tapestry in particular, on social media and in group art shows. I was immediately drawn to these sort of “alternative paintings”, but it wasn’t until January 2016 that I decided I wanted to try my hand at them. Waiting out a blizzard at a friend’s place during a visit to New York, I kept staring at this tapestry they had up, a blocky Southwestern-looking piece of a simple desert scene with a figure reclined by a cactus. I looked at it long enough that its construction started to make sense, and I was really taken by its being pictorial, rather than an abstract, like so many wall hangings I’d seen. I thought, “I can do that, I want to do that”, and signed up for an Intro to Tapestry class when I got home.

What was the initial process like? Were you taught by any mentors or teachers, or entirely self -taught? 

In 2016 I took a two-day Intro to Tapestry workshop at The Workroom in Toronto, where we were taught to set up a frame loom, and other basics. I completed a few small pieces that weren’t great; I made the beginner mistake of doing too much and using every possible technique in a single piece, just because I could. 

For all its faults, I’ve always found social media a great way to discover art. My growing interest in fibre arts led me to weavers Margo Wolowiec, Diedrick Brackens, and especially Erin M. Riley, amongst dozens of others, who completely rocked my world, showing what weaving can be. I simplified my process to plain weave only and attempted to work truer to life. 

Over the years, through trial and error, I’ve taught myself about mixing colours, creating nuanced shapes, and achieving a more photo-realistic outcome. I’ve built a wonky frame loom or two, and dabbled once or twice in natural dyeing to achieve a colour I couldn’t otherwise, but I am VERY happy to leave the carpentry and dyeing to the experts. 

What was most fun about the beginning process of learning to weave and work with textiles? What was most frustrating? 

It’s exciting to start weaving and figure out how fundamentally simple it is: over and under. If you’ve been putting off learning, you can do so in an afternoon with a frame loom (which you can build yourself) and a YouTube video. If you enjoy that, you can get more complicated. Cutting a piece off the loom and having the taut, stretched work fall soft and malleable into your lap, realizing “I just made a piece of actual fabric” is such a buzz. 

I got my cat Domino as a kitten in 2019, and trying to warp my loom or do ANYTHING with yarn with her around was a nightmare. I’ve never had a proper studio, so we’ve had to learn to share the space. Otherwise, weaving is mostly a joy. I enjoy the tedium. I’m nearly never completely happy with a finished piece, but I want to keep trying, which I take as a good sign. 

Talk about your creative process over the years? Where do you find the most inspiration? 

I’m glad weaving has stuck for me, because I’ve dabbled a lot over the years. Drawing, painting, writing, photography, the *idea* of ceramics, etcetera – I love all of these, but don’t have the natural talent (or more importantly, the drive and desire, to master these crafts). In a way, textiles have been a way to express my story ideas or better present a photo I’ve taken. 

My inspiration is just as likely to spark from an overheard conversation as it from Pinterest (literally – I’ll admit it) – but it never comes in greater quantities or as fully-formed as from long, aimless city walks. I’m trying to walk every street in London, which I’m tracking through the app CityStrides. Something catches my eye and sets off a chain of ideas. I like the poetry in everyday grime and grittiness. I want to capture universal feelings that hit you like an inside joke with a good friend. 

When did your dream of studying in London take root? What was the application process like for you? 

I’ve wanted to live in London since the first time I saw Hallie drive through the city in The Parent Trap. Joking (maybe not joking?) A trip to the UK in summer 2022 and a perfect East London Sunday really cemented the desire. 

A student visa was the only way I was going to be able to get to London, and it was time to stop ‘regretting’ and invest in the work I’d spent nearly seven years teaching myself. I applied to University of the Arts London: Central Saint Martins to study Textile Design and told myself it was casual, just a whim, all fine if they rejected me, but I became obsessed. I waited months for a reply. Because Los Angeles is eight hours behind London, I’d jolt awake way too early every day and immediately check my email, hoping something would have come through. I picked up my phone one night for a nice little scroll as a break from weaving and found an acceptance letter in my inbox. I hadn’t had an interview or anything. Unreal! I’m lucky my husband, Lucas, was on board with this spontaneous international move; we had three months to pack, sell, and rearrange our lives. 

How did it feel for that dream become a reality? 

I am the most broke I have ever, ever been. I am also so excited and happy about my everyday life. I have a million and one dreams. 

Also pleased to say going back to school in my thirties has been incredible. I am so much more committed – I actually go, which is a good start – and feel really determined and focused on why I’m there and what I want from the experience. When I was finally kicked out of university in 2015 with a zero-point-something GPA I genuinely thought I didn’t have the kind of brain it takes for higher education. I’m proud to say I got straight As this year 🙂 

Halfway through second year, you choose one specialty for the rest of your degree. Plot twist, I’ve actually chosen knit! I really agonized over the choice, almost embarrassingly so. I consulted everyone I knew, even resorted to an Instagram poll. I had never knit a day in my life before this program, but I have really clicked with machine knitting. 

Using intarsia knitting (intarsia knitting is a specialized style of knitting used to create “pictures” in the knit-LF), I develop wearable tapestry-like pieces; I love the creative freedom to produce fully-finished outcomes. For a long while, I’ve wondered how to make my work accessible to more people (create multiples? smaller pieces? new products?), and knitwear has felt like a promising avenue. I’ve been invited to a Stoll programming course this summer, and I’m super excited; the possibilities seem endless. The perfect-world dream is to be a self-employed tapestry weaver and knitwear designer. A Professional Gemini. 

What do you love about weaving and textiles? What continues to inspire you about it?

Cloth is a part of all people’s lives, whether you’re hugely into fashion and art, obsessed with home decor, or just a guy whose only interactions with textiles are putting on your underwear and drying your hands. Its history is enormous. All cultures have found a way to produce material that will protect skin, soothe children, or warm sleeping bodies, and they’ve infused this material with colour and shape and texture, not because it improves functionality, but simply because they’re human. That’s beautiful! 

What is your favorite project you have worked on?

I think my favourite tapestry so far has been Pulling over to pick mustard flower at sunset along the PCH.  My favourite project in my course of study has been Flowery Speech. At the beginning of second year you make a collection in each of your two pathways and are essentially given free rein to do whatever you want. I experimented with beading, digital embroidery, and sublimation printing alongside my weaving and knitting, with themes in communication breakdown as explored through floral idioms. 

What are you currently working on/trying to master? 

I’m currently trying to finish a shag rug for my living room that I’ve been weaving on-and-off for just over a year, in breaks between school projects. It’s the biggest thing I’ve ever made – will be about 5 feet by 8 feet – and very meditative to work on, very geometric. With my pictorial tapestries, I’ll work from a reference image, but I’m still constantly reassessing and tweaking the image, so a lot more active, creative concentration is required. I’ve been enjoying the production-line feeling of tying knot after knot while watching mindless TV. But most important to me right now is to make some completed wearable pieces! 

Hilary Bryant is a writer and filmmaker based in Los Angeles. She uses her perspective as a storyteller to explore what is beautiful, weird, and hard about being a human. Past and current projects include comedies about dating a war veteran with PTSD (Love and War) and a modern “Mary Poppins-esque” series about a young divorcee processing the end of her marriage (Aftering). She is the co-host and producer of Cereal Bowl, a popular variety show in LA that highlights and brings together some very cool, very talented people! She loves loves coffee and wine and kombucha (basically all beverages).