Niki Brown

 Niki Brown was a long-standing and valued member of the City of York branch of the Embroiderer’s Guild. We were very sad to hear of her death in December 2022. Here is a short tribute from YES member Moira Wood. 

 

NIKI  BROWN

I feel as if I had known Niki for most of my stitching life in Yorkshire but, in fact, we met at the City of York branch of The Embroiderers’ Guild in the late 1980’s.  As Niki lived in Malton and I lived in Helmsley we formed a small group of like-minded stitchers with a core group of Anna Rowntree, Julia Ward, Niki and myself.  We met in each our houses and were joined at various points by other stitchers keen to stretch the idea of embroidery and employ various techniques which were quite experimental for us.

Niki was trained in art and developed a series of ‘paintings’ which involved painting and layering of nets which she called ‘netties’, always enjoying the play on words this involved.  Niki took part in various life drawing classes where she interpreted the subject in layers of nets and thread, much to the amazement of the tutors.

Our core group of stitchers decided that we would benefit from the advice of a professional textile artist and in 1994 we formed a group which we called Ebor mentored by Hilary Bower. Niki was an extremely important part of this group although she was always very modest about what she could produce that would be suitable for exhibitions which we undertook following encouragement from Hilary.  Niki’s contributions were always a delight with a level of detail, humour and invention which were a wonder to behold.  

Niki could always be relied on to entertain us at Guild meetings with unfailingly humorous and informative talks.  I particularly remember her Alphabet talk which I heard more than once but enjoyed it just as much the second time around.

Niki had health issues for much of her life, but she always approached all activities with enthusiasm and humour. Latterly Niki had become housebound but she was still stitching when I met up with her and still in exquisite miniature detail.

Niki Brown – the best of friends.

Moira Wood