Inspired by a love of Nature, I create characters, form and their movements, experimenting with knitting crochet and embroidery techniques. Working from studies of creatures from Museums, Wildlife centres, Vivariums and Aquariums, I create, texture pattern and paint with telephone wire, pipe cleaners and wool. Inventing creature characters, form and movement organically, so the character grows in the making process. My use of colour is striking, inspired by the wonderful coral reef and the lush, exotic creatures of the rainforest and in keeping with the garish tradition of puppets throughout history. I am inspired by the fantastic and strange, I am aware that I couldn’t create anything as weird and wonderful as the real thing and it is the struggle to do so, that keeps me creating. My characters are brought to life with simple hand and rod mechanisms, I develop these by knitting around my hand, creating a form around an opening mouth or around my fingers to create lifelike animalistic movements. The technique of finger knitting wire adds a richness of texture and detail to my work which enables me to create form freely without the use of a pattern. I have recently learnt how to crochet, which has added a new dimension to my work, creating hyperbolic corals, with the undulating effect. I am also able to mix the techniques and crochet on to knitted forms.