Amanda Cobbett:

“Amanda Cobbett is an award-winning textile artist with over 30 years’ experience. 

She took up embroidery after a successful career as a Fashion print designer because she wanted to return to the art of making and a more meaningful approach to textiles as a medium. Through walking in the forest, Amanda found the perfect subject matter to faithfully replicate. She carefully documents each find and notes it location. Amanda has adapted a very simple embroidery technique to create 3 dimensional embroidered hyper-real sculptures. This ‘slow textile’ process has garnered interest from scientists, art collectors and textile enthusiasts alike.

The process of research, development, stitching, and outcome has a mindful rhythm. 

In my footsteps as I walk, I’m imagining stitching a line along the contours of the forest paths like that of like a dotted line on an OS map, with one continuous thread couching me down to an environment that I want to belong to, one that I’m curious about. So concerned for species that we might be inclined to overlook and neglect amongst the forest understory, I’m encouraged to stitch them back into being, to remind us of their importance in our delicate ecosystem. There is something about the nature of a stitch through its strength, its permanence, and its place throughout history that these ‘quiet beauties’ cannot outlast. It will never be the solution to stop their potential denigration, but perhaps it will be a gentle reminder to keep a watchful eye on these vital species.”

Embarking on our adventurous exploration of some of Bowhill’s lesser known areas, we spent time roaming the dark corners of the largely untouched area of Howe Bottom. Howe Bottom lies to the south of the Duchess’s Drive as you ascend Fauldshope Hill and is home to an unbelievably diverse array of flora and fauna. Tendrils of moss drip from tree branches, whilst the dark understory becomes a tangled eruption of foliage and life. A healthy woodland is an untidy woodland, and an old healthy woodland is a place that only the most robust of explorers dare to enter. We peered into the darkness from the safety of the tracks, listening to furtive bird calls and marvelled at the lush vegetation occupying every nook and cranny. A perfect home to some of nature’s often overlooked champions.

Succession, the process of habitats changing from one habitat type to the next, is a natural phenomenon and one that both fungi and lichen play a critical role, but in the modern day and age, this needs to be facilitated through truly sustainable land management practices.

Many current woodland management practices rely on relatively short crop rotations, due to production pressures, and it can take several rotations for soils to adapt (a minimum 40 years per rotation), whereas a more natural woodland can start to develop a diversly structured understory at around 50 years. Planting structure can also be a limiting factor, with closely planted forest stands restricting light and therefor growth. Continuous Cover Forestry, a practice that relies on selective removal of trees, opens the canopy to allow increased light and also room for new growth and regeneration to become established. Species diversity is also a critical component in healthy woodland ecosystems, providing various food sources and allowing ecological niches to develop.

These factors and management practices have been incorporated into the management of Buccleuch woodlands for centuries, which is the sole reason why it has such diversity and is a truly magical place to visit and work.