About Thermofax Screens and Claire Higgott
My work has been textile related for the last ten years but my interest in cloth and stitching goes back to my childhood. After a degree in graphic design and ten years as a primary teacher, I started to work for The Bramble Patch and now design kits, as well as getting involved in other areas such as fabric buying and the exhibitions that are held at the shop.
After making a couple of traditional quilts I was eager to do something more personal and set out on a path that continues to this day. Exploring design elements, particularly line, is always rewarding and this is often a starting point for my own work.
Leslie Morgan and Claire Benn of Committed to Cloth rekindled my interest in screen printing, which I first practised as a student, and also introduced me to thermofax printing. Relatively cheap and easy to use, thermofax screens offered huge scope for me to pursue my ideas for surface design. I scoured ebay for a machine of my own but original machines are now scarce so when news came of a modern version in development in Europe, I put my name on the waiting list. Nearly a year later, my machine arrived and in August 2006 I started the Thermofax Screens mail order service.