There are just a few days left to see Ironstone Memories, the Cleveland Fibre Arts exhibition currently on display at Land of Iron.

Bringing together textiles, felt, stitchwork, dyeing, garment-making and mixed media, the exhibition explores East Cleveland’s ironstone story through a very different set of materials and techniques.

It can be found in the Tom Leonard Gallery on Floor 2 and runs until Saturday 31 October 2026.

A different way of telling the ironstone story

Ironstone Memories grew from the idea of bringing a textile exhibition into Land of Iron, something the museum had not previously done.

For Angela List-Evans, Head of Collections at Land of Iron, part of the appeal was the opportunity to interpret the area’s industrial heritage in a different way.

The work connects directly to ironstone mining through colour, maps, mining imagery, rust and iron dyeing, while also drawing on the wider landscape of East Cleveland and the North York Moors.

As Angela explains, the exhibition brings together “lots of different techniques” while taking its inspiration from both the industry and the land.

That combination runs through the whole display.

Inspired by iron, industry and landscape

Across the exhibition, familiar parts of the local story appear in unexpected forms.

There are references to miners, mine workings, local maps, horses, ammonites and the colours of the surrounding landscape. Some pieces use traditional textile techniques, while others experiment directly with rust, iron and natural materials.

Rust dyeing is particularly important to the exhibition.

Iron or steel objects can be wrapped in fabric and left to react, allowing rust to mark and stain the material. The longer the process continues, the stronger and more unpredictable those marks can become.

That unpredictability is part of the appeal. As Angela noted during our walk around the gallery, every piece created in this way is unique and cannot simply be reproduced again.

Many techniques, many makers

Cleveland Fibre Arts was established in the early 1990s.

The group includes members from the North York Moors and East Cleveland area, who meet regularly to share knowledge and skills and help keep traditional rural crafts alive.

Their work spans a wide range of textile practices, including processing fleece, hand-dyeing, spinning, weaving, knitting, stitchwork and felting.

For Ironstone Memories, those skills have been brought together with techniques including appliqué, beadwork, garment construction, printing, rust dyeing and mixed-media work.

The exhibition guide reflects that variety, with work by artists including Heather Waring, Margaret Woodhead, Margaret Jackson, Lynda Jamieson, Frances McGregor, Jane Gatenby and Catherine Woodall.

Miners, horses and mining life

Some of the most immediately recognisable pieces are the felt figures.

Catherine Woodall’s work includes groups of miners and a woman, created using felt, stitchwork, garment construction and textile techniques.

Her piece The Last Shift brings together a miner and a needle-felted horse, referencing the animals that once worked underground alongside miners.

Angela highlighted the hand-felted horse in particular as an example of the amount of work involved in producing these pieces.

Other works take a more landscape-based approach. Margaret Jackson’s felt pieces draw inspiration from mining photographs and industrial heritage, while textile maps, stitched routes and rust-dyed surfaces connect specific places back to the mining story.

Garments, fabric and experimentation

Ironstone Memories is not confined to framed work.

The exhibition also includes garments and fabric pieces using iron dye, printing, rust work, stitch and embroidery.

A rail of clothing shows how these processes can be applied to everyday fabrics and garments, while the exhibition’s large multi-layered dress has become one of its most striking pieces.

The dress combines knitting, wet felting, leaves, beadwork, a sheep-lock collar, garment construction and iron-dyed elements.

Elsewhere, rust-dyed clothing, printed fabric, shoes, caps and textile panels show just how widely these techniques can be used.

Angela described this accessibility as one of the strengths of the exhibition: many of the processes can be explored without specialist materials, using familiar fabrics and surfaces.

A collection of one-off works

One of the things that becomes clear when looking closely at Ironstone Memories is the amount of handwork involved.

Felting, stitching, dyeing, layering and constructing the pieces can all be slow and detailed processes.

That is also what makes many of the works so individual.

The results of rust dyeing, felting and mixed-media work cannot be repeated exactly, meaning each object carries its own marks, textures and character.

Angela describes the exhibition as having grown beyond what she first imagined, with a much greater mixture of surfaces, techniques and layering than she had expected.

Selected works for sale

A small number of works in the exhibition are available to purchase, and several pieces have already sold.

Not everything on display is for sale, and sold items remain in the exhibition until it closes.

If you are interested in one of the available works, ask at the museum for further information.

About Cleveland Fibre Arts

Cleveland Fibre Arts brings together people with an interest in textile and fibre-based crafts, with inspiration often coming from the natural elements, colours and landscapes of the North York Moors, the coast and Cleveland Hills.

For Ironstone Memories, that existing connection to place has been brought together with another defining part of the area’s history: the ironstone mining industry.

To learn more about Cleveland Fibre Arts, or to enquire about joining the group, contact Margaret Whitehead on 07581 156280.

See Ironstone Memories before it closes

Ironstone Memories: Cleveland Fibre Arts is on display in the Tom Leonard Gallery, Floor 2, at Land of Iron until Saturday 31 October 2026.

If you have not yet seen it, there is still time to take a closer look at the stitching, textures, materials and details that make each piece unique.

For exhibition dates, visitor information and practical details, see the full Ironstone Memories event page.

Land of Iron’s programme of events and activities is made possible thanks to The National Lottery Heritage Fund and National Lottery players.