"The technique I use to create my textile art is called hand hooking which dates back thousands of years and was used by the Coptics to create decorative borders on clothing and in Norway and England to make rugs. Its exact origins are unknown. In the 1850's burlap was introduced to North America and rug hooking took off. It was free, accessible, and the burlap bags were reused as a backing for hand hooked rugs. Salvaged clothing torn into long narrow strips was hooked into the burlap and the tools they used were fashioned from nails shaped into a hook then hammered into handles of wood, bone or antler. I often think about the men and women for whom making a hooked rug was a matter of thrift, a way to use materials they had on hand to create a piece of functional art. Not that they ever called it that. I think many of them would laugh to hear me refer to their rugs as art or being sustainable. They believed they were making rag rugs to warm their beds and keep out cold winter drafts. They didn’t hook rugs to last a hundred years and yet they left us a legacy rich in history and storytelling. My technique is inspired by this eastern Canadian tradition."

Ms. Sirois-Silver is a McGown certified instructor and teaches rug hooking workshops on design and colour planning in Canada and the United States.

Her work has been exhibited at fibreEssence, Contemporary Craft in BC, Surface Design Traveling Exhibition, FibreWorks Gallery, Convergence, Gibsons Fibre Arts Festival, and at the Silk Purse Arts Centre. She has a Creative Arts Diploma from Vanier College, a BA Specialization in Communications Concordia University, and a Public Relations Certificate from the University of Toronto. She studied colour theory with Michele Wipplinger and at BCOU. Ms. Sirois-Silver first began teaching rug hooking in 1998 and formed Big Dog Hooked Rug Designs in 2004.

Visit the gallery section and click on the gallery rugs to learn more about Ms. Sirois-Silver's design process and colour planning theory.

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