Jenny founded First Eleven in 1986. The studio has absorbed and engrossed her but it is designing she loves more than anything else.
Jenny says “The challenge of working in this way is enormous! It’s about pure design without the distraction of an end product... You have to come up with new ideas all the time and they have to be up-to-the-minute, beautifully thought out and executed, exciting and different - and the client must be able to clearly see its potential as a successful fabric or surface.”
Jenny uses various techniques, recently combining computer graphics with more traditional textile design methods. Over the last few years she has developed designs for paper products as well, a completely different task to creating patterns for fabric.
There is a lightheartedness in the design of a greetings card or a wrapping paper - the appeal they must have is an immediate graphic one rather than the long-lasting allure essential in a textile. Colour is every bit as important to Jenny as the construction of a pattern. Her greatest inspiration is Japanese textiles for their simplicity, strength of composition, balance and sublime colour.
Jenny studied weaving at Middlesex University followed by an MA in jacquard weaving at The Royal College of Art, London. In 1998 she was made an RDI, a Royal Designer for Industry - an award conferred by the RSA. link here