EMBROIDERY TEACHER

Press, Volume XCVII, Issue 28481, 10 January 1958, Page 2

EMBROIDERY TEACHER

10,000 Pupils In 30 Years

"the Press” Special Service

DUNEDIN, January 9. When Miss Helen Moran retired recently as head of the embroidery department at King Edward Technical College, Dunedin, she could claim that about 10,000 pupils had passed through her hands since the day she joined the staff in 1928.

Her pupils have brought honour to their teacher in many parts of the world and to New Zealand by the prizes they have won for embroidery. Several have worked for the London City and Guilds embroidery examination and have all passed with honours. Under her supervision and inspiration her students have created many magnificent pieces of work. They have made their own wedding veils in exquisite Limerick lace and they have filled their glory boxes with beautiful things for their homes. Miss'Moran rarely uses transfer patterns. She prefers to build up designs by working directly on to the counted thread of the material. Her pupils do little or no stamp work.

“Once they have .learnt to work on the counted thread of material,” she says, “they lose interest in the use of transfers. Instead of following a traced pattern, they prefer to express their own personality ip individual design*. Their work becomes a craft,” she says.

Good design, she believes, is just as important as good stitchery. She insisted ihat the girls should learn technique before they started designing. They should know the limitations of the material and of the stitches.

Born In. Inverness,' and educated at the Royal Academy there. Miss Moran first developed her love of embroidery wben she was a schoolgirl later In a Belgian convent in Ardenhes. It was there that she received a through grounding in pillow lace, filet lace and broderie anglaise. She carried on with her studies in France, later taking her teaching diplomas in needlecraft subjects in London at what was then known as the Battersea Polytechnlc College of Home Science.