Death Stories: Film & Storytelling

Death Stories: Film & Storytelling at the Birks Cinema

Friday 18 October at 5:30pm (3hrs 30) 

£10, under 18s free | 15+

In preparation for Samhain, come join local storyteller Claire Hewitt, Finnish storyteller Riikka Palonen and musician Richard Martin Clarke as we invite you to step over the threshold when the veils are thin and gather and feast with us. A chance to celebrate and honour our ancestors, and time to share old family stories as we weave Scottish and Finnish lore, customs and traditions into the evening. Bring food to share, we will have an ample supply of Soul Cakes too.

Nettle Dress will be screened prior to the storytelling event.

Textile artist Allan Brown spends seven years making a dress by hand, just from the fibre of locally foraged stinging nettles. This is ‘hedgerow couture’, the greenest of slow fashion, and it is also Allan's medicine. It’s how he survives the death of his wife that left him and their children bereft, and how he finds a beautiful way to honour her. The challenge of making zero carbon clothing sourced within a few miles of his home means re-learning ancient crafts and recalls the fairy tale 'Wild Swans'. THE NETTLE DRESS follows Allan’s whole journey through all the seasons and years. Foraging, spinning, weaving, cutting and sewing the cloth. Finally the healing vision of the dress back in the woods where the nettles were picked, worn by one of his daughters. 'Grasping the Nettle' is at the heart of the film. Making a dress this way becomes devotional, with every thread representing hours of mindful loving craft. Over seven years Allan is transformed by the process just as the nettles are. Both the film and dress, a hand-spun labour of love in the truest sense, THE NETTLE DRESS is a modern-day fairy-tale and hymn to the healing power of nature and slow craft.