These 5 Textile Artists Turn Threads into Stories You Can Feel

Threads are the veins through which stories travel.

Textile art is more than just fabric and thread. A single stitch can hold memory, tradition, or strength. Textile artists don’t just make cloth they tell stories. A hand-dyed fabric can reflect heritage, a quilt can carry the comfort of generations, and even a loose thread can show fragility or change.

When we look closely, textiles are never only about what we see. They are about what we feel. A tapestry can bring joy, an embroidery can show patience, and a patchwork can remind us of endurance. Every stitch mark time, and every fiber connects us to something bigger than ourselves. Just like fabric warms and protects us, textile art touches our emotions, keeps memories alive, and turns cloth into something meaningful.

At the Arts to Hearts Project, we think textile artists deserve more recognition than they often get. This week, we shine a light on the makers who are not always celebrated but should be. Their work shows that creativity doesn’t have to be loud it can be soft, simple, and powerful. These artists invite us to pause and see fabric not just as material, but as a language of care, culture, and hope. Through their hands, textiles become storytellers, keepers of memory, and carriers of beauty.

Simone Elizabeth Saunders @simoneelizabethsaunders

Some artists work with fabric, and then there are textile artists who make you feel the stories woven into every thread. Simone Elizabeth Saunders is one of them. Based in Calgary, Canada, Simone creates vibrant, hand-tufted textiles that celebrate Black womanhood, identity, and heritage. Each piece is more than a portrait; it’s a story of strength, resilience, and connection. Drawing inspiration from her Jamaican roots, art history, literature, and music, Simone transforms threads into powerful narratives. Her textiles invite viewers to pause, reflect, and feel the beauty of culture, community, and personal identity. With every stitch, Simone shows incredible care and attention, turning fabric into something truly meaningful and full of emotion.

Her work has been featured in solo exhibitions like u•n•i•t•y at Contemporary Calgary and the Textile Museum of Canada., earning admiration from galleries, collectors, and art lovers around the world. Through her art, Simone reminds us that textile artists can create more than decoration; they create experiences that celebrate heritage, sisterhood, and the stories that shape us. She inspires us to see fabric as a language, one that speaks with warmth, purpose, and heart.

Kovács Gabriella @__kovacsgabriella__

Some textile artists turn everyday materials into something magical, and Kovács Gabriella is one of them. Based in Gödöllő, Hungary, Gabriella creates felted wall hangings, cushions, teapot cozies, and other functional artworks that carry stories through texture, color, and design. Each piece reflects her deep love for nature, Hungarian heritage, and the beauty found in small details. Gabriella’s journey began with glass design and set-and-costume studies, later expanding into French tapestry weaving and carpet design. She blends these techniques to create her unique textile art, full of warmth and personality. Her work often features motifs like trees of life, pomegranates, and whimsical houses, each telling its own quiet story.

Through workshops and exhibitions, Gabriella inspires others to explore creativity and discover the joy of making. Her textile art reminds us that fabric can be more than functional; it can hold culture, memory, and emotion. Gabriella’s work shows how a thoughtful textile artist can turn threads into stories, and everyday objects into expressions of care, tradition, and beauty.

Christina Anna Sperber @christinaannasperber

Christina Anna Sperber, an amazing artist from the quiet landscapes of Bavaria, Germany, has immersed herself in the fluidity of water and acrylics, drawing inspiration from both personal and collective healing experiences. For her, the natural world serves as a profound muse, reflecting the purest essence of humanity a blueprint untouched by external influences. Nature, with its cycles that mirror our own, resonates deeply in her work. Just as the seasons shift, so do we; this cyclical rhythm informs her palette, often defined by contrasting hues and soft, feminine tones. These colours echo both the cycles of nature and our inner landscapes, offering a balance of contrast and renewal. Christina prefers to work on raw, heavy cotton canvases, drawn to their texture and the way they reveal their own truth the transparency that allows glimpses of rawness beneath layers of water and colour. She begins with water directly on the canvas, cultivating a fluid mindset and surrendering to freedom in every stroke.

Over time, layers of paint accumulate like lived experience, and across this surface she traces paths that symbolize the return to authenticity. Into these layers, Christina weaves hand-stitched elements: delicate lines that reveal, rather than conceal, the beauty of becoming. The stitches act as reminders that scars are not flaws to be hidden, but marks to be honoured testimonies of growth that shape us into who we are today. This philosophy aligns closely with Kintsugi, the Japanese art of mending broken pottery with gold. Just as Kintsugi celebrates cracks by illuminating them with precious metal, Christina celebrates them with thread. Both practices affirm that breakage and repair are not signs of weakness, but of resilience and beauty. The seams, whether golden or threaded, remind us that our stories are made richer, not diminished, by the places where we have been broken and remade. What makes Christina’s work stand out is the quiet strength it carries each canvas holding space for vulnerability, resilience, and transformation. Through the delicate balance of paint and thread, she creates works that are not only visually compelling but deeply human, inviting viewers to reflect on their own journeys of healing and becoming whole again.

Arrti Mansinghka @arrtimansinghka

Some artists see stories in every line, color, and texture. Arti Mansinghka, based in Mumbai, India, is one of them. Her work across visual design and creative direction, shaping ideas into graphics, layouts, and concepts that feel both polished and personal. But beyond the polished surfaces, there’s a sensitivity to material, form, and rhythm that echoes the world of textile art showing that artistry can flow through many mediums, not only threads and fibers. Arti’s practice draws from color, pattern, and texture, blending structure with warmth. Every layout, composition, or design choice tells a quiet story of identity, place, and creative skill. Her work balances intention and feeling, function and beauty, reflecting a vision that honors both precision and emotion. Like textile artists who layer threads to create meaning, Arti layers design elements to form visuals that resonate, invite reflection, and hold subtle narrative depth.

What makes her work particularly compelling is the way she bridges worlds commercial design and artistic expression, clarity and nuance, precision and softness. Each project she undertakes feels thoughtful and deliberate, yet alive with personality and care. Through her designs, you can see a deep understanding of materiality, of how elements interact, of how rhythm and balance create experience. Even though her work is largely in visual design, it carries the same qualities that make textile art so moving: attention, patience, and a storytelling presence that lingers. Arti Mansinghka stands out as someone whose practice reminds us that creativity can take many forms. Her work shows that artistry isn’t limited to fibers or threads it can be conceived, directed, and composed, yet still carry the quiet depth, nuance, and emotion of textile storytelling. Through her designs, Arti proves that every well-crafted composition, like a hand-woven textile, can hold story, feeling, and intention, inviting us to pause, reflect, and see the art in every detail.

Liz Oliver @lizoliverstudio

Have you ever seen fabric come alive, folding and shifting as if it’s breathing? That’s the magic of Liz Oliver, a California-based textile artist. Using ancient Shibori pleating techniques, Liz creates sculptural textiles that play with light, shadow, and movement. Each piece feels alive, carrying memory, rhythm, and emotion within its folds. Liz’s journey began in the Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina, where craft and tradition surrounded her. Over time, she wove those roots into a practice that blends heritage with innovation. Her textiles are not just about patterns they are about moments. The fabric is folded, pleated, dried, and transformed, creating works that can never be exactly repeated. Every curve, every ripple is a new story, discovered in the making.

Her career has taken her from studio to screen, collaborating with world-renowned costume designers like Colleen Atwood, Trish Summerville, Ruth Carter, and Rodarte. Her ability to merge fine craft with storytelling has brought her work to both film and interior spaces. Whether as textiles, sculptures, or commissions, her creations invite viewers to pause, look closer, and notice the delicate beauty hidden in shadow and light. What makes Liz’s work remarkable is the balance she strikes: structure meets freedom, tradition meets experimentation, bold presence meets quiet intimacy. Her textiles celebrate movement, memory, and the wonder found in everyday materials. In Liz Oliver’s hands, fabric doesn’t just cover it speaks, shifts, and reminds us of the beauty in surprise.

Textile art isn’t just about threads, fabric, or patterns. It’s about the stories they carry, the memories they preserve, and the emotions they awaken. These textile artists remind us that a simple stitch can feel like a memory, a layered fabric can feel like comfort, and even the smallest thread can hold meaning.

At the Arts to Hearts Project, we love how textile artists invite us to pause, look closer, and find beauty in details we might otherwise overlook. Their work makes us notice the care, patience, and creativity behind every piece. If you love the quiet magic of textiles, explore the work of these incredible artists and let their creations fill your heart and space with warmth, color, and meaning.