The Scottish artist who waited 16 years to build her dream studio [inside my journal]

Sculptor, textile artist, and co-founder of Rùda Studio — Phillippa Henley — shares the story of building a gallery from a derelict shell in a tiny Scottish village, why analogue making matters more than ever, and how her journals have been with her every step of the way.

 

 

Tell us about Rùda Studio and how it came about.

I’m originally from the northeast of England. I studied sculpture at Edinburgh College of Art, where I met my partner Shaun, who was in the same class, and we always talked about having a studio one day.

Where it would be was up in the air for a while; maybe Edinburgh, maybe the northeast, and then we decided to split the difference and settle in The Borders, which is where Shaun is from. We both wanted to be in the countryside as our practices are very rooted in landscape and place.

That was 2010. Since then, like most artists, we’d been working wherever we could; the kitchen table, in the garden, constantly tripping over equipment. We’d been looking for a premises for a long time but nothing affordable or suitable ever came up. Then the property opposite the village bookshop became available. It was in a terrible state, a real wreck. But, mad as we are, we decided to take it on.

The building changed the plan from being purely a studio to being a gallery as well. It has frontage onto the main street and big, beautiful windows, so it gave us a space to show work. We live upstairs. The back of the building is still a building site but will become our studio in the next couple of years, with a wood and metal workshop, and a dyeing room. That’s the next phase.

 

What’s the meaning behind the name?

We didn’t want to put our own names above the door; they are too long. We wanted something that could be an umbrella for everything we do. I found the Gaelic word Rùda on a research trip to the Isle of Iona in 2016, and I just kept writing it in my sketchbooks. Every sketchbook from that period has it in there. I knew I’d use it for something one day. It means ram in Gaelic, a nod to the wool and sheep industry that The Borders is so famous for.

 

Tell us about the custom journals you had made and how you personally use your notebooks

I’ve kept a sketchbook since I was about fourteen and still have every single one of them. I feel genuinely lost without one. It’s such a personal thing; you become so attached.

I have my main sketchbook, and then my paper republic journal, which functions almost like a folder. Inside I have my diary for general life management, our little Rùda-branded insert for note-taking, and a sketchbook-weight paper notebook for on-the-go sketching. It’s an extension of my thinking and research, and it’s always with me. Artists, and sculptors especially, are real magpies. We’re always collecting things, and my journal ends up full of bits and pieces I’ve gathered and slotted in. I really love that.

 

 

The journals paper republic made for Rùda have our name debossed on the back, which is really lovely. Instead of using the standard paper republic inserts, we make our own. We’ve had beautiful notebook inserts made locally, with covers of handmade paper produced at Paper Foundation, a mill in Cumbria.

The paper is made from recycled denim offcuts, so it has this soft blue tone from the indigo which felt completely in keeping with my work and our ethos. We’re going to keep expanding the range: specialty papers, watercolour paper, sketchbook weight, so the journal can become a genuine artist’s journal that you fill with whatever you need.

 

Your work spans sculpture, textiles, printmaking, and natural dyeing. How do those disciplines connect?

I think Shaun and I both gravitated towards sculpture because it’s so multidisciplinary. Our approaches are different but our instincts are very similar; we’re both driven by process and material. The nice thing about sculpture is that you follow the idea rather than the technique. You start with a concept, then choose the material that best allows you to realise it.

Alongside sculpture, I also studied textiles and spent a year as a research assistant at Heriot-Watt University studying natural dyes. So I have this cross-pollination of the two worlds. The work we have on show at the moment is stone sculpture wrapped in hand-dyed indigo linen. That combination really interests me. Shaun works across metalwork, woodwork, and installation. The gallery was always intended to be a moveable feast.

Printmaking is another big part of what we do, and I think there’s a reason so many sculptors end up doing it. The machinery, the process, the material thinking all suit the same mindset. When the studio is up and running, teaching printmaking workshops is going to be wonderful. It’s very rewarding to teach; people love the immediacy of it, and there’s so much you can do with paper and inks.

 

With AI-generated art becoming so prevalent, do you think the value of handmade work is increasing?

It’s something Shaun and I talk about a lot. We remind ourselves regularly that we were artists before the internet, before social media. We try to stay very much in the analogue world; we use digital tools for the business side of things, but we try not to let it shape our work itself.

Our location helps. Being in a small rural village means technology isn’t at the forefront of everyone’s mind, and that’s genuinely important to us. There are no other art shops in The Borders, so at the gallery we also stock art materials alongside the journals and stationery. The response from people in the few months since we opened has been overwhelmingly positive. The way people’s eyes light up at a room full of inks and notebooks and materials has been really encouraging. I think people are craving it. Creative people especially are hungry for traditional methods of making and recording ideas.

When the studio opens, we’ll bring people through the gallery and into the space where the work is made. They’ll be able to see the human touch on everything, see how we got from idea to object. I think that’s going to feel like a really complete experience. There’s a real appetite for it.

 

Finally, what advice would you give to someone who dreams of opening their own art studio?

The first caveat is that we are incredibly lucky to have found this building. But we also waited a very long time for it: sixteen years! So my overriding advice is simply: don’t lose sight of your dream.

When we had our opening party in December, friends who’ve known us for years came through the door and said, “you’ve wanted this for so long.” They were genuinely proud of us for never giving up on it. And had we not been able to get this building, something else would have come along eventually.

We’ve done almost all the renovation ourselves; the joinery, the electrics, the plumbing, the design. It’s been a huge creative outlet. But the moment we felt the real spark was when we started making work again. Getting back into our practices, that muscle memory returning. Making something and feeling genuinely good about it. That leads to the next thing, and the next.

So: be patient. Keep your dream alive. And make the thing.

 

Phillippa Henley is a sculptor, textile artist, and co-founder of Rùda Studio and Gallery in St Boswells in the Scottish Borders. Find her work at rudastudio.com or on Instagram at @rudastudio_