About

Penny Cheuk-Low is a textile artist who creates fabric art with vintage and repurposed fabrics using techniques such as appliqué, Sashiko embroidery (Japanese hand-stitching) and Boro (mending/patching with fabric scraps). She combines her expertise in traditional Japanese fabrics and dyeing methods with environmentally sustainable materials to express her daily life in the Pacific Northwest.

Penny studied traditional fabric dyeing in Kyoto, Japan as a fabric designer and kimono fabric dyer. Her areas of focus were Yuzen (paste-resist dyeing), Katazome (stencil dyeing) and Roketsuzome (wax-resist dyeing). She then further specialized in Norizome (direct paste-dyeing) and Tsutsugaki (rice paste-resist dyeing) in Tokyo.

She established Someya Studio in Vancouver, Canada in 1982 to create hand-dyed fabrics for fashion and interior design, and to teach Japanese fabric dyeing techniques. She later moved to Seattle, WA where she currently resides.

Penny also holds a degree in Education and has spent over 25 years as a Montessori educator and trainer, traveling and teaching throughout Asia. After retiring as an educator in 2020, she returned to creating art and also enjoys gardening, playing the fiddle, and coordinating a Fiber Arts Group in South Seattle.

Artist Statement

I am a textile artist whose works reflect my experiences in Japan, past and present. My works represent the seasonality and foods of Japanese culture, combined with my daily life in the Pacific Northwest.
I studied traditional fabric dyeing and design in Kyoto, Japan, where I developed a love for traditional fabrics and the symbolism of their patterns. Since then, I have been collecting Japanese vintage fabrics and folk objects. After I retired from a career in education, I wanted to upcycle these fabrics into artworks that are fun and whimsical.

I am also inspired by the applique artworks of the late Japanese artist Miyawaki Ayako. I admire her attention to detail for the items in her everyday life and her use of secondhand materials and patterns. I similarly enjoy taking simple everyday things as the starting point of my creative process, which often starts with a trip to local Asian markets or a walk in nature where a vegetable, fish, or flower might capture my attention. Appreciating their details and experiencing them with my five senses allows me to select the right fabric to represent an item’s texture, pattern, and color. Then the process of cutting up, manipulating, replacing and reorganizing the fabric in my design is the essence of my creative applique technique.