An Inside Look at Stitch Please with Lisa Woolfork
Author: Kyla Denanyoh
What do African textiles, freezer paper, cosplay, wax paper, and Juneteenth have in common? These are all topics that have been discussed on the Stitch Please podcast.
Lisa Woolfork, the host and producer of Stitch Please, is in a unique position to provide sewing instruction and crafting techniques along with insightful critique. Lisa is a fourth-generation sewing enthusiast who learned to sew before earning a Ph.D. and becoming a professor of African American literature and culture.
The diverse podcast topics are important to Lisa because Lisa brings all of the complexities of her life to her podcast. Lisa explained that her podcast is a hybridized form because she is “able to combine rather seamlessly two things that don't seem to go together,” and I agree. Lisa finds that the needle arts of sewing, quilting, and knitting have a long history of minimizing, erasing, and silencing Black women. Lisa is adamant that while everyone is welcome to listen to the podcast, the podcast was created to help black women feel educated and informed about our deep, rich history, our ancestral practices, and things that listeners may or may not have heard of.
“[Sewing] should be celebrated and seen and cherished just like we, as black women should be celebrated, seen and cherished.” - Lisa Woolfork
After speaking with Lisa and finding her motivation for Stitch Please, I can see how Stitch Please fills a need for Black women, girls, and femmes.
I am a crocheter and lightweight crafter, a background that made me interested in the Stitch Please podcast, and excited to share Lisa’s story. Keep reading to learn more about Lisa Woolfork and Stitch Please.
Get your stitch together.
“Get your stitch together” is one of the taglines that Lisa Woolfork uses on her podcast. I find the phrase to be completely accurate because, in each podcast episode, Lisa is informing the listener about something and getting their lives together.
In June 2021, Lisa and I began our conversation by explaining how we started to sew. Lisa learned to sew as a graduate student and I learned to crochet in law school. Although sewing and crocheting were activities that relaxed us during stressful educational experiences, Lisa and I had similar introductions to sewing: our mothers.
My mother used to make my church dresses when I was a child and she would create shirts for herself. But my mom never showed me how to sew and I never saw her sewing. Lisa and I had this experience in common; Lisa remembers seeing completed dresses and tops but never seeing her mother complete the actions. Lisa explained that sewing was probably an act of self-care for our parents. Lisa’s mother, Ianthia, would sew clothing for Lisa and her two sisters, even though Ianthia was an elementary school teacher. Whether it was dresses, short sets, or clothing for school, Lisa remembers that items “would just magically appear” and her mother must have been sewing during the night and on weekends.
Despite the fact that Lias’s mother would sew often and Lisa knew what sewing was, Lisa has no interest in sewing or understanding it. I am grateful that Lisa eventually became intrigued by sewing and created the Stitch Please podcast.
Get free, stay free and be free.
“Get free, stay free and be free” is a phrase that Lisa used during her Juneteenth-centric episodes. This phrase is relevant as we get into Lisa’s motivations to create Stitch Please.
When Lisa explained that she didn’t learn to sew until graduate school, I started laughing. The image of Lisa in the latest 1990’s fashions, living in Wisconsin, sewing a pillowcase during her free time seemed so far from the professorial and passionate podcaster that I met. However, Lisa fell in love with sewing and was almost always the youngest person in any sewing group. Lisa emphasized that she was almost always the only non-white person in sewing groups as well.
Of course, the image I had of Lisa was different from the actual image of Lisa as a young Black woman working with white women who were in their late sixties or early seventies. There were layers of generational and racial differences that made for a lot of uncomfortable situations.
To handle these uncomfortable spaces, Lisa created a number of coping strategies. Lisa would ignore a lot of microaggressions or laugh off these comments. At one time, Lisa kept a journal of the tasteless comments that she heard, including being called the Lonely Only, and Lisa would share these comments with friends and gawk at the insensitivity of these comments.
These experiences led to the creation of Stitch Please. After years of coping to remain in her sewing circles, the white supremacist attacks in Charlottesville, Virginia occurred. After 2017, when they hear the word ‘Charlottesville,’ most people recall white supremacists attacking the city, men driving cars into crowds of people, and iconic images of white men marching down the
streets with torches. During those events, Lisa was in the church across the street; listening to the stomping and chanting; locked in the church, and waiting for a safe time to exit the building.
Lisa calls the events “a transformative experience, uh, dealing with terrorism. And that changes a lot about a person's philosophy.”
As a result of what occurred, Lisa found herself doing a lot of sewing because it was very relaxing. Sewing was a community activity for Lisa and often completed in her sewing circle. A sewing circle is a group of women who meet to sew, share patterns and designs, teach each other and socialize. Sewing was necessary because Lisa’s days as a professor at the University of Virginia were filled with teaching and researching, as well as being a wife and mother of two boys. Sewing was special to Lisa.
A few weeks after Charlottesville, Lisa was meeting with her sewing circle and an announcement was made that the events of Charlottesville were not to be discussed. This event that the entire country was still discussing, an event where Lisa could have been seriously injured or harmed, an event that brought attention to their town, could not be talked about.
Lisa was a member of this sewing circle for yeeeeears (seriously, for 15 years) and although she dealt with some microaggressions, Lisa welcomed the camaraderie of the group members. The ladies would discuss their families and sewing patterns, sending cards to congratulate or share condolences with each other, and travel together.
However, during one meeting, the ladies were informed that no one could discuss their feelings or opinions about what happened in Charlottesville; an event that the entire country was still discussing. While the censorship was disappointing, what truly upset Lisa was the fact that the discussion was not banned out of respect for her, but to protect the comfort level of everyone else.
If you haven't guessed yet, Lisa was the only non-white member of the sewing circle. So Lisa could not share her frustrations surrounding the event and others could not be challenged or learn from Lisa about the events. Lisa spent countless hours with these women, but at that time, their discomfort required that certain conversations were banned.
Jump forward a couple of weeks and Lisa received an envelope in the mail. This envelope contained a check that Lisa submitted for admission to a sewing circle event; an event that Lisa attended multiple times and was looking forward to. Lisa was now being excluded from the sewing circle.
All of these events created the need for community and the spark for Lisa to create her own space.
Hello, Stitches!
“Hello, Stitches” is a frequent greeting that Lisa uses on the Stitch Please podcast. The podcast began in 2019 and is an extension of the Black Women Stitch initiative. Lisa created Black Women Stitch; a digital space where it is safe to be black in the larger sewing and crafting community. Lisa missed the community aspect of sewing and she wanted to create a space where all Black women, girls, and femmes were allowed. Black Women Stitch is a prominent Facebook group, Instagram page, Lisa hosts Clubhouse rooms about the topic, and there is a beach retreat where Black women can meet, sew, and share.
I asked Lisa about the importance of Black Women Stitch and the retreat. Lisa explained that “Black leisure is radical because black people owning their own time is radical.” Wow, let’s unpack this. Lisa shared so much from the retreat attendees and their shared experiences with crafting, that Lisa didn’t want the conversation to end. The desire to continue having conversations about sewing, crafts, racial differences, and microaggressions sparked Lisa to create Stitch Please, where Lisa could discuss these topics on a regular basis.
“I think the most powerful thing you can do as a black woman, as a black parent, as a black person, is to love yourself.” - Lisa Woolfork
I asked Lisa whether the podcast was an act of defiance; a middle finger to the group who dismissed her. Lisa rejected this notion because she doesn’t hold any bitterness toward the group. Stitch Please is a passion project; an act of love where Lisa created a haven for Black women, girls, and femmes to share and build their own platform.
Lisa explained that sewing, crocheting, and stitching are about black leisure, black recreation, and black joy. After discussing the iconic radical images of Angela Davis and the Black Panther party, Lisa explained that radical means ‘of or relating to the root.’ Lisa explained that black recreation and joy are radical because Black people could not have survived as people if we were not able to have some sense of joy and levity in their lives. This joy and levity had to come from somewhere and survive at its root, thus black leisure being radical.
Lisa taught me that black joy was laughing at Black Twitter and black recreation would be embracing traditions at an HBCU homecoming, and black leisure is enjoying a podcast hosted by a Black host. And of course, sewing is an action that Black people have completed for years, despite what is happening in the world.
I have no doubt that Lisa’s childhood experiences, her studies in African American literature and culture, and her personal exposure to racism have taught Lisa to cherish black recreation and joy.
Lisa explained that “[w]e're still loving each other. We're still growing. We're still thriving. We're still building community. We're doing the things that people do to exercise the full degree of their humanity.” We, as in Black people, are embracing black leisure, recreation, and joy and embracing sewing and Stitch Please.
Subscribe and Listen to Rate Stitch Please
If you are not a subscriber of Stitch Please, this is your sign to subscribe and listen to the podcast. Lisa Woolfork promotes sewing, quilting, and needle arts, as well as black liberation, radical self-love, and social justice in her podcast Stitch Please. As a crafter, I find the podcast compelling because I often find myself as the only non-White person in a big box craft store. As a Black woman, I find the podcast unique because the podcast gives me permission to embrace leisure and joyous activities. As a podcaster, Lisa’s authenticity is unmatched. Lisa discusses the topics that are relevant to her, Lisa accepts sponsors who won’t exploit the show for diversity purposes and Lisa is having fun.
The podcast is compelling to listen to because episodes include Lisa speaking with a guest and episodes with Lisa talking to the audience. Oh, and did I mention that the Stitch Please audience includes 130,000+ unique downloads? A success that Lisa appreciates, but isn’t her motivation to record new episodes. Lisa is a podcaster because Stitch Please is a “love letter to other creatives, black women, girls and femmes who are working within this art form, within this medium. A place to show that you and the work that you are doing is meaningful.”
Join me in thanking Lisa for sharing her love letter with the world.
