The Orange Flow: Sea to Silk

 Last February, the journey brought me to Edinburgh. Four hours of shifting landscapes through the train window replaced rare London sunshine with northern twilight. Despite the drizzle, I walked.

The rhythmic beat of carry-on wheels against Old Town cobblestones accompanied me. Another turn, and I stopped. Two doors—bright yellow and deep red—stood out against the backdrop of monochrome sky and stone. I pulled out my phone and took a picture to bookmark a feeling: a lighthouse in a sea of grey.

A lighthouse in a sea of grey. Scottish Textiles Showcase, Edinburgh

But Edinburgh’s streets seemed to have a mind of their own. In the following days, choosing a different route every time, I found myself passing the same storefront. The colorful doors were framing a sign: Scottish Textiles Showcase.

After the third time taking yet another random turn from the Royal Mile and seeing the same pair of doors, I slowed down and began to wonder if the city’s famed storytelling was at work. Edinburgh, after all, had nurtured literary imagination for centuries. It inspired Harry Potter’s world, where magic and ordinary life exist side by side. What if the old stones that carried magical flow through the centuries now carry me to a new discovery?

I crossed St. Mary’s Street and opened the glass door.

A sanctuary of textures and colors greeted me, but my focus was drawn to the bright orange patterns on the neatly folded silk scarves. I reached for one and felt the magical softness flowing through my fingertips and warming my heart like a moving story.

I paused, mesmerized. A young woman was quietly arranging displays nearby.

Seaweeds from the coastline of the Isle of Mull and nature-inspired orange patterns printed on silk by Ellen Martin

“Did you design these?” I wondered.

“Yes,” she replied humbly, her gentle demeanor seemingly at odds with the vibrant orange hues of her creations. Running out of time but in awe with a surprising discovery, I asked for her name and promised to return.

The day before my departure, I found my way to the shop again, but this time it was intentional. Ellen had just finished lunch and was ready to share her orange discovery journey with me.

“It’s only in the past couple of years that I started to use orange in my designs or even wear it myself. I didn't used to.” Ellen began, her authentic smile in harmony with the bright orange of her sweater. “I’ve always liked warm colors—red and pink were favorites. I'm not sure what it was... But playing around with design ideas, seeing what colors pair well together, I thought maybe I need to move away from using red and pink all the time: orange isn’t too far from that. I liked the warmth of the color, and the vibrancy.”

“Vibrant.” Was the answer when I asked her to describe orange in one word. “Vibrant came to mind, yeah." She nodded, confirming alignment of her feelings with the word.

Printed textile designer Ellen Martin from the Isle of Mull loves orange, Scottish Textiles Showcase, 20 St Mary’s Street, Edinburgh

Ellen had grown up on the Isle of Mull, off Scotland's west coast—a place of cool greens and blues rather than warm colors. I wondered what inspired her orange designs.

"Naturally, up there you don’t find much bright color in the plants. Maybe, in the gardens," she explained. "But then, when you look closely… When I did this project with seaweeds that I found on the beaches of Mull, I discovered that looking at it at first, you think it's just brown, but then when you start to take pieces out individually, they're not brown, they're different shades of reds and pinks and oranges. And so, there will be more color there if you actually look for it."

She paused, her eyes lighting up. "And then, orange—it depends on the time of year up in Mull. The hills, the bracken ferns that are green in the summer turn sort of a rusty, deep orange in the autumn and winter. So, the hills all look a kind of dark burnt orange."

Every year, Ellen returns to Mull—her cradle of creativity—where her parents still got a little place.

"I have always drawn since I was a child. My mum’s a painter, my dad makes furniture, so I was encouraged to be creative. But I didn't really know what I was going to do with that until I was twenty-three when I started a course in textile design. And there I realized textiles was my main interest, and it's been growing since."

To my question about what advice she would give to her younger self, she reflected: "Well, it took me a little while; I spent some time working. I think just being patient and giving it time to figure out instead of feeling pressure to just choose what to do right out of school—you don't necessarily need to do that."

"That's precious," I remarked. "Only comes with experience though, right?"

"Yeah, I think a lot of people feel like they have to—when they're eighteen and out of school—go straight to uni and choose their course of study that ten years down the line doesn't mean anything to what they're doing."

Ellen didn’t hesitate when I asked where she sees herself five years from now: "I want to carry on with my creative work and, maybe, have more time for that because I work here at the Scottish Textile Showcase—and I want to carry on with that—but finding balance and having time to create as well."

I learned that her insight extends to the creative process itself: "I think when I've got time off to do creative work, I maybe put pressure on myself that it must have a purpose. A lot of creative people that are doing it as part of their living feel that… but I could just do it for myself as well."

She laughed softly, "I try, or yeah, but if you set aside days to be creative, you might not feel creative that day, and you just have to accept that instead of beating yourself up about it."

When I admired her wisdom, Ellen added: "I'm saying all this, but I don't necessarily do it myself."

"You wouldn't be saying that if you hadn't been exploring it, being aware of a flow as you create." I reflected.

Grateful for her time and in possession of a silk scarf with a beautifully flowing pattern, I stepped out of the shop. The observations Ellen shared with me resonated deeply as I made my way through the pouring rain protecting the orange of the seaweed now printed on silk. Yet it felt like the silk I carried was protecting me.

This subtle awareness made me wonder…

How far our explorations and discoveries bring us when we allow it? If not for allowing, would I be seeking softness in the dreich Scottish weather, or looking for orange in the wintry Edinburgh? The natural textiles embodied healing frequencies woven into their very fibers. It was magical, and it found me when I surrendered to the flow of my journey.

And just now, while searching for the picture I took the night of the train journey to Edinburgh, I realized that the doors that had called me back three times were yellow and red—the very colors that create orange. Once we are in a flow, life keeps revealing its magic to us.