Researching for my novel Pearl of Pit Lane I spent the day at Beamish Museum on a clippy mat workshop. And if you're wondering what a clippy mat is, it's also known as a proggy mat or a rag rug. The BBC puts it like this: Proggy mats were a common sight in working-class homes in the North East of England until the mid-20th Century. Made from old sacks and recycled fabric they were an economical option to keep feet warm and toasty in an era before fitted carpets were the norm. I remember my grandma had proggy mats in her house and I also remember her making them, but I was never interested back then in learning how to make my own. As Ione of my characters in my novel makes proggy mats, I could have read about how to make them or even watched on YouTube, I wanted to discover for myself what the process felt like, smelt like, sounded like. And so I booked myself on to a workshop at Beamish Museum, a place I love to visit. There were six of us on the proggy mat workshop...
