About

Since 2001 Australian artist Michelle Snowdon transitioned from darkroom photography to spinning yarn and dyeing natural wool fibres at the same time she began motherhood.

With a BA in Visual Arts, her creative lens enables her to design unique wearable yarns right on the spinning wheel. At the same time Lexi Boeger invited Michelle to submit some designs for her upcoming book Intertwined.

Michelle soon began teaching her creative approach in art yarn hand-spinning, dyeing and freeform crochet throughout Australia, USA and NZ.

Michelle is renown for playful handspun artisan yarn. Her one-of-a-kind wearable designs have been published in books by Lexi Boeger aka Pluckfluff and Ashley Martineau of Howtospinyarn and Neauveau.

Until recently Michelle was a proud local Australian dealer for Inwood Smith Carding tools and equipment, and continues to support customers with enquires about use and upkeep of Inwood Smith drum carders.

In the webshop you may be lucky enough to find a Wooldancer one-of-a-kind hand dyed, handspun yarn and other fibre arts supplies that Michelle has handmade through careful application of finely-tuned material knowledge, drawing from years of creative experimentation and curious exploration with natural fibres. Shop updates are carefully curated and released usually twice a year.

Browse the gallery of her yArchives, purchase a print or enrol in a workshop.

During 2020-2022 Michelle returned to study a Masters of Art Therapy degree. As a qualified Creative Arts Psychotherapist Michelle now offers textile art therapy for individuals who are keen to work alongside textile-based materials as well as other art materials in art therapy for self-discovery, and as a creative care practice. 

Weaving Wellbeing: An invitation to you from Wooldancer -

I hope you are as inspired by the multitude of possibilities that handcrafting and making with your hands brings to your inner life.

Why creative arts therapy?

Creativity enables flexible thinking, the materials and processes enable sensory and emotional regulation, which engages the rational mind to deliver problem-solving and solutions to feelings that might be difficult to explain. The creative processes offer you a channel for emotions to be released and thoughts be made sense of when in the presence of a trained therapist who has the capacity to listen, hold space for you and facilitate the process with you.

The weaving loom provides a safe place that becomes a container through which we feel safe to make sense and even talk about our inner world. As well as this, it offers new solutions so we can make sense of and discover deeper personal meaning.

I invite you to enter my Tactile Arts Therapy Studio in Blackheath NSW Australia, or make an appointment online, to experience the joy that weaving wellbeing in creative arts therapy brings.

To book an Art Therapy appointment please use the Contact Me page on this website.

Michelle Snowdon is a Blue Mountains Fibre Artist internationally and nationally acclaimed for her unique enquiry into the process of handspinning yarn. Michelle considers the art of handspinning as a deep self-expression.

Through experimental enquiry into unconventional techniques, Michelle’s handspun threads push the boundaries of how yarn is made on a humble spinning wheel.

It begins with making extraordinary yarn, expressive threads ebb & flow and loop together, creating a luxurious tactile experience for the wearer. Each yarn I spin is a one-off work of wearable art.

Hand-crafted yarn holds a story, telling threads become a metaphor for life's journey.. every inch of yarn undulates with a living rhythm to create individual expressive works, as well as functional wearable garments, beanies, & textile jewelry, gifts of pure warmth from my hands to yours.

Sustainable materials, processes and techniques are the driving-ethos behind my studio practice. Wool is sourced both locally & organically where possible from Aussie farms, Peace Silk is harvested only when the moth has completed it's full life-cycle and the dyes used are certified environmentaly friendly and heavy-metal free.