Textile Research Intensives
Private, one-to-one research built around your own practice, in Berlin.
Individually developed programmes for artists, textile and surface designers, fashion and costume designers, textile anthropologists and educators. For anyone working closely with material, colour and surface.
From a single Research Day to two weeks of concentrated artist research.
These intensives are concentrated time inside a working textile research atelier, not a fixed workshop curriculum.
You work with guided technical support, experiment with materials, and have the time and space to develop your own way of working.
Why a research intensive at Atelier Māya
Atelier Māya is a working textile and colour research atelier. The intensives take place inside its ongoing research practice.
The studio holds more than a decade of material investigation: printed samples, dye tests, carved blocks, pigments, natural colour studies and experimental processes developed through fieldwork in India, Malaysia and Indonesia, alongside years of independent research and studio practice. Alongside this sits a growing reference collection of textiles, natural materials and objects connected to textile practice.
You work surrounded by this evolving atelier archive. You can pull out colour tests and compare them. A print sample from a decade ago can sit beside the one you made that morning.
Our practice sits between textile design, craft research, material experimentation and fieldwork. It is informed by traditional textile knowledge while remaining firmly experimental. We are interested in what happens when techniques are treated not as static recipes, but as living systems that can be studied, questioned and developed through contemporary practice.
The atelier is particularly focused on natural colour, block printing, resist and indigo, and on the relationships between them.
You are not coming to the atelier simply to be shown a process. You are coming to work inside an existing body of textile research and use it as a starting point for your own.
Your research can begin before you arrive
Every Artist Research Intensive begins with a paid private one-to-one consultation, online or at the atelier. We discuss your practice, your existing experience, what you are trying to discover and how much time the research needs.
The consultation is the first working session, and its fee is credited in full against the Artist Research Intensive you book.
From there, we develop a research direction for your time in the atelier: which processes are relevant, how they might connect, what materials are needed and where space for open experimentation should remain.
You are welcome to bring fabrics, samples, sketches, references, existing work or a project already in progress.
Choose your textile research experience
A Private Textile Research Day
One day, private, one-to-one or up to four
A concentrated investigation into a specific technical, material or process-based question.
Best suited to practitioners who want to understand something deeply, solve a particular problem, or begin a new direction before committing to a longer programme.
The day can focus on block printing, an introduction to resist processes, natural indigo, or indigo alongside wax and clay resist.
Research Intensive
Two to five days, private, one-to-one or up to four
Focused research across several days.
Best suited to practitioners developing technical knowledge, investigating a particular process, exploring a new material direction or working through a more complex textile question.
Some intensives move through several processes. Others remain with one material question for the entire period.
Private Artist Research Intensives
One- Week Artist Research Intensive
One week, always one-to-one
A sustained period of research for artists and practitioners developing a body of work rather than simply learning individual techniques.
Best suited to those developing a visual or material language, investigating work connected to an exhibition or collection, translating existing research into textile experiments, or pursuing a larger material enquiry.
Five guided research days plus two Slow Practice days.
Two-Week Artist Research Intensive
Two weeks, always one-to-one
An extended research period for artists and practitioners whose work requires greater depth, repetition and time to unfold.
Best suited to larger material enquiries, developing a new body of work, exhibition or collection research, or investigations that need space for testing, reflection and unexpected directions to emerge.
Nine guided research days plus three Slow Practice days.
There is no predetermined final outcome. The direction emerges through the research itself.
Working with custom blocks
If your research involves custom printing blocks, we arrange a block-development consultation before your intensive, separate from the initial research consultation and charged in addition. We review your designs, scale, repeat, line quality and technical requirements, and guide you on preparing and ordering the blocks so they are ready for your research dates.
Because blocks are carved specifically for your research, they should be commissioned well before your dates. Please allow approximately four to six weeks for carving and delivery.
Specialist fabrics and natural colour materials can also be sourced by arrangement, allowing particular materials of interest to become part of the research.
Slow Practice
Slow Practice days are built into every Artist Research Intensive. You work independently in the atelier. We are in the studio, but not guiding you.
You handle the tools, materials and processes yourself. This is the time to test, make mistakes, iterate and make the decisions through which technical knowledge becomes your own.
Textile processes are not learned simply by watching them done correctly. There is an important gap between being shown something and being able to do it unaccompanied.
Guided days give you the knowledge. Slow Practice days are where it becomes yours.
Areas of research
Your intensive is built from these areas in the combination your research needs. We focus on the questions most relevant to your practice rather than trying to cover everything at once.
Natural colour
Plant dyes, extracts, tannins, mordants, modifiers, layering and overdyeing.
Block printing
Repeat, registration, colour separation and experimental print processes.
Indigo
Vat practice, overdyeing, layering and the relationship between indigo and resist.
Pattern and surface
Rhythm, repetition, composition and a personal textile language.
Colour and textile inks
Mixing your own palettes with natural colour systems and water-based inks.
Resist
Wax, clay, stitch, fold, clamp, bound and experimental resist processes.
Custom block design
How artwork becomes a functional printing block: scale, line, repeat, carving.
Material experimentation
Combining colour, print and resist through sampling and iterative testing.
The aim is not simply to reproduce a technique.
It is to understand what a process can do and how it might become part of your own practice.
What you leave with
An intensive is not organised around producing one predetermined finished object.
- A body of samples
- Technical knowledge you can repeat
- Colour and print references
- Documentation of your experiments
- New material possibilities
- A clearer direction for your work
Sometimes the outcome is a finished textile.
Sometimes it is the discovery that changes what you make afterwards.
Continue the research
Where appropriate, your programme can be extended with Independent Studio Days. These give you additional time to continue testing and developing what emerged during the guided research while remaining within the atelier environment.
Additional guidance can also be arranged depending on the project.
Project-specific materials can be sourced through the atelier by arrangement.
Practical information
Fees
Because every programme is individually developed, fees depend on the format, length of the research and any specialist materials or custom blocks involved.
We send our recommendation and the fee together once we know what you would like to investigate.
Language
Research Intensives are held in English.
Booking
Research Intensives are scheduled around the atelier’s ongoing research and production calendar. Longer programmes are best planned well in advance.
Location
All intensives take place at Atelier Māya in Berlin, Germany. Travel and accommodation are arranged independently.
Materials
Standard research materials and access to the atelier’s working textile library are included.
Specialist fabrics, unusually large quantities, custom blocks and other project-specific materials are discussed and arranged in advance and may be charged separately.
Photography + confidentiality
Atelier Māya is a private working studio. Photography and filming inside the atelier are by agreement, with details set out as part of the booking process.
Enquire about your research
Tell us a little about your practice and what you would like to investigate.
Please include:
- Your preferred dates
- Time you would like to spend at Māya
- Your current experience
- The questions, processes or materials you would like to explore
You do not need to know which format is right for you.
We will recommend the programme that best fits your research. For Artist Research Intensives, we will also propose a time for your initial consultation.
Enquire about your research design (at) ateliermaya.eu
