Experimental Goldwork with Elnaz Yazdani

Elnaz Yazdani is an embroidery artist, gardener and educator based in Yorkshire. Her practice is dedicated to sharing textile skills and championing embroidery as a contemporary art form, with a particular interest in its role in community wellbeing.Elnaz has taught embroidery extensively across primary, secondary and higher education, as well as within community groups and organisations. In 2020, she was commended for the Embroiderers’ Guild Teaching Excellence Award and became an Embroiderers’ Guild Scholar following the successful launch of her virtual embroidery school, Embroider Your Future.In 2025, Elnaz was awarded a Master of Arts by Research for her programme of work, Rethinking Embroidery: Connecting, Embellishing and Transforming Communities Through Embroidery.Her practice explores ways of reinterpreting traditional embroidery techniques through the use of unusual and unexpected materials. Inspired by industrial materials and the natural world, she uses stitch to embellish, connect and transform materials, creating new surfaces and forms.Alongside her artistic practice, Elnaz explores the combined use of embroidery and gardening as tools for social prescribing, bringing communities together through stitch, making and plants. She has exhibited her embroidery work since graduating with a BA from Manchester School of Art in 2014 and continues to work across teaching, commissions, exhibitions and collaborative projects.