A Tapestry looks very different from the front and from the back. The side that is shown to the world is clean, crisp and coherent - a beautiful, polished image or pattern. Turn the tapestry over however and you will discover a complex network of intertwining threads, a series of loose ends and unfinished aspects knotted into its background. 
With tapestry work, you can't have one without the other; the big picture could not exist without its messy underbelly. A tapestry's beauty not only rests, but is reliant upon the challenging, often messy work that is going on under its surface. In this I see parallels between tapestries and our own FE/ post-16 sector. We are a myriad of different settings, people and approaches, who collectively create (what are often) 'second chance' spaces for learners who are (by necessity or by design) taking a more scenic educational route.
There's no denying that as a sector we are messy - we've had stops and starts, loose ends and tangles. We are the frayed edges of the education sector, chronically underfunded and consistently underappreciated. But in what could be deemed to be our fragility, is also our creative unleashing; our messiness enables us to flex and mould for learners so they can find their fit. The 'good side' of our sector is in the choices that we are able to offer and the care, respect and understanding threads through our work. It is in this that we shine brightest for learners, especially for those who have struggled or felt marginalised within other educational spaces.

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