The Napkin Project: creativity, craft and dementia – in pictures

Artist Deirdre Nelson with one of the dementia care home residents
Photograph: Jim Wileman

Nelson's work was to stimulate the creativity of people living in the new care home and to explore ideas about the meaning of 'home'
Photograph: Jim Wileman

What Nelson noticed was how important fabric was to the residents; some would spend hours smoothing a napkin, touching its edges or perhaps folding and refolding it
Photograph: Jim Wileman

More than 120 embroidered napkins have been presented to Brunelcare's Saffron Gardens dementia care home, empowering residents in the process
Photograph: Jim Wileman

The project has involved generations of families sharing their sewing skills, workplace colleagues spending lunch breaks stitching, and a whole host of others using their creativity to help people with dementia
Photograph: Jim Wileman

The napkins have instantly become a hit; residents hold them, stroke them, talk about the imagery on them, select a favourite and take it back to their room
Photograph: Jim Wileman

Residents are also encouraged to get creative themselves
Photograph: Jim Wileman

Relatives, visitors and staff can use the napkins to spark conversation and share memories
Photograph: Jim Wileman

Lin Feist, manager of Saffron Gardens, said the napkins have become a tool for reminiscing: 'The napkins can mean so many things to different people and evoke very different emotions'
Photograph: Jim Wileman

By gifting the napkins, people are helping to bring additional creativity and fun into the care home
Photograph: Jim Wileman

The Napkin Project has been so successful that it's being extended
Photograph: Jim Wileman

Those involved in the project hope it will grow to a national level, perhaps becoming used in other care homes and wider care settings
Photograph: Jim Wileman