On 1 August, Lucy Sparrow will serve up her latest felt fabrication—a fully detailed hand-stitched fish and chip shop—at Mayfair’s Lyndsey Ingram Gallery. The Bourdon Street Chippy runs for six weeks, plunging visitors into a textile re-creation of Britain’s most iconic takeaway. It’s Sparrow’s second outing at the gallery, following 2021’s The Bourdon Street Chemist, and her return feels like a homecoming after years of global installations.
Since her breakout Cornershop in 2014, Sparrow has built a practice of turning mundane spaces into tactile spectacles—New York bodegas, supermarkets, even sex shops—each piece stitched with irreverent precision. Her work thrives on the tension between nostalgia and absurdity, inviting viewers into a world where the ordinary becomes uncanny.
Inside The Bourdon Street Chippy, the illusion is total: customers can order their usual Friday-night supper from a felt-clad counter, perch on hand-stitched banquettes, and study a gallery of embroidered “regulars.” Sparrow’s obsessive detailing is on full display—65,000 individual pieces, including 15 distinct chip shapes in five shades of felt. It’s part art, part theatre, wholly immersive.
Lyndsey Ingram notes: “Lucy’s work defies easy categorisation. Its performance, installation, and social commentary are all rendered in her unmistakable visual language. “Her work occupies a category of its own—art that pulls you in, asks you to play along, rather than just stand back and look.”
Sparrow admits this one hits closer to home. “I used to think I was just poking fun,” she says. “But stitching this place made me face things. Food’s never just been food for me—it’s loaded. Turns out, so is my art.”
This tightens the flow, avoids stiff constructions, and keeps the raw, conversational tone. Let me know if you’d like any further tweaks. In a way, stitching these pieces has been a kind of survival—keeping my hands busy while I work things out.”
The Bourdon Street Chippy opens on 1 August at Lyndsey Ingram Gallery, London. Expect queues—both real and felt.
Lucy Sparrow stitches the mundane into something mad. Since bursting onto the scene with her felt-covered universe, the Oxfordshire-born artist (b. 1986) has turned corner shops into textile spectacles and porn mags into plush playthings. Her London studio churns out oversized, deliberately wonky replicas—each piece radiating the same irreverence.
Her breakthrough came in 2014 with The Cornershop, a fully stocked replica of a convenience store where every product—crisps, chocolate bars, even the freezer—was made from felt. The installation drew crowds and set the tone for her later work, which often explores consumer culture and the mundane turned extraordinary.
Sparrow’s projects have since expanded globally, including 8 ‘Till Late (a Los Angeles bodega) and Sparrow’s Sex Shop (a raucous take on adult stores). She works obsessively, stitching thousands of items for each exhibition, often enlisting a small team to meet the demands of her ambitious installations.
Beyond the whimsy, there’s a meticulous craft and a subversive edge—her pieces invite viewers to question authenticity while revelling in childlike delight. Sparrow continues to push boundaries, proving that felt can be both a medium for satire and a vehicle for joy.
Lucy Sparrow Presents The Bourdon Street Chippy at Lyndsey Ingram Gallery. Public Opening: Friday, 1 August – 14 September 2025
Hours: Open Wednesday – Sunday, 11 am – 6 pm plus August Bank Holiday Monday (25 August) www.lyndseyingram.com
www.sewyoursoul.co.uk / Instagram @sewyoursoul