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Mary Corbet

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I learned to embroider when I was a kid, when everyone was really into cross stitch (remember the '80s?). Eventually, I migrated to surface embroidery, teaching myself with whatever I could get my hands on...read more

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Reader’s Embroidery: Cleverly Combining Styles & Color

 

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A couple weeks ago, Marika sent along photos of a beautiful and cleverly designed piece she embroidered for her brother and his new fiancee. Her combination of colored embroidery and whitework is really well done! I thought you might enjoy the photos…

The piece of embroidery is a set of monograms – two S’s – for his brother and his fiancee, both of whose names begin with S. It seems that Marika’s soon-to-be sister-in-law likes her whitework, while her brother likes her colored embroidery. So Marika cleverly combined the two color options in a double monogram set.

Hand Embroidered Monograms in Whitework and Color

Using the monogram pattern for the letter S here on Needle ‘n Thread, Marika designed the piece so that the two letters were joined by a central flower combining both whitework (on the petals) and color (the center). The whitework monogram is entwined with colored flowers and the colored monogram is entwined with whitework flowers. I don’t think I would have ever thought of doing that – I think it’s really cleverly done, especially considering it’s an engagement gift.

Hand Embroidered Monograms in Whitework and Color

She worked the monograms and flowers with a split stitch outline, then filled them with long straight stitches, over which she worked satin stitch, using one strand of DMC stranded cotton for the white, and the color is worked in Chameleon Threads space dyed Soie de Paris for the colored threads. (More on this thread later – I’m intrigued by it, as I hadn’t heard of it before. Anyone? I wonder if it’s available in the US…)

Hand Embroidered Monograms in Whitework and Color

I really like the blue with the whitework flowers – I love the contrast! It reminds me of my grandmother’s Wedgewood Jasperware. Notice as well that she embroidered the date of the engagement just below the S, a very nice personal touch.

Hand Embroidered Monograms in Whitework and Color

But I think my favorite is the white S with the colored flowers. It looks light and colorful. I want to try this combination.

Congratulations on a job well done, Marika – I’m sure the happy couple will love the gift!

Thanks, Marika, for giving us a new take on combining different styles of embroidery! I think I may have to try this whitework / color combination on an oatmeal colored towel… I’ve added it to my ever growing list of things I want to do…

If you have a project you’d like to share with the rest of us, please drop me a line and I’ll send along my e-mail address to you. It’s always fun to see what the rest of the creative world is up to!

I hope you’re all having a pleasant weekend. For me, I’ve got heaps of school work to do (for my real job, I’m a high school English teacher…), so I’ll be busy with that most of the weekend. But I do plan to get in a wee bit of stitching on my Christmas ornament later tonight! Here’s hoping!

 
 

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(6) Comments

  1. Marika, not only is your design cleverly thought out, it is beautifully stitched. Altogether, a beautiful and very personal gift for your brother and his fiancée.

    Well done.

    CA

    2
  2. Hi Marika,
    Its a brilliant piece. Very well thought and also very well embroidered. It is looking just lovely !!
    Though, I just wanted to ask you , what article are you going to convert it into? Are you going to frame it?

    Mary,
    Thanks a lot for sharing it with all of us. Its really lovely.

    Love,
    Shrenika.

    4
  3. I am working on making a few letters from this alphabet (the S is one of them 🙂 ), and I think that adding some goldwork edging to the letters would look stunning.

    However, I have no idea where to start. My S is probably about the same size as the above, but I have two more letters that are about half that size too.

    Any suggestions?

    5
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