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
Contact Mary
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
Contact Mary
September 13, 2011
The following article is by Anne Gomes, who generously offered to write up some tips on using flat silk to share with you. (Thank you, Anne!) If you’ve ever worked with Japanese silk thread, you know that it can be quite difficult to get used to! Anne’s tips will come in handy if you ever want to venture into the world of flat silk threads. The tips are great for working with any flat (untwisted) filament silk, whether Japanese silk or not!
September 12, 2011
Well, you asked for it. You didn’t ALL ask for it, but some of you did! Remember last week when I mentioned my workroom, where I do most of my needlework?
I received quite a bit of feedback and quite a few questions. I thought I’d show you a “reality” picture – pretty much what things look like at the end of a day.
September 10, 2011
Art museums always fascinate me. My favorite part of any art museum is the galleries of paintings. Oh, sure, it’s nice to see artifacts and sculpture and so forth, but I really love looking at paintings. One thing I always look for in paintings is textiles. To me, there’s nothing more amazing than an artist’s rendition of embroidered clothing, fine lace, and so forth.
Often, when I’m squizzing around the internet looking for inspiration, I end up in online art galleries. Besides making note of art that features textiles, I find myself looking at color palettes. Looking at the colors that the masters have used in their work can be an interesting lesson in color, and with technology today, it’s pretty easy to extract color palettes from an image.
September 9, 2011
A little background, so you can see where I’m coming from: felt is used to pad goldwork. That is, it’s cut into the shape of whatever area is being filled with goldwork threads, sewn onto the ground fabric, and then the goldwork threads are worked on top of it. Using felt accomplishes a few things: 1. it lifts the goldwork a little bit; 2. it “fills” the background behind the goldwork with yellow, so that the ground fabric doesn’t peek through; 3. it gives the goldwork some shape and a cushion.
My favorite felt for padding goldwork is wool felt, but it’s not always easily available in gold or yellow. If I want it, I usually have to special order it online. So I often use craft felt that comes off a bolt, and it suffices. Bolted felt (the stuff you buy by the yard at the fabric store) is much firmer than the craft felt squares that you can buy for a few cents.
When padding goldwork with felt, you have to transfer your design onto your ground fabric and also onto the felt, because you want to be able to cut the exact same shapes from the felt. There are several ways to transfer a design onto felt in order to cut it for goldwork use, and one of them is prick and pounce.
September 8, 2011
A few days ago, I mentioned that I love old needlework books, and that I’ve been reading through a few lately. This is a self-inflicted program of study, of sorts. There are things I want to know, and I suspect I will find out these things in old books.
This particular collection of old books that I’m currently reading through came about shortly after reviewing Early 20th Century Embroidery Techniques, by Gail Marsh. If you haven’t read this book yet, I highly & enthusiastically recommend it! Even if the style of embroidery isn’t “you,” there’s a lot to learn in those pages, about the work (the real work!) of keeping embroidery alive. It’s really a good book, and an interesting social commentary.
September 7, 2011
At the beginning of this past summer, I took on a student. Just one student. We met all summer long, twice a week, for about an hour (sometimes an hour and a half) at a time. Her goal is to learn how to do specific elements of goldwork, to use in ecclesiastical embroidery. To this end, she wanted to work on real projects that, in the end (provided they ended successfully), could be usable.
Beyond the most basic embroidery (chain stitch, backstitch), she hasn’t really ever done any surface embroidery as an adult. As a child in South Africa (where she grew up) she learned the basics in school. She does have some really well-honed sewing skills, though, including hand-sewing skills, so she’s pretty adept with a needle. Throughout the summer, we covered the groundwork.
September 6, 2011
I’m drudging up a ghost from the past here! I really do want to finish the Fan Flower Monogram Alphabet – it’s been on my List of Things to Do for the past year or more!
As autumn rolls around and I start looking ahead at other embroidery projects that I’d like to accomplish in the next year, the Monogram keeps popping up in my head. I love the look of monograms, whether they are the single monogram, or the entwined double monogram (is that an oxymoron?) or triple monogram. I often wonder if other people like monograms – they seem to be popular for some things, but do you reckon they still have a popular spot in the embroiderer’s repertoire? Is embroidering beautiful monograms something that entices you? What do people think of monograms these days? These are the questions I was pondering when I remembered this unfinished alphabet.
So, I’m tying up a loose end!
Here’s the N in the Fan Flower Monogram alphabet:
