In and Out of Lockdown

Finished in January 2022 for the Embroiderers’ Guild competition. I’ve finally had a moment to write about it. I’m on holiday, at home this week, catching up on craft things, trying to kickstart the old or is it the new me? To be decided…

As ever with EG competitions, the size of the work is restricted to 30cm x 30 cm. Probably just as well as the stitching was intricate; the whole cloth covered. There was still space for my patched and pieced frame. The bandstand is edged with silver threads. I did an online class in Goldwork with the talented and inspirational, Hanny Newton during lockdown, so a little nod to that.

In & Out of Lockdown: Seasons Blur

I wrote a poem of sorts to summarise the inspiration:

Seasons Blur
Time passed so fast,
Unremarkably.
Morrab bandstand a monument of home
Stitched in my
Imagination
For peace and pleasure.

Some steps in the process:

Rusting structure

This small weaving was inspired by a photograph taken at Rew Down. I think the rusted structure is detritus left over from the war. Somehow it just fits into the natural environment. It was woven on my homemade pin loom using all sorts of wool, choosing colour above anything else. There’s even a bit of silver thread mixed in with the blue/grey. Attempting to add a bit of stitch to my weaving, I machined into some areas, as well as adding a few woolly French knots. I’m not sure that the machining added anything to the piece, but the knots did. It was just something I had to try!

A few of my favourite things

I thought I would support the Embroiderer’s Guild call for entries of pieces reflecting my ‘favourite things’. Looking back at my photographs, I think I’d planned to start this quite some time ago. However, I didn’t. I started with less than 2 months to complete it. For me, that leads to a sense of urgency; planning, preparing and making a 30cm x 30cm piece for public consumption.

The piece is an interpretation of 3 of my favourite things: a Chinese cockerel ornament, a Japanese friendship plant and a small painting by Susie Prangnell, a local artist. It uses my favourite techniques too; working on rug canvas with free-style hand embroidery and applique, machine-made cords and a machined patched and pieced border.

Struggling to take a nice photo in the winter gloom!

Repurposing

The market at the top of Causeway Head in Penzance, always yields something of interest. On the last visit I purchased an old framed embroidery which was looking rather worse for wear in the £1.00 section. I didn’t really know what I was going to do with it and then a flash of inspiration came to me as my husband handed me yet another pair of jeans for the rag pile.

I cut the image from the frame – it was very snug and beautifully laced on the back – a needle even fell out. The colours of the threads were much brighter too, so it was lovely to see.

I decided that it suited the colour of the old denim and so I set to work trying to remember how to approach a ‘log cabin’. Possibly should have sampled first!

My old City & Guilds sample came in handy. I decided not to be too adventurous on making the cushion and followed a nice video from Women’s Weekly .Who knew they had handy sewing videos free to watch online? On the back, I used scraps left over from making a dress – lovely big red roses!

Tumulus stitch sample

A desire to stitch rather than weave, I used my Rew Down inspiration, but the colours came from an automatic drawing that I made after the visit. Made a few months ago, I can’t stop picking it up. I backed it in felt and it just feels sturdy and tactile. I’ve thought about making it bigger but I’m not sure that it will feel as perfect! I would guess its about A5 size. It incorporates stitch, needle weaving, applique and machine wrapped cords. I wanted some small patches of colour around the bottom edge of the circle and I experimented with machine zig-zag over the applique. It worked really nicely.

Merry Christmas

Wishing you a very Merry Christmas and New Year full of warmth and creativity!

Cow Parsley Quilt

You may remember that I attended a Textile Tales workshop earlier this year which rekindled my enthusiasm for printing. Well, I was tidying my pile and decided that I would work spontaneously and incorporate one of my experimental monoprints into a piece of work. I love the cow parsley print so it was a good starting point. The composition seemed to want to be machine stitched. The spontaneity, however, resulted in some mixed ideas for piecing it together. I started with curved lines to hold the fabrics in place, then decided it needed curls to bring it all together, but they seemed to be at odds with each other. I like the uneven bottom, but the uneven top was difficult to work with and I really must learn that there is a time and place for uneven edges and the top of a hanging isn’t one of them. The addition of the organza ‘shadow’ behind is okay, but again, spontaneity wasn’t my friend.  I think it should have been longer and gone around the pole. The cord (made with my special cordwinder machine) is okay, but works its way in to squeeze the top of the fabric. I did like using some worn and favourite fabrics, even going back to my childhood and I enjoyed working onto wadding. I don’t often think to do this, but I like the added texture it gives.

Why I am sharing this with you? I need to say out loud that a basic plan goes along way towards achieving perfection! There, that’s my lesson of 2017 which I will pay attention to in 2018. Return to artist research, experimentation, samples, consideration of hanging mechanism! Back to the City & Guilds files for me!

 

Happy Advent!

I like to make my Christmas cards and I wanted to get ahead of the game this year and stitch something ready to transform into a card. Lacking inspiration, I went on to search Pinterest. Only when I let myself get side-tracked did I find something inspirational – the work of Jackie Cardy, a mix of quirky handmade felt, velvet and machine embroidery. Her work looked so bright and tactile, so I thought I would experiment along similar lines. I already had some handmade felt and knew there was some velvet in the scrap box. This Christmas tree was the first experiment. It was such a pleasure to stitch – no need for a frame, you could just hold it and move it easily through the machine; some straight lines with the presser foot and then some free machine embroidery for the curls.  The following weekend I raided the scrap box again and made a winter house scene. I used wool fabric, for the background, furnishing velvet for the house – which I have to say was hard to get the stitches to show up on as it was so thick – handmade felt for the bushes and I decided to back it with a layer of woollen blanket to make a more sturdy decoration.  I remembered feeling inspired by an artist at the 2016 Knitting and Stitching Show who had made beautiful large flowing pieces stitched into blankets. Then, by coincidence, I noticed in Embroidery magazine this month a small piece of work by Michala Gyetvai – the same person, I think! I’m going to enjoy doing some artist research over Christmas, I feel even more experiments coming on for 2018.