The pages of my first little ''artist book'' are filling up slowly. Slowly is good, I'm in no rush. I will call these pages ''considered''.....I would guess there are around another six ''sides'' to fill. It won't happen quickly.
The response to my ''cabbages'' yesterday was amazing! Thank you. You inspired me to make more last night.
This morning I got a wonderful surprise.....a delivery of beautiful flowers. Each flower head was wrapped individually....wow, such attention to detail. I love them, thank you.
Little fastenings, little adornments for the next pocket. They will sit on the silk velvet when the pocket surface is embellished completely, when the other things I have planned for it are added. I'm aware these look like little cabbages....I like cabbages, they are layered, they have natural pockets, what's not to love about a cabbage?
There are five of these. They took an extraordinary amount of time to make, you wouldn't believe me if I told you. Despite that fact I want to make more. I have a love for the time consuming and fiddly......but I guess you knew that already.
So this is what's happening in embroidery school, as well as the paper piece you saw here. Cloth is our main focus and this piece is the first sample of what I hope will be many. They are just that, samples. Surfaces of pieced cloth embellished with stitch samples and technique samples. New to this piece are a tiny hand stitched buttonhole and a little pocket which has a button with a loop closure.
Videos for our next lesson were made this morning and next time you see this it will look different again....add a little something here and there and these pieces transform and grow quickly feeding ideas for more pieces, more sampling and further along the line finished pieces of work.
White silk Dupion, Ivory silk velvet, gimp wrapping and bullion knots....the start of another little pocket. I have laid two hankies at the side of this, they are auditioning to be part of the decorative and embroidered surface. I think they pass with flying colours.
This afternoon I will play with hankie placement, cut off a few of these hankie corners and move them around on here. I will keep you posted.
A beaded back with a hankie and toggle embellishment in the lining.....the little pocket is finished. It didn't take that long really, all things considered. I am tempted to make another one, not the same of course and besides...I'm not sure how many hankies I can lay my hands on. I feel a hunt through my stash coming on.....
We are working with paper in embroidery school, a slight diversion from our sampling with cloth and thread. There is thread, there are even little snippets of cloth but paper surfaces are the main focus of this exercise. We've introduced tiny bits of silver too.......a completely different surface to paper and cloth. This will be a slow burner, we are back to embroidery on cloth in the next lesson. There's nothing wrong with having a little paper distraction piece lurking in the background though.
A few of you have asked about these boxes from yesterday.
They are from Ted Baker. I have only ever seen them at Christmas and they come filled with shower gel, hand lotion, lip balm and other toiletries. The pink one was purchased half price in this years post Christmas sale, the other one was bought half price last year. In all honesty I buy them purely for the box. I do use the products but they are stacking up! I won't need to buy any shower gel for quite some time.
A few images today taken over the last few days. It's good t record your time in photographs. You get to see how much or even how little you have achieved over a period of time. You will be familiar with everything in these images i think....maybe you haven't seen the boxes before but I'm pretty sure you have seen everything else....
The silk velvet strip, leave it plain or embellish? I went with embellish. I guess you knew I would. Seven toggles, all hand made using rolled cloth, a few slip stitches and little coloured beads. This surface is now finished. I've settled on this being a pocket, now I have to put the reverse together and think about the lining. There will hopefully be hankies involved in both those pieces....now I need to raid my stash.
(I forgot to mention....there's a little embroidered button under one of the hankie edges too. You can see that in the second image)
Some of these images are similar but I just couldn't decide which ones to leave out....it looks so pretty on camera. It looks pretty in real life too but somehow the photography allows it to sparkle more brightly. This is the silk piece from yesterday, the piece with the beaded silk velvet edges. Adding three folded and stitched hankie corners has transformed it I think. Across the top of the largest hankie corner I have added another row of bullion knots with brightly coloured French knots and there's a tiny run of little flower embellishments alongside that section which are more clearly visible in the second image.
This piece makes me smile, makes me happy. Liza doesn't think the velvet section needs any embellishment,
It's a bit of this and that today. There's a tiny scrap which came away from a larger piece but has now been transformed into a page for a new artist book and there's a new piece in progress. I'm not sure what the new piece will be yet. I started it to satisfy a craving I had to stitch beaded loops onto silk velvet. Who knows where these cravings come from or why we are compelled....
The artist book is some way from being finished. There may only be a dozen or so tiny pages but what to put on each of those pages requires me to stretch my imagination and ponder for what seems like forever so please don't hold your breath for that to be finished. I'm hoping to make six of those....no pressure then. I'm not going to push it though. If I make six then great, if I don't then no problem.
We are making beaded loops, sample cloths and wonderful things with paper, collage and stitch in embroidery school. It's not too late to join us and you get to keep the videos forever, yes....and ever...so there's no rush to make anything at all, you can merely sit at the back, drink tea, eat cake and watch. You can read more here....
I'm making good progress with this work, with these 7 inch embroidered squares for a new cloth book of embroidery. The paper piece featured in my last post and I...
