Yesterday was amazing. Yesterday was busy but in a good way........videos for both classes and most importantly, embroidery. This piece is for my ''happy cloth''. It's a long way from being finished , it will be a pocket. With that in mind I put some puffs inside it today, just to look, to play.
There will be a lot more of this going on now. Most of the sorting out is done, a place for everything and everything in its place.....Just one problem.....I just can't find any buttons???
More of my happy cloth today. I did warn you that you would be seeing this a lot from now on. This is another finished panel which will be added to the others using a decoratively stitched seam, most likely comprising bullion knots and French knots. The beads here, the puffs,, the adornments....they will be added at the very end of the making process, after the whole piece is embroidered, backed and edged with stitch.
I still have a long way to go before I get to that point which gives me lots of time to make more of these, lots more.
My table this morning was fascinating, two very different classes, three pieces of work in progress yet a seamless flow from one busy pile to the next. ''An embroiderers ledger'', still thinking about that and playing quietly, ''wrapped and bound in stitch'', making buttons and adding those to an embellished seam. That leads me to plans for later, taking inspiration from all three pieces and working more on a new piece for the first day of ''an embroiderers ledger'' before being re inspired in order to develop ideas for ''wrapped and bound in stitch''.
Now I am going to make anyone who has ever done a class with me either laugh out loud or choke but........have you ever heard of the word cohesion?
Cohesion
| synonyms: | unity, togetherness, solidarity, bond, sticking together, continuity, coherence,connection, linkage, interrelatedness |
The next artist book in progress. I began this one with the intention of making a book which would be smaller than this one and this one.....less complicated, less crammed...ha.....failed. It may be smaller in terms of page sizes but so far it is equally as crammed. What can I say, I just can't help myself.
If you have ever put something like this together you will know how unexpectedly long it takes. You wouldn't be surprised at the hours which go in to each one. Choose a page, choose a sample, said chosen sample inspires another sample which you then need to create. Samples on pages create ideas for tags, make tags, pages inspire ideas for extra touches...a thread wrap, a gimp wrap, a tiny collage and before you know it you are building an encyclopaedia. (or so you would think). I could honestly lose myself in this artist book production line. It's like dreaming the happiest of dreams about scraps, about snippets of paper, about buttons and beads and stitch. If I were stranded on a desert island I would hope to have all my worldly goods with me and I would stay there happily creating little books for the rest of my days!
There is a short, dull (blame the cloud which rolled in at the wrong moment) video about this little thing here.
Cloth, strips of silk, lace and silk velvet. This is one of the pieces I have put together to accompany my paper embroidery and is now ready to be attached to paper and mounted onto a white background. The softness of the silk velvet makes it wonderful to work with and it takes gimp beautifully, as if one was made for the other. A beaded edge has been added to this, to compliment beads present in the paper piece it will live alongside.
Meanwhile.....a couple of images which show progress with paper that I don't think you have seen before.
Surface embroidery is continuing on the silk piece which will become a drawstring bag for Clara. Clusters of French knots are being scattered across the open space and hopefully it won't take long to complete those. The last two images here give an idea of how this will look, front and back, when it's finished.
Last night I played a little more with paper. I will show you where I am up to with that tomorrow. I already have ideas for where I want to go next with the paper pieces, I feel as if I have direction which is what I hoped the play, the sampling would achieve.
I know.....it's not a silk drawstring bag like I promised you yesterday. Sorry about that. I didn't get the bag damp stretched...oops, I'm slacking.
Instead I give you a glimpse of the things crowding my head today, (and for the last million days or so it seems) What exactly do I love the most when mixed with paper? The answer is here, white fabric, white stitch, metallic silk tissue, lace, gimp and glass beads. Now all I need to do is develop my paper experiments with those little things in mind and hey presto we should have lift off. Somehow I doubt it will be that simple. It is however a good starting point.
Do you ever feel as if you want to get rid of everything, I mean samples, finished pieces, old ideas? To get rid of it all and start again, clean slate, an empty mind, no plans, no goals. Kind of be reborn into your love of cloth and embroidery and have no idea how you will express yourself creatively? Just me then? I don't know why but I have felt like that for a couple of days now......I am putting it down to a ''creative meltdown''....please tell me I am not the only one.
There aren't any problems in the embroidery department of Ruane Towers but there are plenty in the camera department. Two cameras, two non functioning cameras means photographs taken with a smart phone which whilst they may give quality in terms of detail fail on the brightness/lightness front. These have been edited in Photoshop but don't quite come up to scratch in my opinion...... I apologise. Sorry. I did my best.
So, the embroidery...silk, frocks, cutwork, gimp, a drawstring bag in progress. It needs more. I can't decide. I'm thinking. Can you hear the cogs turning?
I have been buying a lot of bright and busily patterned fabric recently. These fabrics were bought with my new class in mind where I am hoping to combine them with white, snippets of pattern and bright colours with a white background.
(you can read more about my new class here. It starts in just over one week from now)
In order to get a ''feel'' for this new cloth I spent a little time yesterday afternoon folding and unfolding it, placing it together, comparing and thinking and was suddenly compelled to make the buttons. You can never have too many buttons. If all they ever do is brighten a little corner of a shelf they will have served a good purpose.
Back to the fabrics.....the top two in the last image were bought in France from the show where I was teaching, the other three from the Festival of Quilts. Although I love them all I particularly love the depth of colour in the top two. There is a different quality to the cloth with those two and the patterning appeals more. With that in mind I ordered more yesterday. Although I bought them from France they are available online and if you are even slightly tempted you will find them here. ( I haven't been paid or rewarded for this...I am merely spreading the fabric love, distributing the temptation in order that mine is not the only bank balance with a headache)
Now I am going to find a corner of a shelf for my buttons.....
Gimp secured with bullion knots, strips of French knots, French knots seams, pockets, lace.....surface adornments on the final panel of my gingham coverlet. I mustn't forget the cutwork and applique either.....
Yesterday I went to the Festival of Quilts. Obviously I went to look at quilts however I also went to shop. I intended to buy fabric to back this gingham coverlet.....sadly I got distracted by the most exciting sewing needles I have ever bought. I couldn't resist. A little fabric did find its way home with me too but I'm keeping that for my new class. (it starts very soon!) I guess I will just have to mail order something for the back of this and I still can't decide....bright or white? Answers, suggestions very, very welcome.