Karen Ruane

a new cloth book and a glimpse into embroidery school

Yesterday I spoke about my plans for a summer project , my plans to make a new wrapping cloth. One or two of you mentioned the ''body bag'', you have shamed me, yes. I will speak more about that tomorrow.....

Meanwhile, I am crazy busy getting ready for London (only two weeks away!!) and I am happily embroidering in ''2018 embroidery school'' and happily playing with artist books over on the 12 month artist book blog. Those three things are the reason I don't intend to begin my new wrapping cloth until Summer....they deserve all my attention and I'm having so much fun I want to 'crack on' with them, no additional distractions.

However....yesterday I needed something to play with when I was waiting for collaged paper to dry and damp stretched cloth to be ready so I began another cloth book. This one will be small, it will be tiny, no bigger than 8x8 inches. So far I have used white silk, white lace and a gentle Liberty print which I have embellished with bullion loops, buttonhole stitch, beads and sequins. Laid alongside it here are a few pieces we are working on in '2018' embroidery school'. I can't say too  much about those but you are not too late to sign up for that one or indeed the ''12 month artist book blog'' if you want to play along.

(I must say to my embroidery school group. This new cloth book isn't for class. I won't be using it for my class samples)

Related articles

stitch for artist books - Karen Ruane

early stages - Karen Ruane

French knots, gimp and sequins for London - Karen Ruane

white cloth, dotted paper - Karen Ruane

a front for a new needle case - Karen Ruane

a front for a new needle case

This came together quickly...adding the extra cutwork, hexagons and sequins. Now I'm wondering where I can add something ''dangly''. I like dangly. I'm thinking it will need to go on the inside now though. I am going to put that together this afternoon.

The little cutwork motifs appeal to me a lot here, how they rise a little and take on the appearance of little pockets....as you know I like a pocket. (and dangly things too)

This was embroidered last night after I had spent a couple of hours working on these for London. My London prep is progressing well, really well so I'm able to relax a little with that from time to time and after creating pieces for class, feeding class work, extending class work I am able work on something like this little needle case.

Now I'm off to look for something which dangles!

Related articles

early stages - Karen Ruane

sequins

As you are seeing so much of these pieces for 'London 2018' I figured I should speak a little about the process without giving too much away. There's a short video where I attach a couple of sequins and chat a little about the process involved in creating these fabric 'folders' for the upcoming workshop.

In other news.....I have been teaching myself a couple of new stitches (new to me but much used by others) for my stitch ledger which I will be working on in ''embroidery School 2018''. You can read more about that here...we start next Monday.

If you have already signed up for that I will be mailing you later today.

early stages

It's the start of a new needle case. (like I've got time to make a new needle case???) I had to. I had to do something anyway because my order of this came yesterday and it was too tempting, I had to work with it straight away.

It will have to go away for a couple of days now though....I have embroidered workshop folders to finish for London. There are stitched papers and fabric combinations to be made for the same workshop packs and I have lots of pages to embellish for the ''artist book 12 month blog''. 

There is plenty of time to do all this so long as I don't allow myself to be distracted.....famous last words.

Embroidery School 2018. Begins Monday January 15.

More information here. It's going to be amazing!

the next cloth book continued

I've addedfa little embroidery to the reverse side of this cloth book cover. There are Prairie Points peeking out from some gold silk ribbon and I have started a row of sequined bullion loops. 

(talking of bullion loops....I watched a very quick video on Instagram yesterday from a well known embroidery supply company where they were demonstrating how to stitch a bullion knot. My first observation...they didn't make them in the same way I was taught, which is perfectly ok, there's more than one way to skin a cat and all that but the second most shocking observation? They were using 6 strands of stranded cotton and they didn't separate the strands....jaw drop, shock, horror. If you have taken one of my classes you will understand my horror. Please do not take any notice of them....you know better)

Anyway, back to my cloth book cover. As you know I have been picking it up to work on in between finishing a bag for hankie class. I will most likely work on it some more this evening (the cloth book) because....drum roll....the bag is finished. I can't show you until the girls have seen it but this was my table this morning.

Embroidery School 2018, more information here.

Related articles

Embroidery School 2018 - Karen Ruane

the next cloth book - Karen Ruane

the early stages of making a cloth book - Karen Ruane

contrasting sequins

Hankies, ribbon, edges, cross stitch, web stitch, French knots.....and sequins. I've tried to create a contrast between the vibrancy of those bright pink sequins with a little subtlety from the opaque ones. It works. There's a new row of cross stitch too, tiny pink and lemon cross stitches. 

This is work in progress, stitching my fingers to the bone progress in order to finish embroidery for hankie class. We were supposed to finish last week....we didn't. Teacher is holding things up again. Once the cloth shown here is completely embroidered I will be able to finish my bag, my hankie bag. I am determined to do that before the end of this week. It won't be a rushed finish because in truth there isn't much hand work left to do. When it is finished.....it's for me. It will be a fabric storage bag with layers of lace, embroidered hankie panels and a long strap to hang it from a hook. 

2,30 pm....translucent sequins not opaque...jeez Karen.

Meanwhile.....

You can read more about that here

 

Tomorrow is paper day. I am having tummy flips about pages and torn edges over on the Artist Book subscription blog. I need some of that tummy flipping on here too I think. I need to keep it close, it's so inspiring. Torn edges and sequin edges.................there's a theme there somewhere.

Related articles

cutting up hankies - Karen Ruane

hankies and sequins and hand embroidery - Karen Ruane

a floaty layer

This piece, (the piece on the left) was put together in hankie class yesterday. Cloth was cut, pinned and basted before I started the process of stitching my fingers to the bone in order to get all the layers of my embroidered bag embellished before the end of next week. It's a big task. There is one more panel which is pinned and basted waiting to be embroidered too. 

My favourite thing about this one is the small offcut from the front edge of a vintage nightgown, it's the pointy piece lower centre with the pink sequins clearly visible in the second image. It's made with very soft fabric which is a lovely contrast against the lace and cotton which lays alongside it.

The other panel in the second image will form part of my layered bag too. All the pieces embroidered up to now will be overlaid, secured and titivated a little more before the straps are attached. I am getting there.....

Related articles

my schoolwork

Tuesday

A little bit of everything for you today, glimpses from the past week....

I bought this basket in Spain. It holds everything and anything. I need to stop taking the easy option and just dropping things into it instead of putting them away properly, in the right place.

 

I've been cutting a lot of hexagons over the past few days . These will be stitched to templates and made into ''grandmothers flower garden'' patchwork pieces for my London workshop kits.  (London is selling well...big smile here, thank you!)

 

These images were taken whilst I was making videos for ''hankie class''. There's quite a bit of this kind of thing going on here. Hankies piled high, spread across the table before being cut up and adorned.

 

I'm not sure about this one, when it was taken. It could be ''artist book'' class but there's a little bit of me that says no, it was something else. 

 

And sequins......there doesn't appear to be any shortage of these around here at the moment. These little things are fast becoming my new ''essential''.

And some videos from Instagram which you may have missed....

 

Related articles

hankies and sequins and hand embroidery - Karen Ruane

a beaded edge - Karen Ruane

London Workshop - Karen Ruane

lace cloth for sequins

Last week I made you a video about this piece of work. I spoke about how it would need extending, about how I would have to create more ''patches'' of the surface cloth to piece, to enlarge this . Yesterday I created another section of pieced silk and lace which is now ready for hand embroidery. In the video today I speak about the various stages of embellishing this fabric, referring back to the last video which you can see here. 

Today there's a short video, buttonhole lace on a seam.

 

Yesterday I had cause to look back through several of my ''old'' Flickr groups from classes I have held. If you have ever taken one of my online classes a question. Do you go back to those groups? You should. The incredible, inspiring work over there captivated me. I could have stayed for hours....do me a favour, go back, way back and take a look. What an enormous library of information and inspiration....you never fail to blow me away. 

 

hankies and sequins and hand embroidery

Progress from hankie class. One of these embroidered panels is for a needle case, the other for a layered and embellished bag. There's a lot of French knots here, a little bit of cross stitch and quite a few sequins. 

If all goes to plan our needle cases will be finished later this week, the bag will continue for the remainder of class., more embroidered panels and layers of fabric edged with lace. That's the plan anyway.

Also this week I hope to make progress with my workshop kits for London 2018, a two day embroidery class. I spoke a little about those kits here. There are a lot of hexagons to stitch for that, a lot of ''grandmothers flower garden'' motifs to put together not to mention the embellished pockets I hope to make which will hold the workshop materials. That's a lot of stitching and not a lot of time to do it in. It will be here before you know it.

Related articles

290 stitches - Karen Ruane

126 stitches for the lining - Karen Ruane