Reverse Stitching

Thank you for your lovely comments about the first petal. As Sue said, in Japanese Embroidery, removing stitches or beads is called reverse stitching. In Phases I-X we learn 46 techniques (47 if you count reverse stitching), which ever technique you are taught first, reverse stitch is always the second technique you learn (and the one you practice most).

I think it is true that we are our own worst critics. I also think that we know when we have done that we can and when we could do better. I truly thought that I had not done this petal to the best of my ability.

There were four things that I felt could be improved.

The gold beads that mark the central vein on each petal were worked first. When I worked the other beads around them, their postition looked completely at odds with the rest of the petal. I reverse stitched those.

As I said in my previous post, the angle of some of the stitches and the blending of the colours was not pleasing to me. I reverse stitched those.

Although I was quite pleased with the outer row of beads, they did not sit over the padding as comfortably as they could, I thought this might be because the padding beads were a little too close to the edge of the petal. To reposition the padding, I had to reverse stitch the outer row of beads.

In other words, I reverse stitched everything except for the lovely swarovski beads in the center. There was a surprising amount of stitching holding all of these beads in place and it was quite a complex operation to remove it all ovwithout damaging the fabric. It took me er an hour to do.

First, I redid the the padding beads. I think I may have moved them in a little too far, but the outer edge of the petal now rises in a gentler curve than previously. When reworking the remaining beads I paid much more attention to the direction of the stitchs and colour blending. I also used blue thread to stitch the dark and mid blue beads. I wanted to enrich the colour of these beads to give greater contrast with the paler beads, which I stitched with white thread.

© JEC/Carol-Anne Conway

I think that the differences between this petal and the original one are subtle but I am much happier with it. I think it was worth spending time redoing it.

© JEC/Carol-Anne Conway

Happy Stitching.