Needlework Nibbles

I have been following The Embroiderer’s Story for sometime now. In addition to the beautiful embroidery, the blog is a full of information about the history, materials and stitches of 16th century embroidery. Now there is a newsletter to provide even more information about techniques and materials of this period.

The topic of the first edition, published in May, was gold threads. Some of the threads are familiar to me, but Tricia introduced a new thread that she has developed together with Benton and Johnson - Gilt Tambour Special. The thread is supple with little over twist so it can be stitched with rather than couched.

Tricia has designed a range of taster kits to give stitchers an opportunity to try out the techniques and materials discussed in each newsletter. The first kit features Gilt Special Tambour.

'Strawberry Gobelin Fob' has a small strawberry motif worked in queen stitch. I have never encountered queen stitch before and had to look it up. Each queen stitch consists of 4 vertical stitches that wach start in the top center hole and finish in the bottom center hole and is couched in the middle to form a filled diamond shape. In this design the stitch is worked over 4 threads horizontally and vertically. I found it a very fiddly stitch to work, especially at this scale.

© Thistle Threads/Carol-Anne Conway

The motif is stitched in one strand of Au Ver a Soie Paris. This is the first time I have worked with this thread and found it a total joy to stitch with. Mary Corbit did a comparison of twisted silk threads, including Soie Paris on Needle'nThread.

© Thistle Threads/Carol-Anne Conway

The background is stitched in gobelin stitch using Gilt Special Tambour. An other new thread and another new stitch for me. I'll let you know how it goes.

Happy Stitching

Crisis at the Embroiderers' Guild

The Embroiderers' Guild was founded in 1906 by sixteen former students of the Royal School of Art Needlework to represent the interests of embroidery. The aims and objectives of the Guild

"To promote and encourage the art of embroidery and related crafts and encourage the creation of fine articles incorporating the use of or associated with embroidery.
To educate the public in the history and art of embroidery and to undertake or support research in that subject and to publish the useful results of that research.
To collect, document, preserve, exhibit and interpret, examples of fine embroidery which are of historical or educational merit and to make available to the public such articles."

In 1924 HM Queen Mary became the Guild's first Royal Patron. Most recently HRH the Duchess of Gloucester graciously became the Guild's Royal Patron in 2005, following the death of HRH the Princess Alice in October 2004. On 8th May 1964 the Guild became a Registered Charity and in 1986 Registered Museum Status was achieved in recognition of the standard of management applied to its collection embroideries. The collection is of national significance as a resource for artists and students. It consists of over 11,000 world embroideries dating from the Coptic period to the present day, and includes a major collection of British embroidery.

The Guild also has a collection of over 2,500 titles including 600 reference books available to both Embroiderers' Guild Members and the public within the library and 2,000 loan books (temporarily suspended) which provide a rich source of research material for students and members.

In 2006, a century after its founding, the Guild had over 25,000 Members and subscribers throughout the world, 236 Branches and 85 Young Embroiderers Groups for young Members aged between 5 - 18 years.

Today the Embroiderers' Guild is in crisis.

For the past 25 years the Embroiderers' Guild has been located in apartments at Hampton Court Palace, Surrey. In recent years great effort and resource was dedicated to establishing a National Embroidery and Textile Centre but following an exhaustive review of the proposed NET Centre, the Trustees established that the project posed an unacceptable risk to the long-term future of the Guild and decided to withdraw project. Vast sums of money gathered by years of fund raising were lost. The Embroiderers' Guild licence at Hampton Court is due to expire imminently. The Embroiderers' Guild, its collection and its library face the very real prospect of becoming homeless by the end of this year.

Given the current economic situation, is the fate of a charity concerned entirely with embroidery and textiles significant?

Does all responsibility for preserving such a collection and resource lay in the hand of the membership, or is it of sufficient social and historical value that Government or the likes of the Heritage Lottery Fund should assist in it's preservation?

Is there an historical building, themselves struggling to survive, that might benefit from a partnership with the Guild? How do we find them?

Becalmed

I seem to have hit the stitching doldrums! I have several things that I would like to get started on but can’t make up my mind which to do first, so I find myself becalmed.

I am still working on my JEB Phase II. Kind of ironic that it is called Calm Flow! Some time ago, I set myself a goal of doing a little stitching before leaving for work. There are some mornings when I simply do not have time and a few times I have lapsed but by and large I have maintained this regime. Most days I only manage about 10 minutes but by doing this I am making slow but steady progress.

A couple of weeks ago I reached a turning point. Literally! The design lies roughly on the diagonal and I began working from the center of the design towards the bottom right hand corner. When I had completed all the couching in this segment, I need to rotate the frame so that I could comfortably work on the remaining segment, again from the center out.

© JEC/Carol-Anne Conway

The gaps in the design will be filled using a different technique. For now I am just enjoying the calm flow of couching strung beads on gently curving lines while I wait for a fair wind to fill my sails so I can set sail on a new stitching adventure.

© JEC/Carol-Anne Conway

Happy Stitching

Travelling Book - Networks to Enrich

I always enjoy the workshops offered by the Oxford branch of the Embroiderers’ Guild. For me they are a day when I can totally immerse myself in stitching without thinking I should just peg out the washing or prepare lunch; a day in the company of talented and enthusiastic needle women and an opportunity to learn something new. Whatever the main focus of the workshop, I always learn something new, a technique, a stitch, a product or simply a handy little tip. For this reason I try to do as many of the workshops as possible, even if I think it is a technique that have done before.

I was not at all certain what we would be doing at the April workshop entitled Networks to Enrich but it was the first course that I book when I saw the schedule for this year. Why? Because it was taught by Jan Beaney and I had heard so many good things about her classes. Following her Branch talk in March I was even more keen to spend a day in her company.

Jan was every bit as energetic, enthusiastic and encouraging as I had imagined. She did not stop delivering information and inspiration from before the class was scheduled to begin to long after it was due to finish and if we had not had to vacate the hall, I swear she would have gone on and on. The technique we learnt was simple enough - sandwiching a network of threads water-soluble products before hand stitching (or machine stitching if preferred) through all the layers to tie the grid together and then embellish with decorative stitches and beads or anything you liked before dissolving away the film.


The real lesson was in thinking about a source and translating that into a concept, then developing the design and really working it through. All things that I find quite intimidating but Jan’s is so enthusiastic, so encouraging that you can’t help but get caught up in it. The entire day, Jan went around the group, looking at were you were doing, talking through what else you might do or try, and demonstrating stitches. Jan really made me feel my little piece of work was wonderful and worth taking further. Listening to how she spoke to the rest of the class, I think everyone must have felt the same way about her own work. I have never felt so encouraged by a tutor as I did that day.

I used a variety of threads including knitting threads. I tied the intersections with French knots and sorbello stitch and enhanced them with an assortment of beads. I strengthen the border with a blanket stitch.


Happpy Stitching

Guest Speaker, Maggie Grey

The excellent Maggie Grey rounded off a wonderful year of speakers. I have been following MagStitch since day one and was really looking forward to hearing her talk. I was not disappointed. The talk was entitled 'Old Walls and Painted Halls' but honestly I think Maggie could have inspired and entertained us just talking about dust bunnies!

The talk was well illustrated by a slide and video show delivered by Maggie's husband, Clive. In fact the talk and pictures were so well coordinated that you could have forgotten Clive was even there but for the occasional banter between husband and wife. The slide show began in Port Merion and took us on a tour of holiday destinations and the buildings, art and architecture that has inspired Maggie's work. Intermingled with these were pictures of the sketches, preliminary samples, intermediate and finished pieces. What impressed me most was that this was not a 'this is what I have made' talk but a 'this is how I made this' talk. Throughout Maggie explained at length the materials and techniques used. I came away with a head full of InkAid, transfer paints, soluble paper and embellishing machines.

Throughout this year we have had a program of interesting, inspiring and entertaining speakers. Maggie ticked all the boxes with an enthusiasm that cannot fail to inspire you.

Happy Stitching

More is less

I always look forward to the longer days, thinking that more hours of daylight will afford me more stitching time. In fact, the opposite is more often the case, the main reasons being my garden and a partner who cannot bear to be indoors while the sun is shining. Phase II of the Japanese bead embroidery is claiming the lion's share what stitching time I do have - I seem to be suffering from a bad dose of bead lust! Bead embroidery is sloooooooow and at the moment, one photograph is not very different from the last.

© JEC/Carol-Anne Conway

© JEC/Carol-Anne Conway

© JEC/Carol-Anne Conway

A discussion on the Embroiderer’s Guild forum about making stumpwork into a book reminded me of this little book that I made at a workshop with Heath Power in 2004.


The fan-folds on the bound edge allow expansion room between the pages. Great for embroidery with a raised surface.


Happy Stitching

Japanese Bead Embroidery, Phase II

Two weeks ago I attended a Japanese Beading class to learn the techniques used in Phase II. The Phase II design is a folio entirely covered with just two shades of bead, jet-black and pewter. The beads are tri-cuts that reflect the light beautifully and they are arranged either in flowing lines or as random seeding to maximise the effect. The design is called ‘Calm Flow’.

The guidelines are printed onto the background fabric, black polyester satin that I laced onto a Japanese embroidery frame in the usual manner. The design of Japanese frames allows you to make the fabric drum tight which gives a lovely surface for stitching. After tensioning the fabric, the printed design can distort slightly so I stitched around a template cut from the master design to create a true outline.

© JEC/Carol-Anne Conway

© JEC/Carol-Anne Conway

I first outlined the folio with a double row of black beads. Most, but not all of the guidelines indicate the position of a line of pewter beads.

© JEC/Carol-Anne Conway

The beads are threaded onto a double strand of polycotton and wound onto a pair of koma.

© JEC/Carol-Anne Conway

The beads are attached by couching over the thread every other bead. This method gives a smooth line of beads.

© JEC/Carol-Anne Conway

I apologize for the poor quality of the photographs. I have heard others say that it is difficult to get a good photograph of beads, especially black ones. I experienced the same difficult!

Happy stitching.