Flower Power

I was undecided whether to do the padded leaves and paisley outlines next or the patterned central motifs.

© JEC/Carol-Anne Conway

In the end, I decided to leave the most raised and padded elements to last.

© JEC/Carol-Anne Conway

Although it was the swirling gold lines that attracted me to this fabric, I think these are the elements that bring the design to life.

© JEC/Carol-Anne Conway

I kept the background of these motifs very simple so as not to detract from the floral designs.

© JEC/Carol-Anne Conway

Happy Stitching

Quiet Spots

At first glance it might appear that there is no difference between the pictures on my previous post and those on this post. The centres of the main motifs are, in my view, the stars of the show. There are a few small motifs that are supporting cast. They are, however, integral to the overall design. I see them as quiet spots where the eye can rest a while before moving onto the next highlight.

© JEC/Carol-Anne Conway

I have used subdued colours so that these areas are subtly different from the background but do not compete with the main motifs for attention.

© JEC/Carol-Anne Conway

Surprisingly, these areas took 11 hours to bead.

Happy Stitching

Sowing the Seeds

Seeding the back ground was the last thing I did on side one. I would have liked to do that first on side two but in Japanese embroidery you always work the foreground first. I needed to complete enough of each motif to establish their boundaries before starting on the back ground.

© JEC/Carol-Anne Conway

The first time I did a seeded background the random aspect of seed stitch freaked me out but I have come to enjoy this technique and find it quite relaxing now.

© JEC/Carol-Anne Conway

The seeding took 6 hours and 45 minutes.

© JEC/Carol-Anne Conway

Happy Stitching

Feathering my Motifs

On side one I tended to start with the inside of each motif, picking out the features I wanted to accentuate and then working outwards leaving the 'feathery' bits to last.

© JEC/Carol-Anne Conway

On side two I planned to work things more or less in reverse order so when I had completed as many of the gold outlines as I could, I started on the 'feathery' bits.

© JEC/Carol-Anne Conway

For no other reason than it pleased me to do it that way, I worked all of the red/pink feathers first ...

© JEC/Carol-Anne Conway

... and when they were done, went back and worked all of the green feathers.

© JEC/Carol-Anne Conway

The feathers took 12 hours to complete.

© JEC/Carol-Anne Conway

Happy Stitching

Ding, Ding. Round Two

When I last wrote about Pouchette I had nearly completed side one and had only the seeding on half the background remaining. It did not take me very long to complete that. With a bag that has the same design on both sides, I find it a little bit difficult to motivate myself to do the second side. To avoid this, when I stitched Phase IV I worked on both sides simultaneously. With Pouchette, because I was working out my own stitching plan, I did not want to work that way. Wanting to finish this project provided a lot of motivation for doing side two but I still experienced that "Hooray, I’ve finished - oh, wait! I have the other side still to do!" feeling. I looked for a way to make it fresh for myself.

On side one I had stitched one motif at a time. On side two I planned to work on the whole design at the same time.

© JEC/Carol-Anne Conway

I like the way the gold lines flow through the design and from the beginning I intended to feature them so that is what I worked first on side two.

© JEC/Carol-Anne Conway

It took me 28 hours to couch all of the outlines.

© JEC/Carol-Anne Conway

© JEC/Carol-Anne Conway

Happy Stitching

Smalls Exchange

My Nan used to call her undergarments 'smalls'. I can assure you that this post has nothing to do with swapping knickers!

On a different on-line community that is related to an on-line course I am doing, I took part in an exchange of small embroidered, or embroidery related items.

I made a beaded needle case to give to my swap partner. I have done quite a bit of bead embroidery and done some other bead work but I have not beaded around a form in this way before. I used a pattern from "Beaded Needle Cases" by Carol Andres and Helen E Payne. I had to alter the pattern slightly because I used and different size needle case and different size beads from those stated.

© Carol Andres and Helen E Payne/Carol-Anne Conway

I made two or three false starts while I tried to work out how many beads fitted around the wooden form and how tight my tension should be. I must have made a slight error somewhere in my pattern because things did not fit exactly as I had expected.

© Carol Andres and Helen E Payne/Carol-Anne Conway

All-in-all this was a fun project once I got over the frustration of a few false starts.

Happy Stitching

Elevation Cloak Patch

In September/October last year I worked on two small projects. One was to make a 3 inch square patch to be appliquéd onto an elevation clock. Now, I don’t know exactly what an elevation cloak is. All I know is that Kimiko is a member of the Society for Creative Anachronism (SCA) and that she was to be made a Laurel (an honour and an achievement) and would be wearing the cloak for part of the ceremony. I had met Kimiko in an on-line stitching community and frankly am in awe of her knowledge and her generosity in sharing that knowledge. Many of those in the community know Kimiko are also members of SCA and would be present at the ceremony. Those of us who would not be there in person, but wanted to be there in spirit, embroidered a patch for the cloak.

My Original Stitched in Rajmahal Art Silk
© Debbie Cripps/Carol-Anne Conway

My patch is based on an embroidery I first did in 1999. It was one of three designs by Debbie Cripps published in Needlecraft magazine. Up until then I had been doing mainly needle point and cross stitch. They marked the start of my love affair with surface embroidery. They used to hang on the landing wall but have been in a cupboard for the past few years. I came across them recently and thought it would be interesting to stitch them again to see how my stitching had developed.

© Debbie Cripps/Carol-Anne Conway

I had to reduce the design so that it would fit onto the 3 by 3 inch square. The original was stitched in Rajmahal art silk which is 65% rayon, 35% silk and 100% of a nightmare to work with (but the colours are lovely and it is very shiny). This time I raided my stash for some of my most precious treasures - soie de Paris silks, Elizabethian Twist 2% gold, paillettes and seed pearls left over from the Floral Glove class.

© Debbie Cripps/Carol-Anne Conway

The design being so small it did not take very long to stitch and I really enjoyed doing it. I don’t usually like making something for the second time but so much time had passed since I made the first one that it did not feel repetitive.

© Debbie Cripps/Carol-Anne Conway

Kimiko made a border of gold thread, seed pearls and garnets to her elevation gown. I wished I had a garnet to add to the centre of the rose but Kimiko said that she would add one when she received the patch.

Happy Stitching