BLOG 412

Blog 412

 I have been sewing at Suzette’s this week so I used it as a golden opportunity to catch up on my textile luggage labels. When I first thought of this long term project, the idea was to make a label a week: I felt the small size was do-able!  How wrong was I?! To work in small scale is quite difficult and intense and often requires more time and effort than working full scale. So the idea got shelved and I stopped doing them for a while.

Then it occurred to me that I might be approaching this project from the wrong angle. I was going through a collection of half-finished projects I had in storage: experimental pieces, trial techniques and the like. They were never good enough to use for anything or even worth completing, but they were a vital part of my textile journey. So rather than make a specific label in a specific way, I decided to make labels from these existing pieces. I completed 16 in the time I was at Suzette’s! Result! Here they are with information about the techniques used. (NB they still need the final edging of a larger, closer zig zag in variegated thread to complete them)

 

             1 Free motion stitching on a prepared synthetic background with soldering iron mark making

 

 

            2 Painted background with infill surface stitching done on the WS

 

 

            3 Painted Lutrador with machine and free motion stitches

 

 

         4 Stitch on sheer fabrics with soldering

 

 

 

            5 Fused Angelina fibre surface placed on a floral rubbing with fabric crayons

 

 

          6 Stitched sampler on a dyed background

 

          7 Fabric swatch given to me by an American folk singer/quilter touring the UK

 

 

            8 Stitch and texture on felt surface

 

 

 

          9 Sample section taken from a piece created at an experimental textile workshop

 

 

          

           10 Metallic threads and sheers on wadding

 

 

 

          11Thread detail on cut-out sheers inspired by pebble pavements

 

 

 

           12 Stylised tree in free motion stitch

 

           13 Sample section cut out from a larger ‘thread painted’ picture

 

  

           

           14 Felt wool background over-laid with a layer of cut-out sheer

 

 

 

         15 Selection of yarns under stitch

 

 

             16 Traditional stained glass panel drawn and coloured in thread

 

 

 

 

BLOG 411

Blog 411

 

Another week has passed and much work has been done in the garden! We have lots of borders that need attention and there is nothing I like better than savagely cutting everything back, in the sure and certain knowledge that they will bear me no malice and come back as fresh as ever next spring! Such are the rewards of gardening. So if it is fine I am outside, if not I am in my studio enjoying colour and making steady progress. This sequence of pictures shows the steps towards the completion of the flowers and pot. .

             Palette

 

 

               Detail

 

 

              Flower

 

 

 

            Complete

 

 

At this stage I can peel my creation off the release paper in one piece and place it on my design wall for reviewing from a distance. I like what I see so far! The next stage is to make some decisions about the background so I started by trialling various large pieces of fabric to assess their effect. The first had the vague look of a paving slab; the second gave the effect of a shrub in the background. The next fabric, placed vertically, was overwhelming but looked better on the horizontal. Decisions decisions!

Background 1

           Background 2

 

 

 

           Background 3 vertical

 

 

               Background 3 horizontal

 

That said, on the wall of my studio there is another picture that I finished a couple of years ago; another vase, another bunch of flowers. On close inspection the background is composed of fused horizontal strips of fabric, like the strokes of a brush and I particularly like that painterly effect.

               Sunflowers in a vase 1

 

 

           Constructed background

 

 

And on the wall of my kitchen, there is yet another picture made ages ago of sunflowers in a vase; this time with the background made up of sewn directional squares. Seeing all three pictures together tells me that something creative is trying to get out and I am not quite sure what it is at this stage!

             Sunflowers in a vase 2

 

 

             Directional squares

 

 

 

 

BLOG 410

Blog 410

 

And so the creative meandering continues. I kept cutting up fabrics that were already prepared and I tried to fit them into the picture. The fabrics I generally prefer to use are ones with movement and depth in them, and light and dark values, because they are easier to integrate. This colourful fabric below was a bit too solid for my liking. I tried to include it but found the yellow/green section didn’t flow the way I like it to. So it was a case of ‘now you see it’, ‘now you don’t’! And this is what this method is basically all about: squinting through half-closed eyes as you work and then stepping as far away as you can to assess it from a distance. If there is something you don’t like, don’t tolerate it, remove it!

            Colourful fabric

 

 

           Now you see it

 

 

            Now you don’t

 

I continued to create pink geranium-like flowers separately on the release paper (baking parchment performs the same function).

             Flowers

 

 

 

           More flowers

 

I decided to prepare more fabrics, ones that were specific to what I was trying to create. I used 18” wide Bondaweb and cut pieces of fabric to cover the surface. Occasionally I have to fill in awkward spaces but, as long as the fabrics overlap one another, my iron is safe!! I ironed from the RS first and then turned it over and really worked the whole surface of the release paper, remembering to concentrate well on the edges and corners. If I had any trouble taking the paper off the back of the fabric, I made a small cut with a pin and it is easy to lift off after that.

             Filling in spaces

 

 

            Press RS

 

 

                Press WS

 

 

             Score with a pin

 

Once the paper had been removed, the fabrics were still joined by the Bondaweb and all I needed to do was give a small tug to separate the individual pieces. From the WS you can see the edges that didn’t have any fusible on them and these needed to be removed before using a rotary cutter to cut the fabrics in rough lines and then into smaller squares and rectangles.

             Fusible on WS

 

 

              Remove the edges

 

 

             Lines

 

 

             Rectangles

 

 

         Progress 1

 

 

           Progress 2

 

 

 

 

BLOG 409

BLOG 409

I am really happy to be able to say that I am a lot better this week and being the generous soul that I am, I have passed the cold on to my husband! He is getting better day by day and we will soon both be back to as normal as it gets around here! Feeling brighter meant that I was chomping at the bit to start a creative piece but then we had to go to Scotland to attend the funeral for one of our Gilbert Islands (now Kiribati) friends. Emily was married to Bob and, like us, they got married out in Tarawa. She died of cancer last week and the funeral was a wonderful celebration of her life with the men wearing Hawaiian shirts and the women in bright dresses. Her granddaughters performed an island dance which she had taught them and it was a colourful and sensitive send-off. It’s the way to go!

Back home, I have started to dig out my ‘painterly’ fabrics, many of which are left over from earlier projects. They already have a fusible ironed onto the WS and they have been cut into lines or squares with a fluted or pinked rotary cutter to give an uneven edge. It made my mouth water to see them which is a good start!

             Palette

 

 

I decided to ‘play’ first, just to allow myself to enjoy finding my way again with this method that I developed many years ago. This takes off any pressure to complete a proper finished piece! For inspiration, I chose one of my collection of greetings cards and isolated a terracotta tub festooned with flowers.

                Inspiration

 

 

 I started with the colours for the terracotta pot and isolated them on a tray. I drew the pot roughly with pencil on a sheet of ‘release paper’ from Bondaweb. The ready-fused fabric pieces will only stick to this paper for as long as you are working and then you can peal it off in its entirety when it is complete.  My work station includes the palette, the drawn shape and an iron.

             Palette for the pot

 

             Working station

 

 

Then I get ‘painting’ by overlapping my fabric shapes, just enough so that they will stick together when touched with the toe of the iron. Here is the sequence and you will be able to see straight away that I have deviated from the original picture; everything is dependent on what fabrics you have available. This is the story so far.

 

           Step 1

 

            Step 2

 

          Step 3

 

              Step 4

 

              Step 5

 

             Step 6

 

               Step 7