Embroidery | Week 5

This week in Embroidery we were told to do 2 samples based on our drawings, and then carry on to do another 10 hand stitched samples.

It felt like a huge difference going from machine to hand stitch because the samples take so much more time, even though there is less there are only 5 fewer than we had to do in machine.

I also struggled more with ideas on what to do more than in machine. Eventually I came up with a few ideas but some didnt work very well.

Before this week I'd never really used bondaweb, however when I was stuck with ideas I found myseld using it to give my samples something more. As hand stitch takes so long its hard to make the sample look like it has structure, but I found bondaweb made this easier for me.

 

 

 

This is one of my favourite hand stitch samples. I used bondaweb to glue on some black silk organza. The idea was to take inspiration from the drawings of braids I did in my sketchbook. I think this one works quite well with the french knots.

This is another one inspired by my drawings of hair. I used the same technique as the sample above but with the colours reversed, then used ladder stitch rather than the french knots. I dont think this one was as successful. I prefer the french knots, however I did find that I liked the back more than I liked the front. After I'd cut off all of the excess threads I quite liked the look of the marks left on the fabric.

This hand stitching came as a result of my dream catcher drawings. It it mainly ladder stitch with a few french knots running along the bottom. I quite like how this turned out however I'd like to try it in a few more ways, and experiment with the pattern in the middle of the circle. I think button hole stitch would look really good if I can do it well.

These next two samples were inspired by the bricks I first drew from the chance cards. Again I used bondaweb to stick down the blocks of various fabrics, then I used a messy ladder stitch to join them all up. Although I dont think this is amazing I quite like the different shades of materials and how they work together.

Here I tried the bricks again but with a much thinner fabric to see how it would work. I like how the fabric creases under the stiching and how some of the thread lifts of the surface because of it. I doubled the thread over in some places and pulled it tighter which I think works quite well. As they are supposed to be bricks, I wouldn't want them to be perfect and precise as bricks themselves are usually dirty and worn.



Embroidery | Week 4

 This week we moved onto hand stitch.

We started by learning the 3 basic stitches: Straight, Ladder and Chain. After completing some samples of these stitches for my technical file I started to do the 2 samples of French Knots we'd been set. I think French Knots are really simplistic but populate a fabric really well when you put them in the right place. Although they're quite time consuming I like the outcome they create.
I was also inducted on the Cornelly machines. We got to practice on each of the different stitches (heavy chain, fine chain, fine moss etc) I am going to inclue these in my technical file.

Next week we are creating samples based on our drawings.

 

 

French Knots
This is one of my samples of the French Knots. I really like this. The fabric is black Silk Organza, as it is see through you can see the threads that connect the knots on the back. I did this on purpose so made sure the threads would go in a circular motion rather than all over the place. I think the threads make it look better than it would if they couldn't be seen.


 

After doing some practice on each of the different cornelly machines, I made this sample. I think the cornelly machines are very hard to control and I can't see myself creating anything that doesnt look like a doodle. However we have to create 5 cornelly samples so I am going to experiment with different patterns.



One thing I found interesting about the cornelly machines was the back of the sample. There was no loose threads and everything is exactly how it is on the front, just a bit thinner. In future I may think about using the back of the cornelly sample rather than the front.