The medieval mirror continues…
Its grown quite a bit. I find I can’t wait to shut the computer and set up my lamp, my special specs and start the next section. When I am tired of creating new elements, I return to the leaves in the separate hoop and stitch those. I have 3 oak-styled leaves to do now and then two smaller light green leaves.
If you look at the main piece, you can see I have just finished peas and I’ve yet to finish a pea tendril. The peas actually aren’t supposed to be there. Instead there were supposed to be delicate blue foxgloves which I stitched and applied to the main piece, but they were done at the time my beloved Spot died and they were a right mess of threads and shapes. So I very carefully managed to unpick and cut them away from the work. The decision to replace them with peas was because I needed a 3 branched specimen and one that covered the mess that had been made on the Thai silk. I cut out shapes of various things in baking paper and laid them down to see what covered the damage well enough. The peas fit perfectly and the little curled tendril will echo the delicate curling fronds right round the full vine.
You can also see an aqua stretch of couched thread. That’s the body of a dragonfly. To the bottom of the post you will see that I’ve finished the detached wings which will be cut from the little hoop and applied to the main piece.
The whole piece has been growing quickly and I thought I was way ahead but I’ve yet to do a carnation, two violas, a hedgehog, two more beetles, an owl and the rest of the leaves. Bees around the hive too. I gave myself a year… depending on ‘things’ it might just take that long to complete!
Such beautiful, delicate work. I do admire you for it, Prue!
Gerry, you’re so fast… I’m still linking!
Thank you. I truly love the act of picking up the hoop, threading the needle and dipping into the silk fabric. it links me back through history with thousands of likeminded women.
I can’t decide which I like best, the thistle, the peas in pods, the raspberries … all amazingly beautiful, Prue!
Hi Scribbler… I’ve just finished the final pea and put the little curly tendril on (silk thread wrapped round wire and then the wire curled round a skewer and then when curled, the end of the wire slipped through the Thai silk into the back of the work) and I’ve decided I LOVE doing peas. I’ve never done them before and till now the berries were an all time favourite, but those peas… yum! Hate doing thistles (hate chipping them off the paddocks on the farm as well) because there dozens and dozens of turkey knots (as in turkish rugs) and its such a mess, but peas in a pod? Again…yum. Good to see you here!
Oh wow! Those peas are amazing, Mes!! This idea of using of wire in an embroidery project is revolutionary…to me anyways. But then it’s just another extention of an idea that I should’ve thought of in relation to my cake decorating. I attach floral wires to various elements, like fondant stars, and stick them into the top of the cake so they appear to “float”?! And I wrap thin strips of fondant around larger wire or dowels to create curls to stick out of a cake. Amazing how one craft lends itself to another! This is truly a work of art!
Hello NB: its true… wire is an integral part of stumpwork. Its what creates the three-dimensional embroidery that is added to the main piece. I can see it being used in cakes in exactly the same way.
Fascinating! I’ve never succeeded with needlework beyond stabbing myself while trying to fix a button, but used to love cake-decorating, and the images put me in mind some of the more elaborate wedding and celebration cakes I used to indulge in.
Obviously a very different medium to work with, but at an artistic level very similar.
I love the “modern” sugar-paste work (that coincidentally originated in Australia) but nothing beats the satisfaction of creating intricate fauna designs in royal icing, especially over thrre or five tiers!
Except maybe doing them with needle and thread.Can’t imagine I’ll ever try that now, but it doesn’t prevent me appreciating the beauty of other people’s work.
@Mark..I’ve had my eye on the Australian sugarpaste for the last 30 years! Took me that long to rake up the courage to try it. All I can say is WOW! I’ve done quite of bit of decorating with royal but still have much to learn!!!! And believe it or not, I use all of these aforementioned medium techniques in my scrapbooking. In fact, I’m beginning to see that my scrapping enhances my cake techniques and I can see some interesting possibilities in the realm of embroidery in relation to those techniques now that I have never considered before. Hmmmm…
@NovemberBride – at risk of taking over Prue’s column here with a completely different subject, but your comments sent me off down memory lane with cakes.
I was a first quite wary of sugarpaste too, end especially the idea of using inedibles like wire, but with Mexican paste flowers and gum tag and all that stuff there was just a whole new world to experiment with. So experiment I did!
For one fund-raising event I got art-college students to paint (food colouring) scenes on sugarpaste plaques that created the most beautiful Christmas cakes once royal iced into place, and managed to have tiny (removable) battery-operated lamps inside the cake beneath the plaques so they lit up in the dark, to extraordinary effect.
I don’t miss much about Europe, but when next I go back I shall definitely return with my piping tubes.
Isn’t it amazing how skill in one craft carries over to another? I found the same thing between sewing and bookbinding, weirdly enough. Eventually you realize that if you can make several different kinds of things, you can make anything!
Mark, you never cease to amaze me. You co-write an Amazon best seller, you find NY agents chasing you, you read Georgette Heyer, you write the most hard-hitting and jaw-dropping blog and now you say you make cakes! Tell my husband, please!!!!
BTW I meant floral designs, of course! Don’t know how fauna sneaked in there! Maybe editors do have a use after all!
Sounds like you are a detail person also! I’ve seen cakes using the tiny little lights but haven’t tried that yet. You should post a pic. I’d love to see it!! Would you believe I just tried using fondant last year..after 30 yrs of decorating! The stuff drives me nuts, but slowly, I am getting the hang of it. Seeeeee? Old dogs CAN learn new tricks.
OK, Prue…back to embroidery. I promised I’d send a pic of one of my creations. Must get that done. You’ll laugh tho! After seeing your work, mine looks like pre-school art class! And please don’t kick us cake decorators off your blog?!! =0)
PS Just don’t embroidery so much that Sir Guy is left hanging in mid-sentence. I’m so desperate for his story that I’ve gone back to Chapter 1 for a re-read!!!
NB: I won’t leave Gisborne alone, I swear. its almost as though he is ‘the other man’ in my life.
The peas are cuter than any old foxglove could ever have been. Great design decision!
Thanks Pat. I had a feeling you’d see the possibilities within the pea shapes, in the overall design. I feel i made the right decision now that I have your okay.
Oh, now I understand!
I see now why your writing, Prue is adorned by flashes of sheer brilliance whenever you describe creating beautiful, intricate, handcrafted things such as stumpwork embroidery and illuminated manuscripts. These are the parts I like reading best. Your words convey your absolute delight in the creative process and your excitement is infectious. You also have the knack of being able to describe the process so that it almost jumps off the page into real life.
The embroidery shown here is sumptuous!
Cecilia
Cecilia, you have quite simply made my day. Thank you. To have such words come from a writer of your calibre… the author who taught me 100 new words in over just two books…
I was looking at The Bitterbynde Saga on my shelves the other day and thinking as soon as I have time, I will read the books again.
Hi again, Cecilia. Gisborne began as a fan-fict on the blog but something made me stop putting pieces up and to start researching the timeframe more deeply and to change the structure and style of the story. I’ve left the inititial rough draft uploads on the blog so if you go to the top of the home page, you will see a tab that leads you to Gisborne’s page. That will then take you to the various uploads. Please remember that these were written on the run and that at the point they were uploaded, they were a very unedited first draft. there is also a link to a sample of the re-write of the opening chapter.
Oh and by the way, there is a character called Cecilia in the novel. Lady Cecilia Fineux of Upton.
PS You’re writing a story about Sir Guy of Gisborne? Link please…?
So much beauty, Prue, in your needle as well as your ”pen”. Always a delight to those who can’t, as well as an inspiration to those who can.
I had to smile at myself when I read this post, as I had just been doing one of the rare things I am capable of doing with my hands without getting myself into an unholy mess. Scrubbing the kitchen floor.
And up pops Gisborne, getting a mention on the blog again. Does he have a thing for a bucket of soapy water, I wonder?
Funny, Giselle.
I’m beginning to think I need to wash the kitchen floor again, just to get the ‘feel’ of Gisborne back, because I’ve had a couple of days of spasmodic writing and its so easy to lose the momentum. My husband is accusing me of having ‘an affaire’ with Gisborne… in the nicest possible way.
Beautiful beautiful beautiful. I am in awe of your attention to detail!
TFI:
Thanks so much… the devil’s in the detail. I had such fun last night, stitching the hedgehog. He looks as though he stuck his paw in a lightsocket… all the quills are quite stupendously rigid.