A Row of Tags

In the midst of the lounge decorating that's taken somewhat longer than planned I have finally finished a textile piece.  I've done several over the last year but haven't really liked any enough to finish them or show you.  At one point I got myself so bogged down in the 'rules' and 'balance' etc that I lost all my confidence.  This time I started small and decided to just do things so that I was pleased with them rather than trying to work to someone else's formula etc.

Having said that, I did keep to some self imposed 'rules'. Each piece is on a brown tag and each piece has something 'found' in nature on it and some simple cross stitching.

Each piece also has old lace and buttons,

and they are all of a similar colour palette (one without much colour which is what I always seem to gravitate to!).

Some have text from old books and shredded bark cloth.

All have recycled sari ribbon and some have music and vintage fabric,

and some have string.

They sit side by side, tags in a row, 

and, for the first time in ages, I'm actually pleased with them, and also pleased to have some confidence back! They will hang in my lounge once the floor is laid in a few weeks' time.

A Trip To The Ally Pally

This is the time of year when Fran and I make our annual 'pilgrimage' to the Knitting and Stitching Show at the Ally Pally.  I think this was our 4th visit and, as ever, it didn't disappoint.

Although there were many lovely galleries of work, these were my two favourites; the first by Mandy Pattullo who re-fashions old quilts and fabrics into new patchworks and textile art.   

I particularly loved her use of colour.  There are lots more photos of the work in this exhibition on her blog.

The other gallery that really took our eye was the one entitled "Our World of Make Believe' - a wonderfully imaginative display of free form crochet and knitting by Mitsuko Tonouchi and Sonomi Tanimoto. 

I also really loved this work in the graduate showcase by artist Faith Wray.  

You can't see it from my poor photo but she'd taken photos of old buildings, and created panels using various mixed media, textiles and other materials based on the textures and colours. 

Of course I also did a fair amount of shopping; some alpaca and silk lace weight yarn from Eden Cottage Yarns ,

a rainbow of naturally dyed blue faced leicester yarn from The Natural Dye Studio (I plan to make a crocheted scarf)

and some other bits, mainly for using with the embellisher, including a lovely dark blue based silk brick from Oliver Twists and some fancy threads from Stef Francis.

It was a great day, one of the highlights of my year, and I'll definitely be back for more next year!

I'll leave you with the yarn bombed taxi that was outside

and a reminder that if you want a chance to win the needle-case made from Celia's fabric then pop over to this post and leave a comment, I'll be drawing the name on Wednesday.

Sun Printing

Sun printing is something that I wanted to try last year but it wasn't very sunny and I never got round to it. This year I'd forgotten all about it until Fran mentioned it last week.  I planned to do it yesterday but there was a slight technical hitch - no sun!

This afternoon the sun came out and very soon I had 4 experimental pieces laying in the sun to 'print'.

I have to admit I don't understand how it works (I failed both chemistry and physics o levels!) but the theory is that when objects are placed on top of heat sensitive paints/dyes (I used setacolor transparent fabric paint - it has to be the transparent one) then where the objects are makes an undyed silhouette when they're removed.

I had mixed success - the poppies (far right) didn't work at all.  I think because it was all on a towel which retained the dye.

The albums (which everything I read said would work really well) sort of worked, although the texture from the plastic mat came through rather more than I would have liked.

The lavender worked well

but the one that surprised me most was the feverfew as I didn't really expect it to work (I thought it would wilt before it printed).  

I'm not too keen on how the colours of the paint on this one have dried, they look sort of muddy, but the definition is really good.  Where it's a bit blurry is where the shadows were.

It definitely has potential and I will do some more when I'm next at home on a sunny day.

A Textile for Aldeburgh

I know I've told you before that one of my all time favourite places is Aldeburgh on the Suffolk coast.

A mosaic of Aldeburgh loveliness!

A few weeks ago I wanted to something textiley and I decided to try and reflect Aldeburgh.  Not an actual representation, more of a memory of the light, the textures, the movement and the colours.

I kept to a very limited colour palette, but used a variety of different fabrics and threads.

I did some free motion embroidery, some hand embroidery, half hid some mother of pearl buttons and made some rust like holes through the layers of fabric with a solder iron.

I added some shells and a small piece of drift wood.

A Textile for Aldeburgh - 35cm x 24cm

(click on the picture to enlarge it)

I'm not sure if it does reflect Aldeburgh, but I don't know whether that really matters.  I enjoyed working with the limited colours and at the moment I quite like it.

A Rather Nice Week!

How has your week been?  After my disappointment with the Easter weather I've actually had a very good week - a spot of gardening (including getting stranded in the greenhouse during a very heavy shower), tea and cake at CafeKnit with the lovely Celia (with the obligatory purchase of some wool of course), a trip round Long Melford with another lovely friend Fran and the discovery that I can now listen to the radio in my kitchen again courtesy of this app on my iphone/ipad (such clever stuff!).

I've also made some small textile pieces that I think I'll make into cards.

It started off as one bigger piece but I didn't like it so I cut it up! They're not big, this one is just 3.5cm x 5.5cm.

I found some copper wire in my sewing box (like you do!), so each piece has got some of that on as well as some copper beads.

I'm going to test one out this week for a friend's birthday - she's having a hard time with chemotherapy at the moment, so I'm hoping something homemade might cheer her up a little.

PS - If anyone knows where I can get some good quality blank cards and envelopes from I'd really appreciate it you could let me know - they need to be quite thick to take the weight of the textile without buckling or splaying out. 

Beads and Quacks!

On Monday my neighbour tapped on the back door, holding a yogurt pot, an old jar and two old tins.  "I'm having a clear out," she said "can you use these?  They're left over from my college days."
"Ooh yes please," I replied, not even knowing what they contained but knowing that she did a textile degree.

And what did they contain?

All kinds of wonderfulness!  Old beads, new beads, old bits of jewellery, sequins, buttons and threads.

On a sadder note, her ducks (who personally wrote me notes and gave me eggs) met a very sad and brutal end on Friday night when a fox got into their run - no further details required.  We were both very upset and as she hadn't got any recent photos of them I decided to make her a little picture of them.  I had some of their feathers that I'd collected in the summer when they moulted and happily stitched away for a few hours.  But actually giving a textile picture to someone with a textile degree turned out to be harder than I'd imagined and I then spent several more hours getting colder and colder feet about it.  Eventually I plucked up some courage and gave it to her - fortunately she seemed genuinely pleased with it and quite touched that I'd spent the time making it.

Hinge (on the right) and Bracket (on the left)

Quack Quack!

Holes, holes, holes.

One of the things that I love about textiles is holes and what is revealed underneath them.  A combination of being inspired by the cover technique of this book

Image courtesy of Amazon

and then watching the BBC production of Great Expectations over Christmas and being fascinated by the wonderful Miss Havisham

Image courtesy of  The Telegraph

made me want to have a play and see what I could create.

I'm not sure if it's finished or what I'll do with it, but I do quite like the holes and the fragility of it (although it's ended up pinker than I was expecting) and it does resemble a piece of old fabric from a worn out dress.

Fragile Lace (18cm x 15cm)

The top layer is Crash fabric which I stencilled onto using soft molding paste before blasting it to distress it and make the holes.

The base layer is silk scrim and silk carrier rod strippings and it's held together with beads and french knots.

Detail from above

I'm not sure what this fascination with holes says about me, or where this technique might go, but I think it's something I will return to.

She Sells Three Shells

A few days ago I finally finished (I think) another small textile piece that I started after I'd been to the Knitting and Stitching Show. 

Three Shells - 10cm x 20cm

It's embellished sari silk, with silk fibres, banana yarn and scrim.  I've sort of stitched the shells on, which are years and years old (there's a good reason for not throwing stuff out!) and then added a few french knots.  I'm having problems stopping the shells from falling off, but if I don't touch it they're fine!  Anyone know a good way to secure them?

If you're interested in textiles and live near Bury St Edmunds, the 'Out of the Fold' exhibition is well worth a visit.  Fran and I went yesterday and were really impressed, it's on until the 29th Oct. And if you want a cuppa afterwards then head to 'Harriets' - lovely tea, and the cakes looked good too, although we both managed to resist (this time!)

A Bowl Like No Other

I thought I'd show you a bowl that I made a couple of weeks ago.  It's not like any other bowl (and it's also really hard to photograph!)

Silk Bowl - approx 21cm x 14cm

I made it by sandwiching silk fibres between water soluble fabric and then free motion stitching it - round and round at first to make the base and then out in lines towards the edges. 
Next I ran it all under a cold tap until the water soluble fabric had gone but some of the "stickiness" was left (word of warning, if you fancy doing this yourself then take your watch off first as the "stick" gets everywhere!). 
Then I squeezed most of the water out and molded it over a bowl to dry.

Silk Bowl - approx 21cm x 14cm

When it was dry I stitched a few seed beads on and painted round the top with fabric paint.  It's quite holey but is more rigid than it looks as when the stickiness dries it gives it some stability.

I love these silk fibres, I bought them last year at the Knitting and Stitching Show from Oliver Twists.  I also bought some more this year, including some undyed ones - my next challenge is to dye them using the microwave!

Meet Aunty Elsie

Actually she was my Great Aunty Elsie, my Grandma's elder sister.

Hopes and Dreams (17cm x 24 cm)

Sadly I never knew my Grandma as she died before I was born so Aunty Elsie was a sort of surrogate Grandma.  She was born in 1899 - I'm not sure when or why this photo was taken, but she looks a lot younger here than in her wedding photos of 1928, so I'm guessing it was taken around 1920, maybe her 21st birthday?

Her and her husband lived in Cottenham (near Cambridge) and were fruit and flower growers.  There are pictures of them from the 1930s with strawberries and tulips they'd grown for market.

She sometimes looked after us as children and although they’d sold most of their smallholding by then, I remember feeding a donkey in the orchard behind her house.  When I was in my early 20s I worked nearby and used to call and see her every week.  She gave me tea and tinned salmon sandwiches, taught me how to harvest asparagus, and told me off for suggesting that at 86 she shouldn’t be up a ladder picking plums!  She talked lots about people and relatives that I didn’t really know but had probably met every year on Feast Sunday without knowing who they were!  

 

She was a lovely lady and I hope she would like what I’ve done with her photo.  After some editing in photoshop I printed it onto calico.  Then I added vintage lace, velvet, recycled sari ribbon and some vintage buttons. 

I used to think of her a lot when I had my allotment – especially when harvesting my asparagus as when she died I was lucky enough to be given this:

 her asparagus knife.

Then Came The Jolly Summer

Last week, while I was waiting and generally getting side tracked, I noticed a rather nice pattern had appeared on a piece of fabric I'd placed under some garden fleece I was painting (don't ask!) to catch the excess paint.  The fleece experiment wasn't a success but I fiddled around with that bit of fabric as it seemed to have flowers on.  I cut and stitched, and added some organza.  I painted some handmade paper and stitched the fabric on.  I used my new lumiere paints that I got from my recent visit to Art Van Go. 

Jolly Summer - 17cm x 21cm

  
The text is from The Fairie Queene (Edmund Spenser) because it seemed quite a jolly piece, especially when the sky was grey over the weekend.  I'm not actually sure how much I like it, but my neighbour does so I thought I'd share it anyway! (And is it a textile piece, or is it really mixed media, or doesn't it really matter? It all gets very complicated at times!)

The sun is back now - let's hope it stays awhile this time!

Spring Greens - 3rd Attempt

I've been playing with textiles again, trying to create something inspired by the greenness of spring.  I know we're nearly in summer but it's taken me a while to get something I'm vaguely pleased with!  My first attempt ended up being cut up although bits of it were embellished into number two (whose fate is still being decided).  But one evening last week I just started to fiddle with some scraps that I'd got left over from the previous attempts and produced this little piece:

Spring Greens

The background is left over silk and scrim that I'd dyed in the microwave, with a silk carrier rod stitched on using the flower stitcher.  I'd made the tyvek bead earlier in the week and stitched it on adding some beads.  It's only tiny (4" x 2.5"), and rather "random" but I prefer it to any of the previous (more planned) attempts!

Lavender's Blue Dilly Dilly

Well not exactly lavender (yet), but many of the plants flowering in my garden today happen to be in various shades of blue.

(ajuga, camassia, forget-me-knots, geranium, viola "freckles", 

pulmonaria, bluebells, brunnera and veronica)

One bed in particular is predominantly blue, somehow it seems very calming.

But I haven't just been gardening, I've been some fiddling with textiles too.  I was inspired after reading Emma's blog "A Little Bit of Everything" to try incorporating some seed heads into textile work. I've used them as inspiration before but never actually tried using real ones within the piece.  I was limited in my choice as it's really the wrong time of year for seed head collection but I had some stipa gigantica and lavender hanging about in the conservatory.

Golden Light (18cm x 14cm)

For this one I used handmade paper as well as undyed scrim, gold organza, gold thread and beads stitched onto a background of natural osnaberg.

And for this one I dyed the some of the scrim and used some sheet music and lace aged with walnut ink, before stitching the lavender underneath some lilac organza and adding odd bits of thread and some beads.

Faded Memories (18cm x 14cm)

I'm pleased with how they've turned out, I like the "threadiness" of them and I like that they include plants that I grew.  Not sure what I'm going to do with them though, might have to cogitate that for a while, although I might hang them somewhere!  Thanks Emma for the inspiration.