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Friday, July 30, 2010

Old me - new me...

... or at least I can hope!

I was going to post two photos, one before and one after but there was so much reflection that you can barely see the difference so here is the after shot -

This trapping of assorted threads and fabrics was begun in a machine embroidery class last year. The bits were held in place with a layer of organza stitched with some large vermicelli machining - too large. So last week I ran the straight line stitching across the piece (approx 8" x 6"), then the questions began - "Was there enough stitching?" "Did I need to add more layers?" "Did it need more....?" and that's when the old me kicked in! I put the piece to one side to think about, because whatever I decided to do could spoil the work done so far - not that it was ever a labour of love in the first place.

Each time I went into my room to sew I looked at this thing and it wasn't talking to me at all, then I suddenly realised  - I won't know what's going to spoil the piece until I've spoiled it (or not) so I might as well get on with something and treat it as a lesson, and the new me came out to play!

I added no more stitching, just got out the heat gun. The results were interesting but disappointing, where the vermicelli was less dense I got some interesting holes, but these could have been achieved with more control using a pebble stitch. Nor were they very visible. So I got out some bronze fingering thinking that it would catch on the burned edges of the organza, but it actually spread all over the surface picking up best on the light coloured thread I'd used for the horizontal stitching, blending it in more with the whole. Now that was interesting - I hadn't expected the thread to pick up the colour so well or so easily. 

So in future the new me isn't going to prevaricate, the new me is going to jump in and get those mistakes (or not) made sooner, so that I can get on and make some more mistakes, or not!

1 comment:

magsramsay said...

Well done for taking the plunge!!
Nothing to lose is a good starting point. Do take photos as you go along - I do and I can identify where it went pear-shaped and resolve to do better next time! And the more you do the easier it gets.