Silk Shading: last blossom!

Pushing ahead with the silk shading!  I'm about halfway finished with the last blossom.  Still a bit to finish, but at least I'll be able to say, "The blossoms are done!".

Silk Shading: Another Bit Done

So, I have accepted that I will be redoing this module.  As I finished this bit, I kept trying to think of all the positives of needing to do the module twice.  The main one I came up with was practice.  I will be thankful for it in the end I'm sure.  The thing that makes me the most nervous about this silk shading is that you are looking at the same bit for so long that I start to really to see all the weirdnesses and I really start to second guess myself.  It kind of all starts to look the same and blend together and I start freaking out that it's just not right.  

Anyways, I thought it might be good to just talk about the struggles I've had with this bit.  The first struggle I had was getting the curvature on the tip right.  I know this sounds easy, but it is a very small sized area and getting it just right was difficult to me.  After a few tries though, I think it did improve.  Next, I'm not sure if maybe my stitches were too long, but I had trouble keeping the smoothness as I moved around the bend towards the bottom.  What I cannot figure out is if the stitching towards the base is stringy looking and overworked or if it's just the stripy quality of the colors.  I needed a darker green, but I feel that the darker green that I used (which was the best of the bunch of my DMC's) is too dark and is too much contrast. 

I am trying though and learning.  I think my biggest struggle is actually working by myself on this.  There is something comforting when you work with a group of ladies that are all learning together.  Thinking of all the fun times over the past few years with the many different women that I've had the opportunity to stitch with . . . 

Silk Shading Progress. . . I think

So silk shading has me quoting one of my favorite books as a child, "The Little Engine That Could"- "I think I can, I think I can, I think I can".  Well,  I am going to give it my best try, but I have this distinct feeling I may be redoing this module.  So I keep trying and keep pushing forward (and taking stitches out and redoing).  It's very much a one step forward and a few back feeling.  I will be so excited when I finish it though, even if I have to redo it!  And, I cannot wait to get back to my crewelwork!

Warwick Cosmo Sampler Progress!

I am so excited to make some time to work on this again!   I have been working on the grass and stems of the Warwick Sampler (named after Warwick, NY where I took the photo).  I am experimenting with using the smooth passing with DMC floss using the needle-weaving technique you see on stumpwork to make tiny 3-dimensional flowers and leaves.  I thought it would be exciting to take this technique and scale it up to the full size of the grass blades.  Each blade is created using a different combination of smooth passing and DMC.  There are a few that I wanted to use only the smooth passing for contrast.  I wanted to try seeing how tight I could weave the smooth passing, what would happen if the weaving was fairly loose, and all the in-betweens!  My main goal was to have the blades come off the surface as much as possible.  More to come this week!

Warwick Sampler Progress. . .

Here's some photos of the progress I've made on the Warwick Sampler.  This flower was executed by couching down thin strips of metallic leather.  I tried different couching patterns on different each petal.  On 1 petal I tried to couch down loops of the leather to see how that changed the texture.  The base of the flower was created with bullion knots of gilt smooth passing (size 4) and long pieces of tarnished silver smooth purl.

Warwick Sampler- Creative Goldwork (in progress)

This is a sampler that I started in Durham, England this summer during classes with Tracy Franklin at her studio at Fowler's Yard.  The previous 2 summers, I had taken classes on traditional goldwork technique and wanted to focus on more non-traditional or "creative" ways of utilizing the metal threads and wires.  

For this flower, I have cut thin strips of leather and couched them down using DMC floss.  The base of the flower was created with Smooth Passing bullion knots and tarnished Smooth Purl.

The following 2 buds are created using layered "Wheel" stitch executed in Smooth Passing and DMC floss.

With this flower, I wanted to practice color shading with a burden stitch and smooth passing.  Each petal is slightly different.  I tried shading with not only the colored DMC floss but also the gold and silver smooth passing.  What I find interesting after I added the Pearl Purl edging is that the colors are more of the focus in the petals outlined in gold and the outline is more of the focus on the petals outlined in silver.  This may be because the silver Super Pearl Purl seems slightly thicker than the gold Super Pearl Purl, or it may just simply be the color difference--still an extremely interesting result to me. 

 I added pieces of stretched Pearl Purl (gold and silver) to the Smooth Passing bullion knots.