Sussex Stitchers Workshop

Finishing up my run of seascape classes with a flourish is the Sussex Stitchers! I gave a talk to this group earlier on in the year and was delighted to be invited back so soon to teach a workshop. 

They also opted to go for a beach theme, but this was a mix between ladies wanting a pack from me and also those bringing in their own materials. I think all of them brought in their own 'stuff' to add on and I spent quite a lot of the day wandering around admiring their collections of threads and trimmings and interesting bits that they'd brought in to trial. You really don't need very much to make these hoops so they are brilliant way of using things up when you just have a small scrap left. 

The above piece is really interesting, look at those wonderful textures! This lady brought her own fabrics in and had been previously experimenting with colouring and heating materials like Lutrador, Tyvek and a special type of felt which kind of melts away when heated, I forget it's name. The colours and layers are just stunning and it goes to show that you don't have to stick to printed cotton fabrics to create a Stitchscape, it really does enable you the freedom to use whatever you like (although I am reminded of the lady who made a piece all in layers of tweed fabric - it looked lovely but was almost impossible to stitch through when layered up!). 

Some of the scenes created were very specific. This piece was inspired by a painting of the coastguards cottages with the Seven Sisters cliffs in the background. It's wonderfully evocative don't you think? The use of the frayed edge to represent wild grasses hiding the full view of the cottages is lovely - and quite  a lot of these pieces really use different textures well, have a look at some more....

....felt rocks, driftwood, fancy trimmings, string, sequins....

And the one below has used the splotchy colours on the batik fabric at the top as pathways for lightning! How amazing is that?! It's such a great feeling when a fabric works out and inspires something unexpected.  

This lady (lightning lady) had brought in a really lovely fancy yarn as well which, bless her, she ended up donating pieces of to half of the group, myself included! I have looked the yarn up and it is fairly pricey otherwise I would have tried to include it in a kit but, in case you are interested, it is the thread/yarn with the tiniest of sequins in and it was from Lang Yarns, called Paillettes - image below for you.

What was so nice about this workshop is that I was taught some stitches too! I'm not above learning and I can't possibly know every stitch, so when I saw one that was being done I didn't recognise, I sat on the floor and watched a demonstration by one of the ladies themselves. Later on she was doing another stitch I didn't recognise so I sat down to learn that one too! I will have to start incorporating them into future classes I think as they are brilliant ones for seascapes.

What a brilliant collection of hoops! There's lovely variety here, especially with the direction of the view; some are on sand looking out, some are in the sea looking to land, a couple are more birds-eye-views, others are on rocks with the waves splashing up (one lady used some toy stuffing to trap behind her fabric rocks so it looked like the spray was leaping out at you) and some are on clifftops looking out over the sea (one with just the triangular tops of beach huts nestled into the cliff for protection). 

I think they're all brilliant! Thank you for having me back ladies. 

April Cherry Blossom ATC Swap

What a beautiful collection of cards! And, funnily enough, where I was saying previously in the post about my own cards that I had done a lot of french knots, there appear to have been a lot of french knots being stitched up and down the country! Some stitches just lend themselves to a particular thing, and it seems when you want little details to make an overall texture, like leaves or lots of flowers, french knots are the go-to. 

Some of us may have been unknowingly united in our preferred representation but there are still differences. Some would include the changes in colour, being paler or darker, and there's one that has made knots with a multicoloured knitting yarn by the looks of things. It's definitely not a stranded cotton or tapestry yarn, much too fluffy, so I would like it was some kind of soft variegated yarn that works beautifully! The smaller knots between them look more like ones made with stranded cotton, like little buds yet to bloom. 

Our tree shapes (when we have a whole or majority tree rather than a branch) are also different which is interesting.

I really enjoyed taking these out of their envelopes and looking at them for the first time as they arrived. The detail in some of these cards was breath-taking - particularly on the cards which had focused in on one or two flowers. Sharon's long and short stitch thread 'painted' flowers on the purple background are divine, and I love the simplicity of Lis' petite point single blossom. The colour shading here is really clever. I do admire those who have the patience for this technique.

This one has a padded and textured tree trunk - unlike mine which is flat, this appears to have been stuffed with something so it protrudes out from the surface of the card. A little risky as one of the rules is that it needs to fit into a normal letter envelope but it got here so that's fine. 

Pam's piece below with her lovely satin stitch petals, also has little glittery threads used as stamens which catch the light and just add a little bit of extra sparkly interest.

Jacquie also has some sparkle with her lovely glittery mesh background, and has again used multiple shades of pink. It is definitely about adding detail with more than one shade of pink, such a simple idea yet so effective. 

These two (above and below) are fairly similar in their execution but so stunningly beautiful. The little fly stitched birds is a nice touch, as is the flower garden with the detached chain stitch flowers.

I think this may be my favourite swap theme so far (I feel like I say that every month) and I love that they work so nicely together as a collection. There is a lot of pale blue which offsets that lovely range of pinks to perfection. 

As always, you can find single photos of each card in the dedicated Stitchscape Swap, ATC space on my website. Just click on the front image for the theme (I try and choose a different person to be the frontline card each month) to bring up the whole photo collection for that theme. ATCs | Dotty Textiles

Storrington Quilters Workshop

A few weeks ago, during my hugely busy run of workshops, I was invited to run a workshop with the Storrington Quilters. We were in a fantastic building - Storrington Village Hall - which had lots of windows and loads of natural light. Plus it was a huge group of ladies so we made a big table that seemed to go on forever, piled high with the creative bits the ladies had brought in, as well as my own provided things. 

This was a mixed theme class so some had requested a seaside themed pack and others had asked for a countryside themed pack (with sheep) so it was a fun one to put together and have a play around with combinations of fabrics. Some of the fabrics I'd cut for each theme started blending together as well which created some interesting interpretations of what a beach and the countryside looked like. (The counter to that in this case would be 'whatever you wanted it to look like'.)

There's no pressure for the ladies to specifically use the fabrics in the packs provided, or in the same order as I've layered them, the idea is just to start generating ideas and thoughts so layers can be swapped out or disregarded completely.

It was such a fun day. As mostly fairly experienced quilters and stitchers, I didn't have to do so much teaching of the stitches and giving stitch demonstrations, but it was talking through of the ideas and supporting the "would this look ok do you think?", or "have I done this wrong?" questions.

I say in every single workshop that I teach that I have never told anybody that they were wrong in a decision or a layout. When you are being creative and creating pieces for yourself, how can what you like be wrong? It may not work out as you intended but that's ok, you can usually undo it or try again with something else. It's a learning curve and you have to make mistakes to learn - next time you could try it differently, or with another colour, or in a different scene, but you aren't wrong for trying it. 

How cool are these hoops? We can go from a wonderful boat sailing on the high seas, to rockpools with velvety turkey stitch anemones, to a sunset over lavender fields. There's even a yo-yo (or Suffolk Puff) sun a little further down in the photos. 

The piece above has little pieces of raffia cut up and stitched down to add further texture to the wheat print at the bottom. Along with bullion knots, fly stitches, straight stitches and french knots, there's a lot going on just in that one layer if you look very closely. 

There were 16 ladies in this workshop in total but I seem to have missed the photo of all 16 together so here's 12 to start you off. They work so beautifully together as well as stand alone individuals. Do any jump out at you?

There is a website for the Storrington Quilters and they made a fab little video of the day. I haven't seen myself in action like that before, no one usually film or photographs me, it's all about the ladies and the work they're doing. If you click on the link below it will take you to the page about the class, along with the video and some photos - there's even a photo of a piece that has been made since the workshop which is just lovely! Events — Storrington Quilters

I'm keeping an eye on it myself to see if any other finished hoop pieces pop up. 

Cherry Blossom ATCs

So. Many. French. Knots!!!!

Need I say more really? The knots kind of took over on this one but I'm thrilled with the final effect. Mr DT has a thing about Japan (it's his top No. 1 place to visit when we get rich enough to go...if we ever get rich enough to go) and I've previously painted him a picture with a pagoda and blossom trees so I was kind of going for a Japanese sculpted blossom tree look. A bit like a blossom bonsai tree. 

The fabrics were easy to choose for once, I wanted them to be bright and springlike, and I haven't really stitched them at all as there's so much gone into the trees themselves. I've added a single strand running stitch detail on the green, edged with blanket stitch, and then just edged the bottom fabric with bullion knots, but again in the green as that space dyed batik look had so many colours in, adding a line of running stitch in the top of that layer to help support the edge before adding the knots. As a type of knot they don't like mess so they don't work well with fabric edges that fray and get all tangled up in them - high maintenance knots!

Steely blue fly stitch birds adorn the top layer and that is it really for other stitches in the background. 

I've used felt for the tree trunk and added back stitch lines into the bark for texture. Underneath all of those french knots are pieces of pink fabric which I've used so that I don't have to put quite so many knots down, there are gaps which show a darker pink underneath them all if you look close enough. It also gave me an outline to follow. 

To start off the blossom stitches, I've actually used some little flower beads for additional sparkle. I stole a pot from my Stitchscape Shop ( Flower Bead Tubes | Dotty Textiles ) so you can purchase some yourself if you would like (limited stock and colours available though!). They are textured with each petal its own little bump so I've stitched them down between the petals to accentuate that, using three beads per tree segment. 

Then came the french knots!! I've used two colours (two strand, five twist) over the whole section, then filled in with a darker colour on the lower half of each branch and a lighter colour on the top half to try and create an idea of shadow and give it a more 3D look. 

 

These took a long time! I filled in more than I was initially expecting to because it just never looked quite finished. There are gaps between the knots but the bigger gaps I had initially planned did look a bit odd.

I also then added a few little knots along the bottom underneath the tree to make it seem like a few flowers had drifted off and settled on the ground below. 

Overall, the stitch run down for these cards is; fly stitch, back stitch, running stitch, bullion knots, beading, blanket stitch and french knots. 

Made & Making Shell Class

I think Mr DT, Baby F and I are in need of a beachcombing day soon. I've done so many shell themed Stitchscape classes in the last couple of months that my shell stash is a looking a little bit sad. Don't get me wrong, I still have lots of shells but they are all of a certain size that many people don't want to use. Do you think I could take them back to the beach and swap them for some smaller ones? Would that be strange?

If anyone is reading this who lives in East Sussex, can you recommend me any beaches with lots of little lovely shells? 

Look at this fantastic concentration going on here! This was my latest class at Made & Making and we had an absolutely brilliant day. The studio has such a wonderful and creative atmosphere - often there's another class going on, on the other side of the room, so there is a constant hum of activity like a little creative hive. The conversations are always varied, always different, depending on who is in and how chatty they are. Some classes gel more than others, and sometimes neighbours can go away exchanging numbers or details to stay in touch!

Everyone has their own experiences of stitching and embroidery. Often they'll come up and guiltily admit that they haven't done anything for years, aside from turning up an emergency hem, and that is absolutely fine! There's no set pace on these classes and they will work for everyone. Sometimes people just need a creative push and some spit-balling to get the best ideas and creative juices flowing, others need a little bit more hand holding and teaching of the stitches but with these smaller classes I can still get around everyone for lots of one on one time so hopefully no one feels neglected. 

It's especially lovely to see people have creative freedom to do what they want. And I'm now determined to have about 10 minutes at the end of a workshop just to get everyone's pieces together so that they can see what the others have done and chat about it - the techniques they've used or the colours, and really build up each other's confidence. It's all very well me walking in with my years of experience and 'just the right materials', but it is always so much nicer for them to see what they have achieved and have others be as delighted with it as they are. Hopefully. 

There's lots of texture in these. Most of the ladies embraced the idea of throwing lots of trimmings and shells and bits to create a mass of touchy-feely bits (which also fills up the hoop quicker so they feel they've accomplished more in the day). The lady with the hoop underneath was much neater, with really fine and deliberate work that looks beautiful. I love the different use of the furnishing trimming here, and she also brought with her one of those bath scrub loofer things that's made out of blobs of netting. Rather than throw it away she deconstructed it and brought it in, can you see where she's used it?

Some of her shells were much smoother and didn't have a shape for the thread to attach to so instead she made a little pocket from the loofer netting and has secured one of her shells down with that. You can barely see it because the net is so fine and the colour worked really nicely with the shell itself, but also it just kind of looks like the shell is tangled up in beach rubbish. As it's a net she could go on to weave things through that as well if she wanted to, although I suspect her finished piece will continue to be pristine. Almost like a picture postcard beach from the Bahamas. 

I really hope that everyone who came along to this workshop had a good time. The pieces produced are just stunning and everyone should be giving themselves a pat on the back!!