Bakercourt - Knitting, Sewing, Crafting.

Spring Sampler Stitchery: Done!

Monday, May 13, 2013

07/12/2015 Edit to add: the template has now been updated and is hosted on flickr. Scroll down for the working link!

10/02/2016: I've also added a link to a dropbox download for those who are struggling with flickr. Get in touch if you want it emailed to you instead.

It was a good weekend for stitching! Spring has definitely sprung; there are spring showers, spring flowers, and lots of sunshine! I started a few new projects, stitched along on a few old projects, and finished up my Spring Sampler Stitchery while it rained.

I'm really pleased with the way it turned out. I'm happy with the linen background, and the soft colours used in the design. I like the lazy daisies best. I had to stop myself from stitching them in all the open spaces.

I balanced out the lettering with some simple stitching here and there, and a few colonial knots for texture. This is definitely a feel it stitched piece. I mounted it in a hoop frame, stitched up the back with a running stitch around the edges, and covered it up with a green felt circle. Ready to hang!

I've had a few emails asking for the template for stitching, so you can now download the stitching template here (flickr) or here (dropbox). Add your own colours and free-hand flowers or bugs. Bugs are very spring-y. I look forward to seeing how yours turn out too!

art

Kaffe Fassett: A Life in Colour

Thursday, May 09, 2013

Kaffe Fassett, says Wikipedia, rhymes with safe asset. That settles it. Kafe. I was wrong. It's not Kaff-ee.

Still. The activity sheet made up for my disappointment.

I met up with the lovely Miriam and went to see the Fashion and Textile Museum exhibition on Kaffe Fassett: A life in Colour.

It was ... interesting. You walk through four galleries of Kaffe-displays, from photographs and early still life paintings and drawings from his youth, to later quilts and knitting. Blocks. Stripes. Cave Paintings. Yarn. Mosaics. Ribbons. Diamonds. RED. Smelly pamphlet at the door. Phoo.

The galleries are small - much smaller than I thought they would be - but there is a good display of ideas. After walking through them all, you get to a TV which loops two documentaries on Kaffe's work and life. I wish they had put these first, as they gave quite a brilliant insight into his style and objectives. I had to revisit some of the works to understand them better and appreciate them in a new light.

We both really enjoyed this particular display; I like his love of vegetables. I enjoy the way that the ordinary is made into the extraordinary by immortalising them in stitches. An artichoke. A beetroot. A footstool that nobody would ever put their feet on. We were told not to touch.

I was limited to my phone camera, so everything is a bit blurry, but I found plenty of blocky inspiration in these captured moments. I really really like that footstool. The quilt is lovely in an unexpectedly low volume way. Cumulative cushions, like puffy clouds of colour. A great display.

I like the repetitive patterning in his quilting; the way that the colours melt into each other, or are stacked up against each other in defiant but accepting geometry. The colours are warm. Some of his new colours are surprisingly bright, the patterns aren't quite distinct, and it's like a cacophony of tones. It reminds me of a joke my grandfather, a jazz musician, once told us over a family dinner; what is jazz? it's what happens when a blues band falls down the stairs.

The exhibition costs £8.00. It's on until the 29th of June, 2013.

patchwork

Wednesday WIP: Gypsy Blue Quilt

Wednesday, May 08, 2013

I've been stitching up some more HSTs for my quilt, which has now been named the Gypsy Blue Quilt. It's blue. It's made from FQs of Valori Wells's Karavan which full of fun and a bit of magic. The name seems right.

Blues and greys and subtle greens. I've resisted adding in any other colours - although some of the designs have a touch of apple green and purple to balance things outs.

I really like the geometry of this collection - some of them are rigid and haphazard at the very same time, while the others are completely free-form. Cutting them up into neat triangles and putting them in a pattern is like trying to structure the unstructured. It's quite reflexive; I like it.

Each "block" is made up of nine smaller block units - seven of which are made up of HSTs. I have fourteen blocks like this. The plan is put these big blocks in four rows of four, with two in the middle saved for something completely different. Something with grids, elephants and log cabin squares. Just because.

So far so good, but I am a bit nervous about matching up those points!

paint

Screenprinting and Playing with Colour

Monday, May 06, 2013

My screenprinting course has been marvellous. Week two: we splished and splashed, painted and squeegeed. We rolled, textured, printed and blocked. We got covered in blue paint and our nails were detailed in an assortment of whites, blues and greens. (Ahem, the messy bit is more of a me than a we, but let's not get bogged down in the details, okay?)

My giraffe was a great success. It seems that I have a knack for making my screen-printed transfers textured which is rather nice for a giraffe (I'm still not convinced this texture business is a good thing, but our lovely instructor assures me it is, and I plod along happily).

This week's homework: a complex or intricate design to be used with light-sensitive photo emulsion. Oh My.