With thanks

Wanted to make a 'thank you' card which was stitched, and this blog posting gave me some indirect inspiration.  Design Sponge uses a threadless sewing machine to stitch holes into a piece of card, something I've done before but had pretty much forgotten about. 

I appropriated the idea and used it to punch holes for the letters, using a pin for the curves which were too tricky for my machining.  The stitches are either chain or Holbein, with a buttonhole wheel for the 'O', and some french knots on the flowers.  All in all, fairly quick and fun to do.

Ro Hae Sin 노혜신

Popped into the Ceramics section at the V&A yesterday, and was very taken with these pieces in the modern Korean room.

They're by a Korean artist called Ro Hae Sin 노혜신, and according to this blog, she meticulously builds up layers of different colours, then scores the pattern into the work, revealing the hidden colours.  I love the tactile feel of the spheres, the sugared almond colours and the multi-layered patterns.  I've been pondering spherical embroidered pieces for some time, and hopefully these will prove to be fertile inspiration.

Fishy

This project was an idea from my OH: he asked his niece and nephew to draw some fish, and then we chose a couple to embroider. 

Yes, I did say 'we': it was his first foray into the world of embroidery.  He did confess that the best part was seeing it finished, so not sure he's a convert yet, but we shall see.

The one above I've nicknamed 'skeleton fish', and I think the second one has a bad cause of some contagious vomiting disease, but am really pleased with how they turned out. 

They were surprisingly quick to produce (probably helped by the liberal use of bondaweb), and were completed in a couple of evenings.  Skeleton fish has bullion knot bones, a buttonhole stitch wrapped eye and detached chain embellishment; vomiting fish has french knot spots, a bullion knot tongue and satin stitch teeth. 

I may suggest this as a future project for my local Young Embroiderers - we could have a whole ocean full.