Tulips

I was given a beautiful bunch of tulips which lasted and lasted. Eventually I had the chance to sit down and play with sari ribbons (a favourite) and do a bit of mindful (mindless?) stitching. I made four small stitched pieces - two 'postcards' to send, the old-fashioned way, and two for travelling books.

The Flowers
© Karen Rowe

The Design
© Karen Rowe

Fish

Sue has sent a fish to add to our shoal – now a shoal of three! Does three constitute a shoal? Looking forward to seeing more.

Fish
© Sue King

Canvas Bag

I inherited a number of embroidery transfers from my mother in law and wanted to use this one in its entirety - text and date (1936). To achieve this I glued the transfer to some muslin and then free machined over the design. I then faffed around for months trying to decide what to do with it and couldn’t commit to anything. Then during Coronavirus lockdown I spontaneously stitched it to a canvas bag as it really wasn’t a big deal in the great scheme of things.

Bag
© Lynn Pilgrim

Bag Detail
© Lynn Pilgrim

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Bag Detail
© Lynn Pilgrim

Modern Boro

Inspired by Japanese traditional ‘mending’ or ‘boro’ technique. Denim, Sashiko, tweed and silks used in a patchwork of varied appliquéd fabrics - lace, denim, leathers and labels.

Boro (Before)
© Maureen Ergineli

Boro Detail(Before)
© Maureen Ergineli

Boro (During)
© Maureen Ergineli

Boro Detail(During)
© Maureen Ergineli

Fish

"Here are a couple of fish I made, testers for a project that I will be emailing out to Oxford EG members very soon!" (Based on a project created by Seasalt)

Sample Fish
© Karen Rowe

Daisies in the Lawn

“I've got a rubbish lawn but lovely daisies. Remember when we all did Richard Box daisies? Maybe time to have another go?”

Or, if you have a ‘Richard Box Daisy’, why not share it with us?

Daisies in the Lawn
© Alex Messenger

'Richard Box' Daisies
© Alex Messenger

Ancient Vases

“Inspired by the ancient vases in the Pompeii exhibition at the Ashmolean Museum I created these pieces out of mixed media and stitch. The backgrounds are textured prints on paper printed on a gelli plate and the vases are either gelliprints on paper or fabric made from papers and ephemera laminated with tissue, coloured with inks and then embellished with free machine embroidery. The vases have been stitched in place and then I added a small amount of stitching to embellish. I made these for the Art Week exhibition 2020 which will now be a “virtual Festival” https://www.facebook.com/OxfordshireArtweeks/”

Vase 1
© Lynn Pilgrim

Vase 2
© Lynn Pilgrim

Vase 3
© Lynn Pilgrim

Vase 4
©Lynn Pilgrim

Hares in the Moonlight

These images are from a piece I did for Oxfordshire Art Weeks 2019. I used up scraps of hand made felt left over from another project and found fabric which I embellished with free machine embroidery and then added the hares in the moonlight.

Hares in the Moonlight
© Lynn Pilgrim

Chocolate Biscuits

“Karen was inspired by a wine label, Alex chose chocolate biscuits....”

Chocolate Biscuits
© Alex Messenger

Virtual Workshop

I did a distance workshop with Ruth Singer around her criminal quilts exhibition. There were about 7 of us on a private Facebook group she set up, and she sent out kits with the photos printed on fabric beforehand. The experience was not the same socially as we couldn’t see each other and talked via messages but overall better than cancelling. This is my stitching. To date not yet finished but I seem to be very busy even though I am self isolating with my husband!

Photo 1
© Sue King

Photo 2
© Sue King

Photo 3
© Sue King

Fantasy Birds

When in Orissa we went to Raghurajpur, where we watched one of the village craftsmen engraving on treated palm leaf strips. We bought a piece to share and I chose a piece which showed animals and birds. Each of the designs was approximately 3cm square but modern technology allows size increases which allowed me to turn these two birds into free motion embroidery.

Bird
© photo Jane Treavis

Fantasy Bird
© Jane Treavis

Water Bird
©photo Jane Treavis

Fantasy Swan
© Jane Treavis

Edwardian Body

A picture of a piece done by the much missed Margaret Charlton in the late 80s or early 90s. It’s called Edwardian Body and was part of a series she did that married the two parts of her life. Margaret was a GP in Oxford for many years and really only started her creative side when she was approaching retirement. I was lucky enough to meet her when we were both doing city and guilds at Urchfont Manor and she was immensely supportive of all my textile efforts. The picture belongs to Amanda Smith.

Edwardian Body
© Margaret Charlton

Barbie:Icon?

This piece was made for an exhibition entitled 'Iconic Women'.

I was never a fan of Barbie, but she is definitely iconic! She is undoubtedly a very strange shape once she has been up to life size, seen here standing next to 'Mrs Average'. The more I investigated her the more interesting she became. The two figures are made from fine Vilene and mounted onto sheer fabric which has lots of information (some good, some bad, some weird!) about Barbie laminated onto it.

Barbie:Icon?
© Karen Rowe

Leaves on the Canal

On a warm, late sunny afternoon I sat and watched the leaves floating by.

Done for an exhibition in 2010. Layers of dyed chiffon with hand stitching on each layer of running stitch and French knots. Individual leaves made of layers of muslin, silk and chiffon stitched and wired.

Leaves on the Canal
© Alex Messenger

Queen of Flowers

This piece by Carol-Anne Conway is stitched in a Japanese embroidery technique known as ‘fuzzy effect’. As far as I know this technique is unique to Japanese embroidery.

It is stitched on a special ground fabric that has a pronounced weft valley. The threads are stitched into the valley and then couched with either short stitches perpendicular to the foundation thread or with longer diagonal stitches. By using different thicknesses of foundation thread and by altering the colour of the couching threads, a rich composition can be created using a limited pallet of colours.

Queen of Flowers
© JEC/Carol-Anne Conway

Detail of left-hand flower
© JEC/Carol-Anne Conway

Detail of right-hand flower
© JEC/Carol-Anne Conway