Embroidery

Or, Surface Embellishment with Threads and Other Stuff

Embroidery is the textile medium I've pursued longest on a more-or-less continuous basis. I started in 6th grade with an envelope of iron-on patterns, some J&P Coats floss and a denim jacket that my mother had sewn for me. With the typical child's scorn of hand made, I didn't think it very authentic, though at least it never occurred to me to whine (because I knew perfectly well it wouldn't do any good) for the more expensive article. The yellow wax patterns included, as I recall, a cluster of grapes and a ladybug. I tried stitching the ladybug first, with all six strands of floss, and results were pretty horrible. Eventually I settled down to using two stranded satin stitch, a preference I still retain when using 25 floss.

It soon dawned on me that I could draw my own designs, which I thought were prettier. Certainly I could easily compensate for the limited palette available---my only source, at first, was Minnesota Fabrics, and this was before the days when they carried DMC, or even before I knew DMC existed --and the fact that I could never remember, without a reference on my lap, how to do anything besides satin, chain, stem or french knot stitches. I've embroidered for close on a quarter of a century now, and am pleased to say that within the last year or so finally managed to memorize the boullion stitch.

After the jacket, I turned to chambray shirts, decorating them with unicorns and other fantasy characters. I was particularly proud of a monarch I put on one shoulder, because one day my mother tried to brush it off. Nevertheless I longed for more hues, especially realistic flesh tones, and was therefore enchanted when a coworker brought in a cross stitch project (a bedspread, still in progress, as far as I know) in colors I'd never seen before. She said she'd bought the flosses at a little town in Wisconsin. I reasoned if a little town could support a such a market, there must, in a big city like Detroit, be a similarly stocked shop. I was correct, and my quest led me to Needlearts, Inc, where I was eventually to learn some basic precepts of traditional Japanese silk embroidery, and where I still purchase the bulk of my embroidery threads.

freeform embroidered xmas stockings made by three generations of women in my family, including perhaps 2/3 of the roughly 15 year series I've made for relatives and friends (the oldest and newest need still to be photographed and/or completed, as of 11feb05 post date)