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| No beads added to the centers yet! |
Since I was seduced by beads and bead embroidery so many years ago, I have somewhat neglected my thread embroidery skills, if I ever really had any. Part of my new year's resolutions was to try something new, so I dug out an old book I'd purchased but never used, and put my needle to work: The Art of Dimensional Embroidery
by Maria A. Freitas.If you are proficient at thread embroidery, you'll see all kinds of imperfections and irregularities in my stitches. I just want you to know that I got better as I went along! My next step is to fill in the centers, with beads of course.
Added later: Here is the finished piece
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| Pistol stitch flowers |
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| Bullion and loop stitch flowers |
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| Knotted chain, bullion, cast-on, and pistol stitches |
The book features what is called the Brazilian style of embroidery, which is a raised form that usually features rayon threads. I used some rayon, but mostly stuck with the cottons, silks, and blends that I already own. I highly recommend Maria's book (all the stitches are shown as black and white drawings...very easy to follow), but if you'd like to see a few of the easier stitches online first before you decide, here are a few resources:
Loretta's Custom Stitchery
Brazilian Dimensional Embroidery
Copyright 2011 Cyndi Lavin. Not to be reprinted, resold, or redistributed for profit. May be printed out for personal use or distributed electronically provided that entire file, including this notice, remains intact.
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10 comments:
This is really stunning. I actually learned bead embroidery first, so I'm now in the process of learning thread embroidery - I'm finding that it's not difficult to learn, but you need practice to make nice even stitches; no shortcuts here.
By the way, did you see the button dress from CHA?
It was really fun to "get back to my roots". The evenness of stitches is what I was lacking when I began this piece, but it got better :-)
Thanks for sharing that button dress...that's amazing!
Aw, I love it. You really did beautiful work here, Cyndi.
Thanks Cherie. I'm happy with the colors, but I can see *all* the mistakes!
Wow! This is so very beautiful! I did some embroidery a (aherm) long time ago. Maybe I should take it up again :D
I'll bet it wasn't as long ago as it was for me, Limar ;-)
You did a beautiful job, Cyndi. If there are any imperfections, I certainly can't see them.
Thanks Eileen! I need more friends with bad eyes lol ;-)
I never was that great at embroidery. Maybe now that I've done a fair amount of bead weaving I might be better at it. I think your flowers look great, especially considering you haven't done this is awhile.
Thank you Tammy :-) Now that they have their beady centers in place, they look much better!
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