Point de Gaze flower

My latest completed piece of needle lace is this Point de Gaze flower. The pattern is from Catherine Barley's book Needlelace: Designs and techniques classic and contemporary but in the book the flower is not enclosed in a background.  I placed the flower in a tulle ground oval. 

I am really pleased with the flower itself but my tulle ground needs more practice.  The thread used for this is really fine, Brok 100/3 and took a bit of getting used to as my previous needle lace projects have been in substantially thicker thread.  I have to admit that a certain amount of cursing took place while making this!

Cross stitch work in progress

I've been creating like mad over the last few months but a lot of my work is destined for exhibitions/competitions so I have been keeping it under wraps.  In my "spare" time I have recently started working on a cross stitch.  I have not done any cross stitch for about 20 years; I have looked at a few kits but was always disappointed by the lack of detail in them. 

Last month I discovered Heaven and Earth Designs and was blown away by their designs and the fine detail.  So I downloaded a few (!) and started work on this one which I will reveal bit by bit as I stitch it.  The above picture is the first compleed section.  The design appears black and white from a distance but is made up of 21 colours of the most subtle shading.

I am stitching this using 25 count Lugana fabric, so each cross stitch is about 1mm each side.  I'm using DMC embroidery floss, 1 strand at a time and there is a Kreinik sparkle thread in there as well.  I expect this will be a long term project that will be picked up and put down over a number of months - if not a year!

More Aemilia Ars needlelace

With lots of time away and evenings to kill I've been able to do a lot of work on my Aemilia Ars needlelace.  Here is the piece I have just finished, a centre and edging both designed by Margaret Stephens.  They are mounted onto linen with buttonhole stitch round the central piece and two rows of pin stitch for the outer edging.  Some of my bars in the central piece are a bit wobbly but overall I am pleased with this piece.

Inspired by a tree!

It's amazing where you can find inspiration for shapes and colours if you have a look around.  Here is a photo of a tree trunk in King's Park Perth.

This has a great swirl pattern at the stub end of where a branch was cut off, lots of deep texture in the bark and great variation in colours in the bark itself and caused by shadows.

Last week I attended a 3 day workshop with Vilte and I interpreted this bark pattern in one of the samples I did that focussed on surface texture.  This sample uses tissue and paj silk fabrics, silk throwsters wast and mulberry silk.  The silk is all "glued" together through being felted with merino wool.

The finished texture is wonderful and I made a dress during the workshop following the same lines and colours as the sample.

Aemilia Ars needlelace

I am learning how to make Aemilia Ars style needlelace.  This is based on Punto in Aria (stitches in the air) which is Italian needlelace dating back to the 16th and 17th centuries.  I am lucky to have a wonderful teacher, Margaret Stephens, who has kindly sent me her course on how to make this lace.

My first few small samples I actually incorporated into the dress I made at the Eco-couture workshop last October.  Then I had a bit of a lull while I concentrated on other activities but recently I have been able to spend some more time learning this type of needlelace.  Here is a small circular piece.

Today I finished this larger square:

I need to work on straightening the edges and getting my scallops more even and a better shape.  It is good to learn a traditional needlelace, then I can break the rules and incorporate the stitches and patterns into newer designs!



The four elements masks - Air

This is the first in what I intend to be a series of masks depicting the four elements of Air, Earth, Fire and Water.

Air is made from two layers of Felbi batts, flat felted.  The felt was soaked in a thick solution of lux flakes in water then shaped over a plastic mask shape and manipulated into swirls and drapes.

The next step was painting with Stiffy fabric stiffener and acrylic paints.  It took a lot of paint to gain a good coverage.  I used some opalescent paint and sparking opal dust paint to add highlights.

For the stitching, I used needlelace techniques and stitched an outlining thread directly onto the mask.  Then I filled in on the right hand side with occasional beads included.

On the left hand side I did heavier beading, adding a bead at each stitch and using a white thread instead of the blue.

By making the needlelace directly on the mask it hugs the contours of the face nicely.  More beading was added centreing on each air swirl.

The finished mask:

I'm now on Etsy!

It's taken a while to get around to it but I have finally set up my shop on Etsy.  I have decided to separate out the lace making equipment sales from my textile work, so the lacemaking bobbins stay on my current website/shop at Panache Lace and the nuno felted scarves and textile work can be found on Etsy.

I had a big debate whether to change the business name to something more generic like Panache Designs but decided in the end to stay with Panache Lace but have the two operational branches - wow doesn't that sound posh!

At the moment I've only loaded half a dozen wraps onto the new Etsy site and I'm hoping to expand the range over time.