White Threads

Off to Queensland

This morning I’m off to Queensland for classes in Yeppoon and Gladstone. I’ll be teaching Portuguese whitework (we’re doing the Square Mat from “Portuguese Whitework”) and merezhka (we’ll be making the Climbing Rose Runner from “Ukrainian Drawn Thread Embroidery”).

I’m looking forward to meeting new people, sharing a love of embroidery with them, enjoying the warm Queensland weather, and having a lot of fun!

I’ll be arriving back next Wednesday. In the meantime, there will be no-one holding the Vetty Creations fort, so I apologise but I won’t be able to do anything about any orders until I get back.

Beating Around the Bush Market Day

In just a few weeks time, I’ll have a stall at the Beating Around the Bush Market Day. This fabulous stitchers and craft market day is open to students of Beating Around the Bush and the general public. I’ll have books, fabrics, threads, patterns etc available for sale. I’ll also have a display of projects from my newest book “Early-Style Hardanger”. Come and say hello!

WHEN: Saturday 8th October
WHERE: Immanuel College, Novar Gardens, Adelaide
TIME: BATB Students from 10am, general public 10.30am to 4:00pm
ENTRY: Free for BATB students. I did try to find out what the entry price is for non-students, but this information doesn’t seem to be readily available. Let’s assume that it wouldn’t be huge. My guess is in the $5-10 range (but this is just a guess!).

I’m loving learning

Learning about a local embroidery for one of my previous books.

One of the things that I am really enjoying about researching my next book is how much I am learning. Another is the fun of sleuthing.

As I research this book I am spending a lot of time searching through museum and library databases and catalogues in search of images and information about my chosen subject. Because I am dealing with another language and also dialects of that language, there is a lot of sleuthing to be done. Once I have used the most common term for what I’m looking for, then I use as many alternative terms as I can find. Things are not always catalogued as I might hope. I guess that has to do with items being catalogued by many different people (speaking/writing in different dialects) over many years, at different museums/libraries. Cataloguing appears to be a more inexact science than I would like.

When you find something, it can feel like a real victory. Over the past weeks I have expected that in one particular region, given the other embroidery that was common there, I would be very likely to find the style of embroidery I am studying on a particular item of clothing. It just seemed to me that it would be logical that they would have used it there. A museum curator had agreed with me that it seemed likely. However, I had looked and looked and found no evidence of it. Until this morning – I FOUND SOME! 🙂

I was looking through a range of images, checking each one, and suddenly, there it was: the embroidery I had been looking for! And it must be a fairly important example, because whereas the other items I had been looking at only had about 3 photos each, this one had 10, with many detail shots, showing exactly the sort of information I wanted to know. The Gymnast actually said to me, “I’ve never seen you get so excited about anything before.”

The other day I was looking at some images and I noticed a little detail in the stitching that I had not seen/noticed before. (Quite possibly I had *seen* it, but not noticed or understood what it meant.) I was so excited! It answered another of my questions that I had. Since that time, I have noticed it on another example, from a different region.

There is so much to be learned. Sometimes I just browse. I choose a wide search term and then just see what I can learn by observation. I’m not looking for anything in particular, just drinking it all in.

By observing, taking notes, looking at locations, dates, materials, motifs, and more, then by looking for patterns in that information, you can learn so much. From what I know, I can make hypotheses about other things, and then go looking for historical evidence to back up my hypotheses. Sometimes I find it, and sometimes I don’t. Sometimes it just sits there, niggling away as a question, until finally I use the right search term and find the evidence.

I am totally enjoying all that I am learning and discovering. What a joy! What a privilege!

Working on the new website

I’ve still not been totally well, so I’ve had a very quiet week, mostly working on the new website. It will be a total revamp. I’m making sure you know that so that when it goes live (don’t hold your breath…) you don’t think you’re in the wrong place. It will look totally different.

Over the past few days I’ve been working on getting the shipping working for the shop. Not an easy task. I think I’m getting closer to a way of getting it to accurately quote on shipping. The plug-in still needs some tweaking, but I am confident I will get there! The task over the next few days will be to weigh and measure all of my products and input that information.

In the sections on the different embroidery types, there will be lots of new photos from my research trips. Lots of pretty things to look at!

Hopefully the new website will be intuitive to use and easy to navigate. I’m working on simplifying things as best I can.

And the new website will be responsive, so it will work on your computer, your tablet and your phone.

I’ll keep beavering away!

Starching linen fabric

Hardanger shirt from Early-Style Hardanger

I have a linen shirt that I want to starch. I took myself off to the supermarket yesterday and was going to purchase some spray starch. I stood in the aisle and read the backs of the cans. Good thing I did, because each one said it wasn’t suitable for use on linen fabric. I was quite surprised because I thought starching linen fabric was a reasonably common thing! If there’s any fabric you might want to get the wrinkles out of, it’s linen!

I’m in Australia, so the brands I saw were Fabulon, Crisp (both aerosol and trigger spray) and the Woolworths home brand one.

Can you suggest an alternative product? I’m particularly looking for Australian products, however, as I realise that my readers are not all in Australia, others might be able to suggest products that others can use in the same situation wherever they are in the world. If you have suggestions, please suggest them AND say what country you’re in.

But please, *I’m* particularly interested in Australian products or solutions I can use to starch my linen fabric shirt. I’m also happy to hear of more traditional starching methods (ones that don’t come in a can). Thanks!

New linens from Weddigen

This morning I have uploaded some lovely new linens to the Vetty Creations website. They are from Weberei Weddigen (Weddigen Weaving) in Germany, who are manufacturers of high quality linen fabrics for hand embroidery.

At this stage, I have chosen to stock three of their fabrics: Weddigen 121 linen (50 count), Weddigen 160 linen (34 count), and Weddigen 925 linen (40 count).

Weddigen 121 linen, 50 count

Weddigen 50 count linen, Weddigen Artikel 121

Weddigen 121 linen is see-through.

Weddigen 121 linen is a simply lovely fabric that I just had to stock. It is a very lightweight linen, which is see-through. It is perfect for use in shadow embroidery and other embroideries such as fine white work, that require a lightweight, gossamer-ish linen. As it is evenweave 50 count linen, you could also do counted embroidery on it, if you were game!

Unfortunately I’ve come to things a little late with regards to this linen. It is no longer being manufactured, and therefore the stock that exists will eventually run out. I will continue to stock it for as long as I can.

Specifications: Weddigen Artikel 121 linen – 185cm wide, evenweave 50 count, 100% linen, bright white.

Weddigen 160 linen, 34 count

Weddigen 34 count linen, Weddigen Artikel 160

Weddigen 160 linen (34 count evenweave) is recommended for Schwalm embroidery by specialist Schwalm embroidery teachers in Germany. It can of course also be used for Hardanger embroidery, cross stitch and other counted embroidery. It is a lovely looking fabric.

Specifications: Weddigen Artikel 160 linen – 140cm wide, evenweave 34 count, 100% linen, bright white.

Weddigen 925 linen, 40 count

Weddigen 40 count linen, Weddigen Artikel 925

Weddigen 925 linen (40 count evenweave) fabric is also recommended for Schwalm embroidery by specialist Schwalm embroidery teachers in Germany. As with the 34 count linen, it can also be used for Hardanger embroidery, cross stitch and other counted embroidery. Because it is has so many threads per inch/cm, and is not “gappy” between threads, it can also be successfully used as a ground fabric for non-counted, surface embroidery.

Specifications: Weddigen Artikel 925 linen – 140cm wide, evenweave 40 count, 100% linen, bright white.

Is she…?
And so, these recommendations of fabrics for Schwalm embroidery and shadow embroidery might have your mind whirring… “Is she writing a book on Schwalm? Is she writing a book on shadow embroidery?” Sorry if it disappoints, but no, neither of these forms of embroidery are the subject of my next book.

All these linens are available on the Vetty Creations website. They are well priced, and while the prices are comparatively lower than other linens, the quality is definitely not lower.

Lacemaking in the Rio Olympics closing ceremony

Today we have a guest post from Regina Yatiyo Otake Mattosinho who lives in Brazil. She’s going to tell us a little about the lacemaking that was featured in yesterday’s Rio Olympics closing ceremony. If you’re like me, you were more than a little surprised that lacemaking was featured in the ceremony, but I was so happy that a textile art was given the world stage!

Links to images from the ceremony, in case you missed it:
From the Sydney Morning Herald
From Team USA media
From the Sydney Morning Herald

Over to Regina who provided this information to me on Facebook. She kindly consented to me sharing it with you.

I don’t know much very well, the origin and the history behind this lace. The pattern [shown at the ceremony] is a bobbin lace. In Brazil we call it as “Renda de Bilro”. (*It’s better search the Wikipedia for the Portuguese pronuncation of it.) The Portuguese brought it when they came to colonize Brazil.

“The bobbin lace is made on a cushion with horsehair stuffing, sawdust or cotton; such cushion is generally coated fabric whose colors do not harm the view. The pad can be stuck on a wooden support, but there are tenants who simply support a chair or stool. The cushion is the basis on which to perform the lace and it attaches the card to the scheme over which will braiding bobbins , ‘ as they are concerned the bars with pins. The bobbins are a kind of wooden rod provided with a small head at one end. About it winds up the line to make income . The bobbins are always used in pairs.” Original link in Portuguese.

The pins used are thorns that every northeast house had on the backyard. It is a typical cactus in some regions of Brazil. As it is an organic material, it doesn’t oxidize.

Depending on the size of the work could take from 6 hours to 3 months to be finished.

The music that was sang during this presentation, is a Brazilian folklore song. Legends say that it was composed by an outlaw, known as Lampião. In the lates 19th and begining of 20th centuries. The chorus says something like “Lacewoman please, teach me how to make lace then I will teach you how to flirt.” It is registered on a movie “O Cangaceiro” from Lima Barreto. Lampião was a kind of Brazilian Robin Wood.

Here we have many others kind of lace that still being produced. They were brought by the European since the begining of Brazil as a colony. You can see some of them it this link that is in Portuguese.

I hope this help you to know a tiny little bit about Brazilian culture. That is very complex, because is formed by many origins and influences. Not only from the Brazilian Indian (that was also shown during both of the Olympic ceremonies) culture but also from many other countries. Including me, that I’m a Japanese imigrants’ grandaughter, married to a Portuguese descendant.

Thanks so much to Regina for sharing some of your culture with us. We really appreciate it.

Another review of Early-Style Hardanger

Early-Style Hardanger by Yvette Stanton
This morning Karen Platt contacted me to let me know she had reviewed my newest book “Early-Style Hardanger”. You can read her review at yarnsandfabrics.co.uk.

A small excerpt:
Yvette Stanton’s books are all superbly created – she gives so much more than anyone can expect of her. From the clearest photos and diagrams as well as instructions to the exciting designs, this book is so professional. I wish all creative embroidery books looked like this.

Thanks so much for your enthusiastic review, Karen!

Singleton Mountmellick lilies workshop

I went to Singleton in the Hunter Valley on the weekend for a workshop of Mountmellick lilies. Two projects were on offer, both featuring lilies: a cushion and a runner.

Some of the participants of the class, hard at work.

We had a lovely time, playing with stitches. We solved the problems of the world with our discussions (don’t we always, whenever we embroiderers get together to stitch?), and we enjoyd good food and good company.

Thank you to the lovely ladies of Singleton Embroiderers Guild Group for your warm hospitality. Your stitching was beautiful, and thank you for showing me all your completed projects from our last class together. I enjoyed my time and it was great to be back amongst you again.

Mary Corbet Hardanger book review

Before I hop in the car to head off to Singleton for a lovely weekend of Mountmellick embroidery classes, I just wanted to make sure that you’ve seen Mary Corbet’s review on Needle’n Thread of “Early-Style Hardanger”.

If you’re familiar with Mary’s book reviews, you know how thorough they are, and this one doesn’t disappoint. Lots of photos of the book and lots of text pointing out all the things she loves about the book.

Mary has said some very nice things about the book, summed up here:

“In a Nutshell
If you love whitework, if you love counted whitework techniques, if you love Hardanger, if you love regional styles of embroidery, if you love linen, if you just love good instructional books – you’ll love this book! And you’ll want it in your needlework library!”

But don’t take my word for it, go and read her whole review!

I have asked Mary to change one thing, and it is her prerogative if she does or not: in the last bit about where you can get the book, I’ve asked her to mention that it should be available in most good needlework stores, and if they don’t have it, they should be able to get it for you. I think it is really important that we support not only needlework authors, but needlework shops. If we don’t, there won’t be any left for us to enjoy.

So for those of you who don’t have a local needlework store, you can purchase your copy here from me at Vetty Creations. I’m happy to post worldwide.

Thank you Mary for your kind words and wonderful review.