Today we are heading back to our very first flower, in this Mountmellick embroidery stitch along. My intention was always to put some filling in these petals. If we remember the photos of the lilies that I had right near the beginning of the stitch along, you may have noticed that lilies often have some spots on their petals. Depending on the lily, these may be very prominent or not even really there.
We’re going to make a feature of them on the petal, which will provide more texture and pattern for the overall appearance. The idea is to fill the petals with a scattering of French knots.
I’m using the darner needle (which I can’t remember if I mentioned it previously, but it should also be used for all the bullion knots too) to work the French knots. We use a darner needle because its eye is not much thicker than the shaft of the needle. For knots, where possible we use milliner’s or straw needles (two different names for the same type of needle). They are perfect for knot stitches as their eye is the same width as the rest of the needle, meaning that its much easier to pull the needle through the knot’s wraps. Unfortunately, milliner’s/straws don’t come in a large enough size for Mountmellick thread, so we have to use the next best option, which is darner needles. They’re not *quite* as good as straws, but they’re pretty good!
My French knots have two wraps each.
“Randomly” scattering things can be a little hard to do sometimes, so what strategy do I use? In actual fact, my French knots are anything but randomly placed, but equally they are not measured out.
I start at the top of the petal, with a French knot that is a little distance away from the buttonhole stitching. Then I move downwards, placing the knots so that they form the corners of approximately equilateral triangles. They’re deliberately not exactly equilateral, but I find that it does help to space them reasonably evenly, without looking like they’re all in neat little rows, like trees in an orchard!
I’ve also circled a spot where I did work a French knot, but took it out again, because it ended up too close to the buttonhole stitching. I wasn’t sure, so I put it in, then decided it didn’t look any good.
You can fill the other petals of the same flower similarly, but as the spaces are smaller, there’ll be fewer knots.
White Threads is the blog of Yvette Stanton, the author, designer, publisher behind Vetty Creations' quality needlework books and embroidery products.
I recently was in a class (another ethnic application) where we learned the granitos stitch. It seems like it would be appropriate here, or would it be excluded because it does not fit into the traditional repertoire of Mountmellick stitches? Or would the Mountmellick threads be too thick to successfully create the granitos?
Hi Terry, Granitos are lovely little lumpy stitches, but unfortunately are not suitable for Mountmellick embroidery. As Mountmellick is an historical style, we work with the stitches that were historically used, and granitos were not part of that.
As for whether the threads would be too thick… I’d say that its probably worth giving it a go, and if No3 is too thick, I’d say that No2 (the thinner weight), would work fine. But not for Mountmellick embroidery. 😉
Great tip about placing dots “randomly” – thanks 🙂
Yes, a lot of effort goes into “random”!
I too like that tip about placing the knots – well worth remembering!
great tip Yvette. Thanks