Thursday 3 April 2008

Gold cuff

The magazine Design-IT arrived today with one of my pieces on the front and the article for it inside. Nice start to the day.

I made two postcards yesterday to send to friends - they were copies of one of my mini panels - that's the only way I can part with my work - hope they don't mind.

My OH brought a bag full of books home from the camera club last night. The wife of one of the members died and he sent me her embroidery books because he knew I did embroidery. Need to find a home for most of them as some are repeats or not my field. It was a kind gesture.

I keep getting distracted by a pair of Dunnock collecting moss to build a nest in the hedge just outside the window. They are my favourite bird. They have a beautiful song - similar but much sweeter than the blackbird.

Now for a little workshop.


I have been making some jewellery using the Ancient Egyptians as the design source to add to the project.
Most illustrations of the Egyptians show them wearing broad wrist bands so I decided to make one using fabric and fibres.

First I made a sandwich of sheer fabrics with a filling of dyed synthetic fibres.

This was pinned to soluble fabric stretched in a frame.



I used spirals and a simple flower which were used by them for decoration.
I drew the design on the soluble fabric so had to work from the back. I couched gold twist following the design.
Once the design was applied I pulled some cord through a length of gold Rowan knitted tube yarn to make it solid. Then I used a zig zag machine stitch to couch the gold yarn in rows along the top and bottom. I had to unpick and restitch part of the top two rows to smooth then out. You can probably see where that was as I took the photo before I altered it.
Once the stitching was complete it was removed from the soluble and the surplus fabric cut away using a soldering iron to seal the edges.

Loops of gold covered elastic and two gold beads were used for fasteners.






















Simple to make, comfortable to wear and washable!

4 comments:

Purple Missus said...

What a gorgeous piece Shirley. So simple and yet so stunning.
Did you machine around the edges after burning the surplus fabric away.
Keep looking for soldering iron evidence i.e. burnt edges, but can't find any :)

vivien said...

congratulations :>) - we need a photo of the mag and article!

sharon young said...

Hi Shirley
I agree with the Vivien, where's the pic of your success? Congratulations.
What a lovely idea , the wrist bands, and a great tutorial. I was fascinated to see how you'd framed your work for stitching, I always use one of those expandable machine hoops.

hippopip said...

Brilliant bracelet,I also vote for a look at the 2 pieces in the magazine.Pippa