Paris project comtinues

Not such a long gap this time so straight on with the post.

The first piece was inspired by a carved motif on a door not far from our hotel.

 This is the motif itself.

I made a pattern of the motif.

I used a lovely red satin weave fabric for the base to work the gold motif. The lid was for the main design. I padded the main motif shape and hand satin stitched the fan design. Another version of the design was created on the sides.  They were machine stitched and painted with gold metallic paint.

As always, I created a mobile using the text of Paris.  Each letter was stitched out by the machine and a digitised distorted Paris text stitched out for the header of the mobile.

Obviously, the tower itself would be the base of many designs including this one of a needle case. I wanted to use up some serendipity paper so I ironed vilene onto the back to give it body and strength. I made different sized stencils of the tower and stenciled them onto the paper. The largest and front tower was over-stitched with gold thread to represent the structure of the tower. I used one of my Eiffel tower charms to hang from the tie.

I distorted the text of Paris then digitised it to stitch out on the front of a needle case.  Dyed blue fibres were laid down on the front of the folder and held in place using vermicelli stitch and gold thread. The digitised name was machines and then outlined using gold Japanese thread.

The pyramids at the Louvre were a needed inclusion to the project.  I wanted to represent the glass panels of the pyramid.  I decided to use Irisé cellophane paper.  This was laid over painted pelmet vilene with machine pattern stitches for the framework.

It turned out better than I had hoped.

One of the entrances to a metro station used a contemporary design of circles and coloured glass.

I decided to create some jewellery using the circles as the design source.  I rarely throw anything away and the little metal or plastic rings from old bras were just the job. I covered them with buttonhole stitch using a silver fingering thread. When all were complete, I stitched them together into a pendant necklace and a bracelet.

Continuing with the tube station entrance design, I decided to make a design to stitch onto the front of a note book.

Different sized rings were covered with silver fingering and then joined together into a design for the front of a note book book.

A further use of the distorted windows was to make the cover for a needle case.  the design was printed onto fabric, slightly padded and then machine quilted following the edges of the design.

A different distorted effect was printed onto fabric and once again machine quilted and made up into a make-up purse.  I used gold buttons filled with tiny beads to cover the stitches of the press fasteners.

That is it for this post.  More to come.
Cheers everyone.

More of the Paris project

Another long gap between posts but at last the time to post.
There are a number of what are known as 'ponds' around the pyramids outside the Louvre in Paris.  They have now become cracked and damaged and are now,  I understand, undergoing renovations. I took photographs of the tiled floor and through the water they were a lovely range of pastel blues, greens and yellows.

I took two slightly different photographs of these tiles and they inspired me to create two large painted and stitched panels.

One of my favourite buildings in Paris is the Grand Arch at La Défence.  It has many windows with lots of reflections in them.

I wanted to interpret this in some way and came up with the idea of having different iconic places in Paris in each of the windows. The windows were replicated in the sides and lid of a box.

The images in the windows were printed on clear acetate.  The cross members of the windows were made from button hole bars.
After creating the oak leaf vessel and bag tag, I continued with the oak leaf theme and made an oak leaf tassel. I made three oak leaves from pelmet vilene for the header of the tassel.

While I was on with making tassels, I decided to make an Eiffel Tower tassel using the same method.

The tower is decked out with lights for  nightly light show so I used beads down the joins to represent this.
Following the theme of iconic places in Paris, I printed more of them on the acetate sheets and used them on the flap of a hand bag.

The body of the bag was dark green acrylic velvet.  Not easy to work with and so very messy.  Bits everywhere!! However, it looks nice.
I have already used the Arab Institute building as inspiration for a number of pieces and this wall of tiles was used again to create another piece.

I used a distortion filter on this image of the tiles.

To create the fabric I used a mono printing method.  I spread a mixture of gold paints over a sheet of teflon and using my finger created the scrolls.  I pressed the fabric onto this paint to print it onto the fabric.  I added the black swirls with a brush.  The resulting fabric was made up into a purse and I used a swirly design to quilt the fabric.

Finally, from another iconic structure, the Moretti tower in La Defence, I created a panel.

The tower is very colourful with painted tubes of colour. Again, I applied a distortion filter to create a pattern.

I couched coloured yarns as close as possible to the colour of the tower and the design.

Well, that's it for this post.  Hopefully it won't be so long to the next one.
Cheers to everyone who visits.

Successful exhibition and workshop then back to Paris

My exhibition at the Scottish textile museum in Hawick, Scotland seems to be very successful with lots of positive feedback. I was very pleased with the way the pieces had been displayed. A lovely job.

The workshop too was very successful with everyone enjoying trying new things and some right out of their comfort zone.

The will be another workshop at the end of August.  I hope it will be as successful as this last one.

Back to my Paris project now.

On either side of the gates to the Tuileries garden which leads to the Louvre, are two towers which are decorated with oak leaves and acorns.

I used the design of the oak leave for a couple of pieces.

First I had to make a pattern.

As the original was a tower I decided to make a round  vessel. I used pelmet Vilene as the base material, painted it, added a mesh then using the traced pattern machined the acorns.  Once the machining was complete, I painted the leaves and acorns. The top edge was cut and the Vilene rolled and a base stitched to it.

I also made a bag tag of a single oak leaf.

The aperture metal windows of the Arab centre inspired a bracelet made from faux silver leather.

There are a lot of tiny silver beds on the centre of the star.

The internal tiled wall inspires another bracelet.

The architecture of La Défence inspired many pieces.  This wall of windows was first changed with a colour filter and then distorted.

This is the resulting art quilt.  I created a pattern and then traced it onto white calico.  I really enjoyed painting this piece before it was free machined.

Still in La Défence, the wonderful structure of the Grand Arch inspired this art quilt.

And that is it for now.
Cheers

Jewellery, books and purses

Time for another post.

There will be only three pieces from my Paris project this time.  One is of the jewellery I created using part of the image of the American embassy door panel.  I used the technique of printing onto transfer printer paper for dark colours and then applying this to navy blue felt.  The pieces were then hand stitched and beaded. There is a bracelet, a necklace and a pair of earrings.



The second Paris piece is also an example of the pocket booklets that I will be  teaching in my workshop at the Scottish textile museum in Hawick, Scotland in July.  I hope to cover a number of different techniques one of which can be used for decoration on the front of the booklet.  I have chosen to use the fluer de lis design to create the embossed metal shim motif for the front of this booklet.



At the end of August, I will be teaching another workshop and this time we will be making purses.  I have already made a number of samples to help the students create their own.
We will be recycling fabric stripped from skirts and dresses no longer in use.  We will be over-dying, stamping, stencilling, quilting etc.  The following images are all the little purses I made.
The first one was created to fit into my Paris project.  It uses the stencils I made of the Paris text and the Eiffel tower.



The next one - over-dyed fabric from a skirt then quilted.



Over dyed fabric from an unused pillow case which was then stamped and hand embroidered.




Recycled over dyed fabric from a skirt then free machine quilted picking out the design of the original fabric.





This was one a long thin silk scarf. It was quilted and gold braid added.






Dyed pelmet vilene with bits of metallic sheer under a black sheer fabric which was then decorated with lines of machine patterns.



This next purse began as a 'mop up' wet wipe.



The last purse was another mop up.


As you can see, I have used a number of different mixed media techniques, all simple but effective.
I have already sent a selection of textile pieces which have been displayed to advertise the exhibition starting in July and runs through until September.  Fingers crossed it will all be successful.
Cheers for now