botanical embroidery

Confessions of a lucet owner

| ehpyle

using a lucet

Have I told you I’m the owner of a lucet? Probably not. It’s not the kind of thing that comes up in conversation. Or blogging. Also, it’s not exactly the coolest subject. But here it is – a simple little tool used to make cording.

On a trip to colonial Williamsburg last summer, I first caught site of a lucet, alongside thread winders, knotting shuttles, and other nearly-obsolete notions. Like this 18th century ‘pocket book‘, I knew I had to give the lucet a try.

I bought mine here, and struggled with various online tutorials to figure out how to use it. (If you ever find yourself wanting to learn, I liked this tutorial.) Most recently, I used my lucet on this embroidered felt needle book.

needlebook and needles

If you’re a regular reader, the embroidery will look familiar to you. This one, I made for myself, so I could throw out the plastic bag I’ve been using to store embroidery needles.

I jumped into the project without fully planning it. In the end, I had managed to design and execute the entire needle book without considering how it would be held closed when not in use. That’s where the lucet comes in.

needlecase with button

I found a button to apply to one side and then used my lucet to make a little cord loop to go over the button. So there you go, it might be a bit frumpy and obscure, but that little lucet came in handy after all.

needlecase with needles

Botanical Embroidery Pillow

| ehpyle

botanical embroidery on pillow

I’ll admit that I am often caught up in the excitement of new projects at the expense of finished or nearly finished work. So while not actually making any type of new year’s resolution (not my type of thing) I have been making a conscious effort to finish off projects which are nearly complete but stored on a shelf, waiting to be made into something or otherwise employed.

side view embroidered pillow

My first successfully finished item of this year is this pillow made from a piece of botanical embroidery I posted last November.

piece a pillow

Quite honestly, I did not love sewing this piece. I was in over my head with trying to set the embroidered linen into the surrounding fabric. Not a quilter, I had to work hard to make the angles and corners work out. (If I had included myself in this photo, you would see the crazed look that was in my eye at that point.)

side view of embroidered pillow

I can thank this extremely thorough tutorial on making welting for the relative ease with which I accomplished that part of the project. (I always knew to make welting on the bias, but now I know why!)

Overall, the experience confirmed the troubled relationship I have with my sewing machine, but I am thilled to have it finished, off the shelf and sitting primly on a chair.

embroidered galium on pillow

Botanical embroidery project

| ehpyle

embroidery floss, WIP

Last week, I wrote about the beautiful needlework of Gerda Bengtsson. This week, I’m sharing my own copy of one of her designs – embroidery of a bedstraw, or Galium plant.

galium embroidery

Most Galium are wild, frothy, unassuming plants. Their beauty lies in delicate arching branches, leaves that cluster around the stem in whorls, and dainty white or green flowers. Some species can be quite weedy and others, like sweet woodruff (Galium odoratum) are both ornamental and medicinal.

This embroidery by Gerda Bengtsson captures the beauty of Galium saxatile growing in a flat form. (It comes from Gerda Bengtsson’s book of Danish Stitchery, published in 1972.) The black and white photos probably don’t do justice to her work, but this project still seemed timeless and appealing to me.

tracing galium

To embroider my own version, I scanned the image from the book, printed it, and then traced the original shape. Since I enlarged the design a bit, I modified in some spots and had made most of the branches shorter.

transfering galium design

I then used a hot iron, transfer pen and tracing paper to transfer the design on to some white linen. Since the design was larger than the 8.5″ by 11” transfer paper, I had to improvise with stapling sheets together and my transfer was a bit light in some places. (Note to self: pin the transfer paper down carefully before ironing.)

embroidery work in process

I stitched away, filling the leaves in with satin stitch and tracing the stems with stem stitch.

It was a big project and took a few months. Over time, my transfer ink began to fade, eventually becoming non-existent. By the end of the project, I’d done enough of these stems and leaves that I was fine just making up where to stitch.

I tried to vary the shades of green, with the tips of the growing branches and leaves stitched in lighter shades. Overall, I’m pretty delighted with the outcome, though I have no idea what I’ll make out of it. Cushion? Wall hanging? If you have any ideas, I’m all ears!

overview galium embroidery