| Take
up freestyle hand embroidery and use your new skills to adorn
twenty projects. There are some imaginative choices for items
to decorate in here, ranging from the ubiquitous cushion,
egg cozy and pin cushion, to a hair barrette, decorated coat
hanger cover, oven mitt and sewing machine cover. The book
is divided into four seasonal sections, starting with a few
pages showing the featured embroidered flowers. Then follow
the projects, although not all of the flowers are used --
some only appear at the back as patterns. Each project has
staged photographic instructions that are easy to follow even
for those fairly new to sewing projects, together with a picture
of the finished item in situ, a list of what fabric and thread
you need, plus a list of stitches. The color palette is shown
as a key with actual photographs of stitches worked with the
thread (DMC), a nice touch. Some patterns can be measured
out directly; others appear as patterns in their projects
or at the back, either full sized or requiring sizing. This
does not need to be done on a computer or copier, but dimensions
are listed so you can draw out the patterns yourself.
All the embroidery stitches are shown at the back and have
been chosen to suit the subjects, so range from standard freestyle
stitches, such as long and short, French knots, and chain
to more exotic offerings like granitos stitch, ghiordes knot
stitch, and double drizzle stitch. There are also projects
involving beads, even a bit of ribbon embroidery, and stumpwork
to add interest to the embroiderer and show what a bit of
hand stitching can do. At the back are also all the drawn
patterns for the flowers etc., with indications as to which
stitch goes where, plus how to do the various types of fancier
work. Under the heading of "Getting Started," you
can find out about threads, transferring methods, resizing,
and what you need to kit yourself out as a hand embroiderer.
As for the patterns, choose from mimosa, plum blossom, yew
berries, cosmos, safflower, wild strawberries and others,
along with bees, butterflies, snowflakes and other accents
(over 45 of them). This is a lovely book destined for many
a keeper shelf that would be ideal for beginners upwards.
If you cannot find a good range of embroidery materials locally
try www.searchpress.com
for a list of suppliers. |
