Hot Off The Press

When I was doing my A Level in Textile Product Design we all had a go at using some fabric that you could feed into an inkjet printer and print onto like paper. I think the technician had to cut the fabric to size and there was a solution you had to soak it in and leave to dry for it to work. Also, you had to feed it into the printer from the back. The results were reasonably successful, but I imagine it was a awful lot of faff and that's why we only ever did it once. Luckily some smart person has simplified the process greatly and you can now buy pre-cut, pre-treated sheets of A4 fabrics, both washable and non washable, and in cotton, linen and silk. Amazing!

I'd been planning to try some out for a while so I ordered a starter pack from this site, which inlcudes an A4 sheet each of cotton, cotton lawn, linen, silk and silk organza. One of the things I wanted to do was try and reproduce my hand embroidery on decorations and accessories. I love embroidering and how fluid it is compared to, say, sewing purses or folding books, but it takes a long time and that increases the final price considerably. I'm not at all against charging lots of money for things when it's justified by the work involved, but I don't want to sit at a stall for hours on end with lots of beautiful things that no one can afford. (sometimes it's hard enough with very reasonably priced work, but when people think a craft market is basically the same as a jumble sale there's not much you can do) Wouldn't it be nice, I thought, if you could have the look of a hand embroidered piece without spending a fortune on it?

As we are over the middle of the year 'hump' it is sadly acceptable for me to start thinking about (whisper it) Christmas. So, my first experiments are of a decidedly festive nature, and for that I apologise. Using some of the leftover linen from my vintage tablecloth and red stranded cotton (and 3 episodes of The Sopranos, and lots of cups of tea, and Poirot) I produced these:

Redwork heart on vintage linen. Lazy daisy, chain stitch, running stitch, french knots and back stitch.

The heart was first and quite restrained. The tree had a couple of false starts in green but the red seemed to make more impact on the white, and I didn't plan any of it out to start with, just added and filled in gaps as I went along. I've found Pinterest to be a great help when looking for embroidery inspiration, partifularly for less formal approaches than you'd find in books on the subject.

Redwork Christmas tree on vintage linen. Chain stitch paper chains, lazy daisy flowers, french knots and running stitch.

 With the embroideries complete I gave them a good iron and then scanned them and uploaded the images to the computer. After a little playing around in Photoshop this morning and a few test prints on paper I was ready to go with the fabric. I used the cotton lawn for these, a nice smooth weave and natural feel. The fabric comes backed with paper and goes straight in your ususal paper tray, paper side up. Set your print quality to Best and away you go! I find it easiest, once you've printed and left for 30mins or so, to mark your cutting lines on the paper and cut them out, then peel the backing off.

 With my printed designs ready I tested two ways of making hanging decorations. First up I used some gorgeous red 100% wool felt from Myriad and wundaweb-ed it to the printed lawn, finishing with a machine stitched edge, I prefer the zigzag, but think either would be better in a white or off white thread so as not to distract. The tree has an extra layer of medium interfacing between the layers too which makes it hang straighter. I like the simplicity of these, but I'm not sure if the tree has too much of the car air freshener about it, what do we think?

Next up I went for a tried and tested 'stitch and stuff' method, using red polka dot cotton for the back. I like the squishy-ness of these, and it's great to substitute the stuffing for lavender or other aromats. I'm currently on the lookout for festive smelling things if anyone has any tips on that? Perhaps steering clear of anything too pine-y as we'll be back in car freshener territory again.

As a start I'm quite pleased with how these have turned out, might have a couple more stabs at this idea and then settle on a final method. The other fabric sheets I have plans for too, there'll be more on those in future.

Today I realised I've also passed the 1000 mark on my blog views, woo hoo! I'll be doing a little giveaway to celebrate that in the next week or so, so stay tuned!

Retail Therapy, Part 2

In Christmases past I have tried to be superwoman and make all my gifts, or at least make one thing for each of my immediate family. I enjoy being able to make something specific for someone and know that it's exactly what they'd like and when time isn't an issue it's well worth the effort. But sometimes there just isn't time, and that was the case this Christmas. Instead I resolved to buy each of my family something handmade, and support my fellow designer-makers. Here are my handmade Christmas Highlights:

Both of these beautiful items are by Chatty Nora, a graphic designer based near York. The tote bags she makes are all so beautiful, it took me an age to choose one for my older sister, but as we are a family of cat lovers I think any one of them would have been perfect. I particularly liked the scrolling Art Nouveau text on this one. The Jane Austen quote poster was for my younger sister, and the picture here doesn't show just how much work went into it. All her posters are hand drawn in pen, so each one is unique, and I can't imagine the time that must take, I certainly couldn't have found anything better for my Austen addict sister!

This lovely sock yarn from DyeSpinKnitUK is hand dyed by Kerry, a fellow Merseyside Etsy Team member, and with another skein I bought, made the perfect present for my Mum, who's been knitting and crafting for as long as I can remember.
The colours in the yarns are so beautiful, and there's lots more amazing colours in her Etsy shop, it was hard not to choose things for myself while I was shopping for gifts!

I had a similar problem when I went to Landbaby, so much to look at and so much to want! It might sound odd but I always forget to look up in shops, eye level is buy level as the saying goes. I thought I'd seen everything there was to see  and was struggling to choose, and then I glanced up at the top shelves and saw so much more!   I managed to restrain myself though and only came away with presents, a lovely pink felt brooch by Love Ruby Red, and some amazing birdie hair slides by Layla Amber for my friend Jo. I don't have a picture of them but here's some lovely budgie studs, and you can see other lovely illustrated items in Landbaby or in her Etsy shop.

I'll admit I struggled with my Dad, handmade for men is always a little trickier, but I'd seen this for sale from one of the exhibitors at the Liverpool Design Festival, and it seemed just the thing, not handmade but definitely not high street either, a happy compromise!

Next time, a tale of retail woe....