Velvet, Anyone?

Ahh, velvet . . . even the name has a warm, fuzzy feeling. As textures go, it is hard to beat, with its softness and shiny nap catching the light, making the color sing. Since we love to mix fibers and textures in our work, we were thrilled to discover this new product—a hand-dyed stretch velvet, by The Velvet Hook. We first tried this velvet a couple of years ago, when we began our Woodland Reverie series. We thought it would be perfect for our pussy willows and mushroom caps. And we were right! This unique fiber does not fray, so it is easy to gather and even needle-turn! It is superb for flower centers, adding dimension and texture, and creating interest in your appliqué designs. And because of the stretch, a little bit goes a long way!

As we have sung its praises as a great fiber for embellishing appliqué, Dianne—owner of The Velvet Hook—has offered to put together sample packages arranged by color so that we could offer them to you. Take a look at some of the ways we have used velvet in our designs.

 

In our Woodland Reverie Spring Robin, the pussy willows are made of velvet, gathered, stuffed, and sewn down to the branch.

The velvet mushroom caps in our Woodland Reverie Autumn Mushrooms really reflect the light! 

Alsatian Urn includes several velvet embellishments, seen below.

Gathered around a circle, it is the perfect center of this ribbon flower. Note how it catches the light!

The center of this flower is appliquéd with the velvet, and then stuffed for dimension.

Patterns and kits for Alsatian Urn are available on our website.

Next September, we will be teaching four of our Woodland Reverie blocks in wool at Baltimore on the Prairie. More pussy willows are seen above in the wool version of the Spring Robin.

And one of the new blocks is the Summer Fox, which also includes the velvet.

The gold velvet was perfect for replicating the conical center of a coneflower, and because of the nap, it didn't need added knots to give that effect.

The velvet was also ideal for these stumpwork blackberries. The beads blended into the stuffed velvet, and the stretch made them quite easy to create!

Our new Poinsettia Stocking kit features padded velvet petals and a stuffed velvet flower center. The velvet adds a richness to the poinsettia. Patterns and kits are available on our website.

Introducing Velvet Varietals

Hand-Dyed Stretch Velvet

by The Velvet Hook

Each package of hand-dyed stretch velvet includes five 6-inch square pieces of velvet, and we have four colorways available: Reds, Greens, Purples, and Yellows.

Reds and Pinks 

Various Greens

Purples and Magentas

Yellows and Light Oranges

We are thankful to Dianne Tobias from the Velvet Hook, who has been willing to work with us and has dyed several pieces especially for our designs. It may be a new fiber for you, but we think you might enjoy it as much as we do. Aren't the colors just spectacular?!!

To order velvet, go to our website, needleseyestories.com/shop. Supplies are limited, so don't wait too long to check it out! 

Alsatian Urn

In a perfect world, this post would be filled with pictures of our wonderful week of teaching at Baltimore on the Prairie at Lied Lodge in Nebraska. Sadly, COVID interfered with that perfect plan, but we are still anticipating with excitement the opportunity to visit next year,  September 8–11, 2021. You can visit the BOTP website, linked above, for all the details of the conference and see more about the classes we will be teaching, but we thought we would give you an "up-close and personal" tour of our blocks here on the blog. This week we will look at our first session, and next week, we’ll look at Session B. 

A couple of years ago, when I (Teri) visited Kara in Germany, we spent a day in the Alsace region of France. I loved the small villages and was enthralled by the stitching inspiration everywhere we looked. I took hundreds, maybe thousands, of photos of shutters, signs, buildings, etc., of potential designs. You may have seen a few in our work, in fact!

You don't see many functional shutters with this kind of charm here in Maryland!

We visited several small villages, including Riquewihr.

    

I loved the quaint charm of this village, from the colors of the buildings and window boxes to the cobblestone streets.

On a later visit to Riquewihr, Kara saw this stunning antique wardrobe. We both knew that it would make a beautiful appliqué design. Indeed, it inspired our Alsatian Urn, the first class we will be teaching at Baltimore on the Prairie 2021. 

Session A: Wednesday–Thursday, September 8–9, 2021

This class will explore a variety of materials to achieve textural dimension with our wool appliqué. We will be playing with different kinds of ribbon, threads, and stitches. Let's take a closer look at the elements of this block.

Wool and stuffed velvet flower with silk ribbon, silk and wool thread embroidery

Wool flower with silk and wool thread embroidery and a gathered ribbon leaf

Wool flower with silk thread and silk ribbon embroidery

Wool appliquéd flowers with embroidered wool daisy petals and silk ribbon leaves

Wool appliquéd flower with ruched and embroidered ribbon

Wool with silk thread embroidery and ruched ribbon tape

Wired-ribbon petals with wool and velvet center, with silk ribbon and thread embroidery

Wool urn with embroidered design 

We would be delighted to have you join us in our first class, Alsatian Urn. So many textures and so much fun!

Alsatian Urn, by Through the Needle's Eye

 

Examining Crazy Stitches

In November, I (Teri) wrote about a lot of three crazy quilts that Kara and I won in an online auction. (See Still Crazy...) I described two of them, but the third was—is—going to be the inspiration for a new project, so I decided to share that one on its own. There are so many lovely stitch combinations to study; it deserves its own post. After writing about my 2020 goals last week, I realized that this new project might be put on a back burner for awhile, so I thought I'd share the quilt with you now. 

At first glance, it is a pretty simple quilt, but oh, the stitching does draw some attention! We know none of the provenance of this quilt, but my imagination pictures its maker as a seamstress, who lovingly made dresses with beautiful hand-embroidered embellishments. That would have given her access to samples of silks and satins. Each piece in the quilt is unique, with only one or two repeats. She arranged them in rows of color families, placing the darker rows in the corners. The rectangular patches are set in black velvet, which serves as both sashing and border, and the diagonal rows are set in the style of subway tiles. And then, I think, our dressmaker decided to play, experimenting with various stitch combinations, showing off her skill set. Each patch is outlined with unique rows of decorative stitches on both of the longer sides, and each diagonal row is stitched with a different set of combination stitches. The rows of stitching are varied and creative, and many are quite intricate.

Here are just a few close-up shots to enjoy and glean inspiration:

Flowers are created with simple stitches—straight stitches, lazy daisies, knots—with very different looks.

The variegated thread gives the chain stitch at the top an interesting look, and those orange buttonhole wheels are fun.

Does anyone else see a row of moths in those cream stitches?!

What fun little dragonflies!

Sometimes simple stitches can create an elegant effect.

 So many fun combinations to study!

By far, my favorite part is the border of stitching around the entire quilt.

You can see by these corner shots how intricate the border is.

Did she plan the border, or just go from flower to flower, varying the color as she stitched? How I wish I knew her thoughts as she stitched this gem!