AMATEUR: researcher, translator, needleworker. I am not an expert nor a teacher nor a designer.
I do not get paid for any of the tips or information that I write about, nor do I get any kind of kickback from any website that I recommend. This information is given wholly from the desire to share my experiences and help those who would like to learn more about Italian Needlework. My interests are my *hobbies*.
The publisher Nuova S1 has told me that he can accept PayPal as a method of payment and that the shipping costs are 22,00 euros which is about $30.00 USD. This is for tracked packages. It seems the shipping costs are the same for one or two DVDs. Send an email to order.
I'd love to hear from you regarding how it goes and what you think of the DVDs!
I always start out thinking that my next trip to Italy will be all long, relaxing days doing research or studying museum collections. I don't know why I think this as the trips always fly by and are full of frenzied trips to see as many people as possible. I always end up not being able to do all the things I wanted to and offending people that I am unable to visit. When I get back home I try to make sense of all the hurried snatches of things I've seen and done and resolve that the next trip will not be so jam-packed. I do however get things done and this trip I got to go to three museums that I've wanted to visit for a long time. One was the Museo di Tessuto in Prato, another was the Museo della Tappezzeria in Bologna and the one I'm going to tell you about today was the Museo del Ricamo in Pistoia.
An easy train ride from Florence, you can arrive in Pistoia in about 45 minutes, I'm not sure if you can take a bus in less time, I took the regional train which makes a few stops along the way but Pistoia is only 40 km from Florence. I was lucky to have Maria Elide Melani from the embroidery school Ago Aga e Fantasia waiting to pick me up from the station in her car. I'm sure there is a bus that can take you into the centre of town from the rail station. We did not head directly to the museum from the station as it was too early so I can't tell you how long it takes to get there but Pistoia is a relatively small town.
As the Embroidery Museum is run by volunteers, it's wise to double-check that they are open before making the trip. We arrived expecting there to be a lady that Maria Elide knew but instead her husband was taking her shift as she had had to attend to other business. The museum has a large collection of pieces and consequently they are always rotating the items on display. Maria Elide has been there many times but the day we went, she said there were pieces displayed that she had never seen before. This makes repeat visits interesting.
The first thing I noticed was that the placards were in English and Italian and that the English was good! Whoever is doing translations for the museum has done an excellent job.
Image copyright Museo del Ricamo
While the Embroidery Museum is indeed small (there are only two exhibition rooms), there is a valuable collection housed here and you could spend many days studying the excellently displayed and well-lit pieces. In the second room are two large storage cabinets filled with drawers full of embroidered things. Lots of Punto Antico, Casalguidi and even some Lamporecchio embroideries along with many other Italian and classic needlework techniques are to be found here along with gold and silk embroideries too. The elderly custodian showed us an amazing bedspread embroidered by his mother when she was young.
An exciting thing to find out was that the museum offers a research centre, documentation, didactic and historic study. I will definitely be going back!
You can watch a quick YouTube video which is narrated in Italian but which has a few photos of the interior of the museum and a few pieces of it's collection. The narrator says:
Passing through Pistoia, when you are in the Piazza del Duomo, don't miss visiting the museum, you will be amazed. Even in a few minutes you can see the most important finds. The entrance is free, the personnel are available, cordial and competent.
The Rospigliosi Palazzo is the home of the Embroidery Museum, a cave of wonders constructed with knowledge by patient hands. Exhibited here are hand-made articles embroidered in many techniques from the 17th to the 20th century. There are embroidered trousseaux, clothing, tablecloths, doilies and much more. Sacred vestments and antique ecclesiastical clothing of great quality are on display.
Periodically the museum gives embroidery courses. The embroideresses have produced and continue to produce cushions, purses and antique clothing. A 62 segment quilt was made in 2012. Francesco del Cossa's embroideresses.
In the hope that these few hurried images may have stimulated your interest, we await you certain to not disappoint.
Four days before I left for Italy in September, I received an email from Bianca Rosa Bellomo of the Associazione Culturale "I Merletti di Antonilla Cantelli" in Bologna. She was putting the finishing touches on a couple of Aemilia Ars needle lace DVD instructional videos that the Associazione had made in collaboration with the Nuova S1 publishing house and there was provision for subtitles in English - could I check over her translations?
Back of the DVD
We worked right up until the day before I left on English subtitles for both DVDs. The first one covers the basics of Aemilia Ars needle lace and includes the printed patterns for a lavette cloth with a border and a rose motif (48 minutes long). The second covers the same basics of Aemilia Ars needle lace and includes a printed carnation motif design (35 minutes long).
You can check out the DVD trailer on YouTube, be sure to change the settings to 1080pHD for high definition quality:
When we met in Bologna a week later Bianca Rosa told me all about how the Associazione's idea came to fruition and the incredible work involved in making the DVDs. She described all the things you never think about like the music selection, typography and the best camera angles. They were hoping to have the DVDs ready for the (then) upcoming handmade creativity exhibition Abilmente in Vicenza the weekend of October 17, 2013. Unfortunately I was unable to get to the exhibition but Bianca Rosa performed acrobatics in order to get me my copies of the DVDs before I left Italy for home.
I was going to Ferrara to visit some friends and I emailed Bianca Rosa to tell her that I had to change trains in Bologna and that I would be thinking of her as I passed by her city. She responded that she'd meet me on the platform. Now, the Bologna central rail station has recently undergone massive improvements and it's huge! There are many entrances and exits to the platforms and great confusion can happen. The morning I left Florence for Ferrara there was a freak rainstorm and flash flooding which resulted in many of the local trains being cancelled due to damage along the tracks and huge delays with the trains that were running. Suddenly the half hour I had to change trains in Bologna became 5 minutes. I hit the ground running from my arrival platform in search of my (by now almost deserted) departure platform and upon arrival at the top of the stairs I didn't see Bianca Rosa anywhere. My train rang the bell that it was departing and I had to jump on immediately. When I arrived in Ferrara I contacted Bianca Rosa to apologize for leaving her hanging around the station for an hour wondering what had happened to me and we resigned ourselves to the fact that we would not see each other again before I left Italy at the end of the week.
Bianca Rosa however is a very determined lady for which I am profoundly grateful. She called my friend in Ferrara later in the day to say that she'd looked up my return train to Florence on the internet and even though this time I didn't have to change in Bologna, the train would still stop to pick up passengers there. She asked what carriage my seat was in and said she'd be waiting on the platform right where my carriage would stop and that I should jump down for a second and get the package she had for me.
It all seemed so simple.
My train left Ferrara on schedule and the rain had stopped. Five minutes outside of Bologna I got up and went to the doorway of the carriage to get ready to jump down at the station. All the lights in the train went out and we came to a dead stop. We sat there on the tracks for 20 minutes. Early evening in late October in the countryside of the Emilia-Romagna region of Italy means no lights in the darkness. I had returned my borrowed cell phone and therefore had no way of communicating with Bianca Rosa. I will admit that I thought about Harry Potter and the Dementors while we sat there on the tracks in the darkness. Luckily Bianca Rosa waited and when we finally arrived at the Bologna station, I jumped down, thanked her profusely and jumped back on the train instantly. I was afraid that it would leave right away as we were now behind schedule. I ran back to my seat with my parcel and looked for her out the window but she was gone. The train sat in the station for another 15 minutes. I thought about the little mini-visit that we could have had instead of that last panicked hug. Well, enough about my adventures, you're thinking: tell us about the DVDs!
DVD no. 2
Of course I couldn't watch them until I got home to Canada but I can tell you that they are worth all the acrobatics done to get them! They are priced very reasonably for the amount of instruction there is and if you're like me and have been fumbling around with Aemilia Ars needle lace on your own at home, just watching the execution of the lace and observing the way the piece is held, the usage of the thumb and the movements involved will be a great help to you.
Been struggling with those picots? Now you can see exactly how they are done. I really like the graphics and the way they illustrate which parts of the lace you are watching. Even with the sound off and no subtitles, it was very easy to see what was happening. The assembly of the support system is shown as are the various steps to changing threads when you run out in a wide variety of positions (eg. during filling stitches, during structure construction, while executing support stitches, while executing a petal, an arch and other motifs), detaching the lace from the support system, attaching the lace to fabric, attaching the fabric to the support system and many other interesting and valuable tips and tricks.
The Aemilia Ars needle lace DVDs are in PAL2 format which means that they won't work on your DVD/TV combination at home in North America but I watched mine without a hitch on my Macintosh computer - I can't tell you if a PC can do the same but I know that there are programs which allow you to view European formatted DVDs, best to inform yourself first if you have any doubts.
At the moment, the Aemilia Ars needle lace DVDs are only available directly from the publisher Nuova S1. I have talked to them and they are looking into shipping costs to North America and the possibility of accepting PayPal as a form of payment, I will update you when they get back to me. Lacis in California distributes their books but doesn't have the DVDs - you could try contacting them to see if they can bring the Aemilia Ars needle lace DVDs in for you. Please let me know if you are successful, so I can spread the news to others!
I've been back for a whole week after nearly a month in Italy and already the cold and rainy November days here have made the sunny warmth of Puglia, Lazio and Tuscany seem very far away. To chase away the blues, I'll tell you about my trip to Prato in Tuscany and the Prato Textile Museum.
Museo del Tessuto, Via Puccetti 3, Prato, Italy.
The regional train to Prato from Florence takes 20 minutes and the distance from the Prato Centrale railway station to the Museo di Tessuto is a five minute walk. I've wanted to go there forever and never investigated how easy a trip it really was, no excuses then for not going there every time I'm in Florence!
Since May of 2003 the Textile Museum of Prato has been permanently housed in part of the restored rooms of the old Campolmi textile factory. There is a great collection of photos, past and present at the Comune di Prato website. You can read the history of the Campolmi textile company here.
Pictured above: the voided silk velvet woven by Gianpaoulo Cherchiarini of the Fondazione Lisio inspired by Mercury's clothing in Botticelli's painting Primavera.
We were exceptionally fortunate to have a fascinating guided visit by the curator Daniela Degl'Innocenti, an extremely knowledgeable young woman who was able to explain the links between Prato textiles and famous renaissance artists, the rich textile history of Prato and it's people, recount the history of the Campolmi textile factory, show us Leonardo Da Vinci's innovations for textile production and so much more. I could have stood and listened to her for hours. The exhibition's collaboration with the Leonardo Museum in Vinci meant understanding Leonardo's designs for increased productivity for many of the steps in making textiles. Check out the models they've made from his specifications here.
We were even able to study a few of the lace pieces from a collection that the museum holds but are not yet on display as they are being catalogued - let's save that for another post.
The Museo di Tessuto bookshop was a treasure trove of publications that I've seen or read about online but never been able to leaf through and of course I wanted them all! Limited space in my suitcase meant that I was not able to bring home all that I desired but if you're interested in any or all aspects of textile documentation (weaving, spinning, dyeing, fashion, costumes, embroidery, lace and more) you'll definitely find something worthwhile there.
I highly recommend taking a guided tour, or if you have more time, they offer collection consultations and educational programs as well.
For more information about Prato's textile history, you can read Iris Origo's biography of Prato's famous medieval merchant Francesco di Marco Datini.
In 2011 I wrote a thesis for the EGA's Legacy Scholarship Program on Sardinian needlework with emphasis on two techniques specific to the area in and around Teulada. The edited thesis and projects became a two-part article series for EGA's Needlearts Magazine this year with the first part including a Punt'a Brodu project in the June 2013 issue and the second part including a project in Punt'e nù in the September 2013 issue.
Due to some unfortunate electronic difficulties the Punt'e nù project in the September 2013 issue has a couple of errors.
On page 14 the materials list should have 3 1/2" x 9 5/8" for the piece of organza.
On page 19 the photo J is incorrect and the text at the top of the page explaining how to end the thread at the end of the work is incorrect.
To end the thread when ending the work, take the needle through to the backside in the nearest ground fabric hole and slide the needle under 3 or 4 knots on the backside of the work (use a sharp needle to make this easier) to secure the end and trim the thread. (This is different than ending the thread when changing to a new thread and continuing on with the work. In this case both thread ends are secured under the newest first 3 or 4 knots with the new thread, pulling tightly to secure them and carefully trimming the tails of both the old and the new threads. Pay careful attention not to snip the working thread which will continue on.)
On page 20 the piece of organza (3 1/2" x 9 5/8") is folded in half to make a 3 1/2" x 4 13/16" bag.
I am sorry for any inconvenience this has caused anyone attempting the Punt'e nù project. Please contact me if you need any further clarification.
Back in March of this year I told you about an upcoming needlework contest which will take place in Florence at the end of the year.
I have just received an update from the Club del Punto in Croce and wanted to pass on these dates and locales to you. It seems I was not totally in error to tell you that the exhibition would be displayed at the Palazzo Davanzati after all - they have added a second exhibition:
November 9 - 30 2013 – Palazzo Borghese – via Ghibellina, 110 – Firenze
December 3 - 15 2013 – Palazzo Davanzati – via Porta Rossa – Firenze (open only in the morning!)
Please let me know if you see or participate in this exhibit, I'd love to hear about it!
For a little while I have been admiring the Blackwork designs of Valentina Sardu of Ajisai Press. Instead of just telling you about her work which you can see on her website and blog (and read in English), I contacted her directly to see if I could tell you a little bit more about her. She graciously answered all my questions and gave me permission to use some of her photos.
Valentina, pictured above, is inspired by nature and Japanese Ukiyo-e prints and the name of her company Ajisai Press is the Japanese word for the Hortensia, or 'embroidery flower' as it translates literally. Her Blackwork designs reflect Japanese influence.
Valentina studied Painting and Decorative Painting at the Liceo Artistico (Art School) of Turin, and is self-taught when it comes to her needlework. She feels certain that her Sardinian heritage (her paternal great-grandmother was an expert Sardinian weaver) has equipped her with the fine sense of precision and aesthetics so fundamental to embroidery. She owes much as well to her maternal Piedmontese great-grandmother from whom she inherited a few special items: a beautiful Viennese Biedermeier embroidery pattern and a few embroidered holy cards which Valentina later discovered had belonged to two great-aunts who were cloistered nuns in a convent destroyed during World War II. Her curiosity to learn more about these items led her to the world of textile arts.
Along the way to learning about the textile arts, Valentina began to collect old needlework publications and three years ago after publishing a book on the Japanese art of furoshiki, in collaboration with the publishing house Marco Valerio she had the first Italian edition (1890) of the Encyclopedia of Needlework by Thérèse de Dillmont reprinted. She has since reprinted a number of old publications.
Valentina then started to design Blackwork patterns:
What I love is its more contemporary style, with classic geometric filling motifs scattered here and there, breaking up or merging with other patterns, or they become more sparse, to create areas of light and shadow worthy of a work of art... Furthermore, I always experiment with new effects, and so often I do not stop at the traditional black on a white background, I enjoy using different colours, both for the threads and the fabrics. ...lately I've found it very interesting to combine blackwork and cross stitch because the little crosses are strengthened by the Blackwork and they seem to emerge from the canvas taking on a nearly three-dimensional appearance.
The design above is an example of the tri-dimensionality Valentina talks about. The ladybug & daisy is the first in a series of these mixed techniques.
Check out Valentina'sonline store where you can download digital copies of her patterns or order her needlework book reprints. Don't forget to stop by her blog too for lots of information including a step-by-step instructional video!
The very best gifts are those that are unexpected. Last week a courier arrived with a package from Italy and I had no idea what it could be. The little girl in me took over as soon as I'd signed for it and I sat down right there on the stairs and ripped open the envelope. Inside was truly a wonder to behold and I sat there for the better part of an hour (probably with my mouth open the whole time).
As regular readers will know, I absolutely LOVE the textured Italian embroideries and this is a stunning example. An Umbrian Embroidery pillow cover in amazing condition!
This very fortunate find was discovered by Bianca Rosa Bellomo of the Associazione I Merletti di Antonilla Cantelli in Bologna. She told me that she found it at a stall in the market at an excellent price. The lady running the stall told her that it came from an rich estate in the hills which was vacated. It has certainly been well looked after!
In the book Ricami della Bell'Epoca I found two photos of a table cover with the same design (repeated seven times!). The caption says that that piece dates to the 1930s. I wonder how old the one I have is?
Four delightful knotted tassels, one at each corner of the pillow cover. Inside the head of each one appears to be a wooden bead.
Check out these exquisite buttons which run along the top edge to enclose a pillow! They are slipped through buttonhole loops to close.
Insertion stitching used on three sides to join the front and back together. See how the edging matches? The back has three sets of blanket stitches repeating all the way around and the front is bordered by chain stitching. The stitching matches along the edge of the insertion stitches.
Detail of my pillow cover.
Detail of my pillow cover.
Detail of my pillow cover.
Detail of my pillow cover.
I can study the back side of the embroidery too!
I just happen to have the perfect size pillow to put in it and now it sits on my bed so I can see it every time I walk into my room!
A tremendous and heartfelt thank you to Bianca Rosa for this most precious of gifts!
Summer always has me thinking of learning something new and I usually decide to tackle a technique that I haven't tried yet. This summer though I am thinking of getting to know some techniques a little better instead of taking on a new one.
Lots of Italians head to Sardinia for their summer holidays and since I can't do that, I've been revisiting some of their needlework techniques in the unusually sunny weather we are having at home. There is nothing better than sunlight for visibility when stitching so I've been out on my deck under my own ombrellone.
In the spring of 2011 I visited Sardinia and spent some time getting to know a few Sardinian needlework techniques like Puntu Vanu, a type of smocking and two techniques that are specifically from Teulada: Punt'e Nù and Punt'a Brodu.
I'm running into all kinds of difficulties not the least of which is lack of good eyesight!
Puntu Vanu is usually executed on percale cotton fabric as it is traditionally worked into a shirt or blouse. I honestly tried to perform an evenly spaced running stitch line on a piece of percale but I couldn't see well enough to do more than a few stitches a day without hurting my eyes with the amount of magnification I needed so I switched to a piece of Sotema Batiste cotton.
Using Rosalba Lecca and Ebe Ciampalini's book, I chose a simple heart pattern and then withdrew one ground fabric thread into which I stitched my first running stitch line.
The first stitching line of my Puntu Vanu piece.
It was tough going as even the fabric count on the Batiste cotton is quite high. Eventually I figured out that if I wrapped my finger in piece of dark leather-like cloth and laid the work over it, I could see relatively well and the stitches went more quickly (the leather-like cloth was sent to me by the lovely Elizabeth Prickett for use when making Ruskin Lace. Unfortunately Elizabeth has since passed away so I cannot ask her for a supplier or even what the cloth is made of. If you really want to know, you could try contacting the webstore).
As Puntu Vanu is a kind of smocking, the strip of embroidery must be long as it will be pulled so that the fabric bunches up to form the pattern. Roughly a 36 inch strip of the Batiste of this thread count will produce a 12 inch piece of embroidery. I'll update you as I stitch more.
For my Punt'e Nù practise, I decided to make a bookmark using some of the colours found on the traditional Teulada man's costume.
I took some patterns from this blog where you can also find the instructions on how to execute this embroidery. While you're there search Puntu Vanu, Punt'e Nù and Punt'a Brodu for some great photos!
I think I'll trim my fringe down a bit more. This was made on 28ct Jubilee cotton fabric using DMC no. 8 Pearl Cotton:
Punt'e Nù stitching
And for Punt'a Brodu, I've taken part of a pattern off of a lovely vase painted by Marilena Ledda that I saw while in Sardinia in 2011:
The work of artist Marilena Ledda
I'm still trying to perfect my stitching on this pattern that I proposed for the EGA magazine Needlearts, June 2013. In the magazine, I did the pattern using embroidery floss but here I've done it using DMC no. 80 tatting thread. I still need a LOT of practise!
I hope you have enjoyed "travelling" to Sardinia with me. As far as I know there are no instructional books on Punt'e Nù or Punt'a Brodu. The instructions (which start in Febbraio 2010) for Punt'e Nù on the blog I mentioned above are quite good - give them a try! The only book I know of on Puntu Vanu is the one I mentioned above.
Bruna Gubbini of the Associazione Il Punto Antico in San Giovanni in Persiceto, near Bologna has released her seventh volume about Punto Antico Embroidery.
This latest publication has Italian and English text, is over 160 pages packed full of colour photos and offers 20 projects!
From the introduction:
In this new book you will find, apart from bed sheets, cushions and towels, many tablecloths among which are different examples of runners. My students appreciate this new way to dress the table because the runners are more elegant than the simple placemats, less onerous to work than the classic tablecloth and easier to wash and iron. They can make different designs which can be combined with each other in order to avoid repetition. The runner can also be used as a table centre. The book concludes with a ring cushion and a series of beautiful favours entirely worked by hand.
There is a small how-to section at the beginning of this book and then more how-tos sprinkled in with the projects themselves. Signora Gubbini's impeccable good taste regarding colours and motif combinations is elegantly displayed with the help of her students and their works.
The photography and styling is delightful. If you are already a fan of Signora Gubbini's books, you will not be disappointed and if you are new to them, all I can tell you is that they are definitely worth the cover price. There are so many inspiring ideas and lovely embroideries to look at!
I am intrigued by the use of a large hoop stand which seems to enable four ladies to collaborate on the work of one piece! Not that I'd want to stand and stitch but it does make me think of an old quilting stand that I have which would be useful for executing embroidery on a tablecloth.
So, I've cut a 4m length of 100% cotton Cotone Povero yarn to make the second leg of this tassel. I tied a knot at each end because after all the knotting, the ends tend to become quite unravelled and messy and you lose a lot of your length. Sometimes all you need is just another inch and if it's unravelled and destroyed it can be frustrating. Let's call this long thread the main body thread just because it may become confusing later as to what I'm referring to.
First leg of the tassel completed.
The reason that the main body thread has to be so long is that all those knots upon knots consume a lot of yarn. By the way, kitchen string works nicely if you want to try this method out before investing in some yarn.
Since this tassel requires two legs be made out of the main body thread, I measure out to the half way point (marking it for now with a paper clip) and start a little to the right of it. The centre of the main body thread will, after being folded in half, be where we'll need to attach the "handle" of the tassel so I need to leave a little space for that.
Let me note here that there are no detailed step-by-step instructions in Rosalba's book, so I'm stumbling along on my own. I'm sure there is probably a better way to do this, and it could also be that I'm doing it totally wrong. In other words this is not the authoritative guide to this technique!
The first thing we need to do is make a series of big knots for what will form the head of the tassel.
I made four knots side-by-side
and then made them all into one knot (let's call it a doubled knot).
The end result didn't seem big enough to me so I then made another three more doubled knots
and tied all four into one tripled knot.
Of course you can go on and on and achieve even bigger knots this way but I stopped here. The resulting tripled knot is an interesting little uneven blob.
On I merrily went attaching other lengths of thread with tripled knots by piercing through the main body thread, making doubled knots on either side of groupings of small knotted lengths like I made here which are attached by threading them on to the main body thread like beads.
The only thing to note was that I ended off the completed side of the main body thread with a tripled knot and didn't tie another knot on the main body thread to secure it so in no time at all while I was working on the other side, it came undone!
Of course I had already trimmed the main body thread and therefore I didn't have enough length to re-tie the ending triple knot again, nor to secure it with another single knot.
Argh!
Long about this time the tripled knots that I'd made on short lengths of thread and attached by piercing the main body thread also came undone as they didn't have a knot at the end of their lengths to secure them either.
Double argh!!
I went back and checked out the first leg that I had completed previously (first photo above) and sure enough all the triple knots at the end of all their lengths came undone easily.
Triple argh!!!
At this point I must confess I threw the whole thing in the stitching garbage can which contains thread and fabric and paper only. Muttering to myself I went off in frustration to do something else.
Later, with a cooler head, I dug it out and cut off the parts that had undone. I attached new lengths of thread with a weaver's knot to the main body thread and remade the missing parts. As this is all constructed of knots over knots, no one will ever see where I attached new lengths of yarn!
Here it is, I could have left more space between the head and the first part of the skirt and the head itself is quite irregular (Rosalba's is so much better!). All in all, I like it, I would make another one. What do you think?
A couple of months ago this new book by Rosalba Pepi came out on Catherine de'Medici Embroidery. I have just recently gotten my hands on a copy of this over 120 page volume. I've told you a bit about Catherine de'Medici Embroidery in a few previous posts so you already know that it's a technique that I admire. I've written a bit about Rosalba Pepi of the Laboratorio Tessile di Alice in Castiglion Fiorentino, in the province of Arezzo in previous posts as well. She is also someone that I admire.
Rosalba has a very creative mind when it comes to textiles and has taken ancient traditional techniques like Trapunto and Catherine de' Medici Embroidery and made them delightfully contemporary: see one of her kits here and one of her books here. She was a part of the publication of this essential book on Tassels too.
Rosalba loves to work in breathtaking silk threads dyed with natural materials. Make yourself a cuppa and explore the website of the Laboratorio Tessile di Alice which has Italian and English language versions - you will be delighted by Rosalba's works.
Back to this book: The first section is a few pages on the history of the running stitch with photos of contemporary and early 20th century Catherine de'Medici Embroidery works among other things and a bit about the history of traditional materials used, colours and ideas for application of this technique. (Text in Italian) There follows an instructional section with clear diagrams for executing different pattern lines and starting and finishing working threads. There are some ideas and instructions for edge finishings and tassels too - as well as the care and maintenance of stitched pieces and the tools required for executing the work. The remaining 3/4 of the book is choc-full of over 75 charted patterns and motifs and colour photos of finished works.
There are no precise project instructions but that didn't stop me from deciding on a table runner project anyway. Inspired by Rosalba's use of indigo-dyed silk yarn, I ran off yesterday to my local knitting shop with a ball of Cotone Povero - the traditional cotton yarn used in Catherine de'Medici Embroidery and a piece of undyed modern Buratto linen fabric from Sotema. I found a 17%silk/83%cotton blend of yarn called Night Sea from Misti Alpaca which is slightly thicker than the Cotone Povero yarn but will work nicely all the same. Last night I stitched a bit of a sample border on a scrap of undyed Buratto.
Can you find my stitching error?
Worried about the colour running, I soaked the embroidery in cold water (the label says it's to be washed at 30 degrees) and Marsiglia (Marseille) soap for about an hour. The water was a bit blue but I can't detect any bleed marks on the fabric, at least it doesn't show up so much that it catches the eye. However when I ironed it dry face-down on a white towel, it left some blue on the towel. The hank of yarn is now soaking in a tub of soap and water and I'll be rinsing it until no more blue comes out.
In the meantime, I decided to try one of the tassels from the book using the traditional Cotone Povero yarn.
This is the first of two legs that will be tied together to make the tassel:
This tassel is made of knots on top of knots. I'm going to photograph the process of the second leg so I'll save that for a future post.
In Europe you can purchase this book directly from NuovaS1 the publisher via bank transfer. To pay with PayPal, check out Tombolo Disegni, click on "Libri/Books", then "Libri Ricamo", then "Assisi, Caterina de Medici, Ricamo a Treccia e Nappine" - its about halfway down the page. Send an email to order.
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