Bird Portraits

Grey Heron, 2015

Since January I have had some of my work on display in Gallery Artemis in Cockermouth. This has been a really good experience for me for several different reasons. Firstly it's always a good confidence boost if someone else likes your work and wants to show and sell it, secondly it's given me a good reason to get on and do more work and thirdly it's made me concentrate more on how I present my work. And of course it's always good to sell some work and make a bit of money!

Wren, 2015

Blackbird, 2015

Bluetit, 2015

Knowing that I'll need to frame my work to take to the gallery has meant that I now consider the scale I'm working on a bit more carefully. In one sense this places limitations on what I'm creating but in another way it gives me some boundaries to work within and can make me focus a bit more.

Scruffy Crow, 2015

Tree Pipit, 2015

Swallow, 2015

The first pieces of textile work that I took to the gallery were either quite large or very heavily embroidered (or both) and so as a consequence were quite expensive. I also took a small machine embroidered picture of a Black Redstart which was less expensive as it did not take me as long to create. This piece sold fairly quickly and so the gallery owner suggested I did some more smaller, quicker pieces in time for the Christmas (sorry to use the c word.) So, I took her advice and did a series of machine embroidered portraits of some of my favourite birds. This seems to have been a good move as two of the pieces have sold already!

Black Redstart (I forgot to take a photo of the finished piece!)

These pieces are a different part of my work; smaller, more controlled. I still have my ongoing interest in crows and my desire to make big drawings and layered and embroidered pieces and I will continue to develop this work but making the bird portraits helps me develop my skills, explore my love of birds and get my work out there. Everything is connected and these pieces are just one of the strands that make up my work...

Lovely Lacey Birds

New Dress (needs a press)

I bought this dress in the sale last summer with the intention of customising it but it has sat in my to-do pile for a while. A couple of months ago I used a printing block I'd made to print some birds on it but because I used a dark green they didn't show up too well. Then last weekend I was looking at the lace bird cushion covers I'd made and thought that it would be a good idea to use the same technique on the dress. So I did. I used the printing block as my template to cut out the lace birds and I used fusible adhesive web to attach the lace to the dress. I then secured the birds with free machine embroidery and gave them buttons for eyes. I'm really pleased with this dress now, I got lots of comments when I wore it to work this week and I think it will become one of my favourites.

One bird

Halter-neck  purple jersey with lace birds

Another bird

Five birds

Top bird

Backwards BookJacket

The Backwards Book Cover

I thought one of the projects I could do with my textiles group this term is book covers. The construction is fairly simple and there's plenty of scope for embellishment. So I dutifully began making a sample, merrily embroidering a bird and branches in sparkly thread (ooh, shiny!) I cut a lining and stitched that on, using some interfacing for increased stiffness. It wasn't until I actually came to press in the folds that I realised my minor error. I had embroidered the bird on what would be the back part of the cover. I'd been so involved in the decoration I'd neglected the construction! However, it's a very pretty bird and it really doesn't matter, I just laugh at myself every time I see it. I'm using the book jacket for my little knitting notebook as it was getting a bit dog-eared. Hopefully next time I'll get it the right way round.

Opened out book cover

The back/front!

The front/back!

The lining

New stuff on Folksy

Embroidered Blue bird Bag

Embroidered purple bird bag

As well as being busy with Universal (The Heathlands Summer Project) I've also been embroidering bags for my Folksy shop. I've also been working on a small commission but more about that later. For now, here are the bags I've been working on. You can follow the link on the left to my Folksy shop for more pictures (shameless plug!)