Hi <<First Name>>,
Welcome to Embroidery News Issue 36.
This week we’re calling all bird lovers and treating them to a flock, a gaggle, a bevy and even a brood of masterful needlework projects starring a huge variety of different species of our fine feathered friends.
It’s always fascinating to learn where one’s inspiration for a needlework project comes from, and you can often get a sense of where someone lives by what they stitch.
It might be a landscape image, a floral design they created or a particular wildlife species that was chosen, a lot of what we do is a reflection of our place of residence.
Then there are projects chosen from a photograph, a painting, perhaps images from the internet or even the growing trend of using a design from a colouring-in book, like one of the projects in this weeks ‘What Are You Stitching’. |
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Wherever, whenever or however you chose your next subject matter to stitch, we look forward to sharing it with our community.
Do you have something you can share with the Inspirations community? We’d love to hear from you, please email us at:
embroiderynews@inspirationsmagazine.com.au
| THE BENEFITS OF NEEDLEWORK |
It wasn’t our original intention for the Benefits Of Needlework to become a regular segment in Embroidery News, but we continue to receive inspiring and touching stories about how needlework has positively impacted the lives of so many. As this is your newsletter, if you keep writing, we’ll keep publishing, so this week Anne Ford from Mount Eliza in Victoria, Australia shares her story…
Ten years ago I was diagnosed with severe Rheumatoid "arthritis", a disease of the immune system. I was unable to cook, clean, wash my hair or even hold a book. The saving graces were my two beautiful cats and many copies of Inspirations which I placed beside me on the couch and slowly, painfully, turned each page. As I drooled over the pages I promised myself that when I was "better" I would stitch ALL of the projects! I didn't get better but I still enjoy my stitching! Thanks Inspirations, you saved my sanity! Anne.
Anne we can only imagine how difficult the physical pain you have/are enduring as well as the emotional pain of being unable to indulge in your passion of the needle. We are honoured that Inspirations has played a small role in your journey, and we want to use your story to remind people that although Inspirations is very much a ‘how to’ publication, it’s equally an aspirational one. So if you can’t make the projects we publish for whatever reason, just enjoy admiring the beauty of what others are stitching.
If you have a story about the benefits of needlework you would like to share, email us at embroiderynews@inspirationsmagazine.com.au
| INSPIRATIONS MAGAZINE UPDATE |
To kick start our feathered friends theme this week, we’re taking a closer look at the project ‘Les Hirondelles’ in Inspirations issue #89 and the designer herself Catherine Laurençon.
‘Les Hirondelles’ by Catherine Laurençon – Inspirations #89
‘Les Hirondelles’ depicts four little swallows in this lovely thread painted study, one resting briefly at the end of a branch and the other three circling high in the sky above. Worked in stranded cotton thread on a beige linen ground, this would make a perfect gift for any avid bird-watcher.
Catherine first appeared in Inspirations issue #85 with her spectacular thread painted butterfly (pictured above). A highly skilled and award winning embroiderer based in Loudun, France, Catherine’s work is frequently on display at exhibitions nationally.
Behind The Scenes – Les Hirondelles Photo Shoot
Other than creating her own stunning designs, Catherine’s primary focus these days is teaching needle painting. Having taught classes all over France including members of the famous Atelier National de dentelles d'Alençon, who normally specialize in lace, in case you haven’t caught up with the news, it was with great excitement we announced that for the very first time, Catherine will be joining us to teach at Beating Around The Bush 2016.
With 3 sensational projects to choose from (pictured above), BATB 2016 is the perfect opportunity to take a class with Catherine and create for yourself one of her beautiful thread painted designs.
GETTING YOUR CATHERINE LAURENҪON FIX
Here are 4 ways you can enjoy more of Catherine Laurençon:
1/. – Purchase a copy of
Inspirations issue #89
Inspirations Issue #89 Includes the following projects:
Love Letters; Still Life With Flowers;
Windflowers; Chatelaine; Les Hirondelles; Florentine; Flowers Of The Sea; Curtain Call
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2/. – Purchase a kit for
Catherine’s project ‘Les Hirondelles’
Les Hirondelles by Catherine Laurençon features dainty thread painted swallows.
Great value at only $67.15
(based on 15% subscriber discount)
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Click here to order |
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Click here to order |
3/. – Register for a Catherine Laurençon class at
Beating Around The Bush 2016.
Currently there are still placements available for Catherine’s classes, but they are selling quickly. To register for Beating Around The Bush visit our new website here.
4/. – Check out Catherine’s Blog here
Inspirations Kit Update
To browse our complete range of kits, click here.
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Last week we posed a new set of conversation starters from Ansie, Claire and Carol and asked you to share what you had to offer not only with them but with the Embroidery News Community as a whole. Well share you did, so this week we will help point Claire in the right direction on her ‘Destination London and Edinburgh Adventure’ and will open up the other conversations over the coming weeks.
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Last year, The Embroidery News Community helped Louise Upson plan her own ‘Destination Japan Adventure’, and now she’s returning the favour by helping Claire with all things needlework inspired whilst she’s in London! Here are Louise’s personal recommendations:
 Ribbons from V V Rouleaux & ‘Strawberry Thief’ fabric from Liberty
In Central London there is much inspiration to be had at the Victoria and Albert Museum (Cromwell Road), whilst Liberty London (Regent Street) and John Lewis (Oxford Street) both have well stocked haberdashery departments, are close to one another and to Oxford Circus Tube Station. V V Rouleaux (102 Marylebone Lane) is a wonderland for ribbons and trimmings and is also in this area.
 Sew Over It
A few tube stops away in Islington is Sew Over It (30A Myddelton Street) and Raystitch (99 Essex Road) for fabrics, patterns and trimmings and Loop (15 Camden Passage) for knitting and crocheting yarn, tools and notions – all of which offer classes that can be booked via their websites.
If time permits, there is the glorious London Bead Company (339 Kentish Town Road) for embroidery threads, silks, crewel wools and beautiful beads and other surface embellishments.
Fabrics Galore
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Another must visit is Fabrics Galore (52-54 Lavender Hill, Battersea) whose name says it all!
Just 20 minutes on the Victoria line from Oxford Circus is Walthamstow Market (67 High Street), one of London’s outdoor markets which is off the tourist trail, but well known to fashion and design students for an enormous range of fabrics at very affordable prices.
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Also in Walthamstow is the William Morris Galley (Lloyd Park, Forest Road) which has a wonderful range of his textiles and others designs on show.
Claire, we hope Louise’s incredibly detailed and exhaustive list hopes to make your Destination London trip a truly inspired needlework adventure! We’d love to hear all about your adventure and what other ‘must visit’ places you find along the way, so please email us at embroiderynews@inspirationsmagazine.com.au.
Special shout out for London Bead Company who have been a long, long time supporter of Inspirations Magazine. THANK YOU to Faye Niven and her team for advertising with us since the beginning – make sure you check out their website and add their store to your list of stops when visiting the UK.
| STITCH.OLOGY WEBSITE NEWS |
Birds, birds and more birds… when we told our online team that’s what we need, here is what they came up with:
TWO NEW INSPIRATIONS BACK ISSUES NOW AVAILABLE IN PRINT
‘Birds Of A Feather’ from Inspirations issue #70 is a project by Terry Loewen which features two sweet birds resting on a twig.
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Printed Copies of issue #70 are now available for purchase.
Projects in this issue include:
Crewel embroidered needlebook;
Baby accessory roll with thread painted bunnies;
Silk ribbon floral
Sampler; Stumpwork daisies with a traditional rhyme; Footstool embroidered with Jacobean motifs; Mountmellick cushion cover; Ayreshire inspired quilted cushion; Shadow work butterfly curtain; Tray cloth embellished with birds and blossoms.
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Click here to order your printed copy of Inspirations Issue #70.
Song Birds by Marie Suarez is from Inspirations issue #61, incorporates timeless whitework techniques in this exquisite linen batiste pillow.
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Printed Copies of issue #61 are now available for purchase.
Projects in this issue include:
A lavishly embroidered little bear; An amazing stumpwork picture; A fascinating embroidery étui; An elegant embroidery accessory; Charming linen placemats; A dainty potpourri pillow; A superb whitework cushion and 2 simple 'pocket projects' to make
in a night.
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Click here to order your printed copy of Inspirations Issue #61.
PLUS TWO NEW DIGITAL PATTERNS NOW AVAILABLE TO DOWNLOAD
Beautiful Needlework. Sold Here. www.stitchology.com.au
In keeping with our birdlife theme for this week, here is a truly glorious brood of projects from our stitching community all based on some of the finest feathered friends you’ll ever see…
To get us started, we pick from where EN issue #30 left off, when Ruth-Anne Cain from Tennessee USA sent in the exact same project that this week, Kent Pond from Canada shares with us:
‘Hello, in Embroidery News issue 30 you included photos of a project which a lady did in the US of the Great Blue Heron. I recently completed the same pattern. Like Ruth Anne Cain, I knew that I had to stitch this piece as soon as I saw it. Here on Prince Edward Island we have lots of Blue Herons during the summer months.
When I finished my piece, I entered it into the Needlework competition as part of our Provincial Exhibition and it placed first in the stitching category. I even had a few offers from people who were interested in buying it from me, however, I resisted and it hangs at the end of my hallway in my house. I really liked the way that my framer did the mat work, with cut out bulrushes along the sides.
I tend to work on larger pieces and I have completed many of the angel patterns from Lavender and Lace and some from Mirabilia. I am currently working on Spirit of Winter by Heaven and Earth Designs.
Happy Stitching, Kent.
Thank you Kent – it really is a fabulous project and your version is brilliant, especially with the framing which has finished it off perfectly. Job well done!
Next up Iris Vodopivec from Buenos Aires in Argentina tells us how this picture perfect piece came to be.
‘Hi! My name is Iris and for many years I have been doing cross-stitch, Hardanger, long-and-short stitches, among others. This is my last project which I adapted from a graphic in a coloring-in book. The fabric is linen and the threads are #5 and #6 strand floss. The choice of colors was mine. Thank you for showing my work. Iris.’
Wow Iris – this is exquisite! The level of finish and attention to detail in this piece is superb, and your colour palette is perfect with just the right mix of subtle hues for the foliage and vibrant, strong tones for the plumage. Really terrific!
From time to time we receive projects for ‘What Are You Stitching’ that are of such a high standard, they look like they stepped out from the pages of Inspirations magazine itself. Renette Kumm from Knysna in South Africa is most definitely in this category, and when you read her story you start to understand why her embroidery is so outstanding…
‘Hello, first a quick back ground. We had a business in Gauteng, South Africa and on a visit to Exclusive Books on 17 February 1993, browsing the needlecraft section, I found “The Embroiderers Countryside” by Helen Stevens. Up until then, I only did a couple of tapestries and I did not think, looking at the beautiful image on the cover, that I would ever be able to embroider anything remotely as beautiful as that.
In 1999 we bought a house in Knysna and permanently relocated here in 2000. After several busy years in our business in the beginning of 2008, during an aqua aerobics lesson I mentioned that I so wanted to learn to embroider, but living in this small little town there is most probably no chance of finding a teacher. To my delight one of the ladies at the class told me that I am in for a treat as there is an Embroiderers Guild in Knysna and some wonderful teachers, and so my journey began.
I started lessons with Leslie Turpin Delport and Rose Barnes and produced my first piece in 2010. Our embroiderers group went to a workshop with Trish Burr and I have to confess that I love needlepainting, long and short or thread painting however you want to describe this discipline. I was also fortunate to arrange a one on one lesson with Helen Stevens on one of my visits to children in the UK and on other visits a course at the RSN on needlepainting with Jacqui McDonald and a lesson with Sachiko Morimoto.
My teacher Rose Barnes kept nudging me to do my own designs and then one day she made me an offer I could not refuse. My first piece was a Bearded Vulture (Lammergeier) that she commissioned me to embroider as a gift from her to her son. I was petrified of making a mess of it but with a lot of encouragement from my teachers and my fellow embroiderers I stitched and completed this piece and my joy at this had no bounds.
My love and passion is stitching. I am the current Chairperson of the Knysna Embroiderers Guild and we are very excited to host the Ighali Festival in Knysna in August.
This piece (above) is a Eurasian Vulture I completed just recently. So that is my story in a nutshell. Thank you – Renette.’
Rennette – where do we start? Goodness gracious, what an exceptional gallery of projects you have treated us to! Thank you, they are all amazing. You have certainly learned from the best, your list of tutors along the way reads like the who’s who in needlework and this excellence of teaching, combined with your own amazing talent, is evident in each of these pieces.
In our next project, once again you can see how beneficial studying under a great tutor can be. Pauline Fozard shares her piece featuring one of Australia’s favourite winged characters:
‘Dear Embroidery News, I recently got interested in Stumpwork after attending a wonderful workshop by Jane Nicholas. We made a sampler through which we learned how to make a bee, a cricket, a beetle and a dragonfly. I have since made this Kookaburra and I enjoyed it so much I think I will be doing a lot more Stumpwork in the future. Regards Pauline.’
Pauline your Kookaburra is just terrific – you have captured the cheeky, fun and adorable aspects of these beloved birds perfectly, and who better to learn from, than the legendary Jane Nicholas herself. Well done.
To round out our feast of feathered friends special, Lois Woollams from Pelican Point in Western Australia, whom we first met in issue 13 of Embroidery News, has these two delightful projects for us to enjoy:
‘Hello, here is a little bouquet of flowers and a little blue wren, both of which are done with silk threads on linen ground. Lois.’
Thank you Lois – they are both beautiful. The silk threads really help the striking colours stand out and yet at the same time give your pieces a warmth and endearing quality, they are really lovely.
Quick note – once again we see another project sent in featuring the super popular Blue Wren. If you want to create your own Blue Wren piece the magnificent Trish Burr design ‘Royal Blue Wren’ is included in Inspirations issue 77, printed copies of which are now available for purchase.
This highly sought after issue of Inspirations contains some of our all-time popular projects from designers including Jenny Aiden-Christie, Trish Burr, Jane Nicholas, Hazel Blomkamp, Jenny McWhinney and June Goodwin.
Click here to purchase a copy today
What Are YOU Stitching? We’d love to see it… send your photos, a description of the project and a little about yourself including where you live, to embroiderynews@inspirationsmagazine.com.au.
ISSUE #90 IS COMING!
In the very near future, Inspirations issue #90 will be dispatched to our subscribers across the globe. Will you be one of them? This week we have begun billing for issue #90 so if you haven’t heard from us, your credit card has not been debited, or PayPal invoice not arrived, please contact us, we don’t want you to miss out. To update your credit card details, use our secure online form here and select ‘Update Details’ and let’s get your subscription current again. Alternatively email us at subs@inspirationsmagazine.com.au with any questions regarding the status of your subscription.
WE BRING THE BEAUTIFUL – THE ONLY THING MISSING IS YOU.
Inspirations is the world’s most beautiful needlework magazine. We bring all the beautiful needlework projects from all over the world together for your viewing pleasure 4 times a year.
So if we bring the beautiful, all you need to do is subscribe and we’ll deliver it right to your door anywhere in the world.
If you have never subscribed, we’d love to have you join us.
For those who don’t have a current subscription – we’d love to have you back.
Either way we’d really appreciate your support.
Beautiful is waiting … subscribe today.
PRINT | For a print subscription simply fill in our secure online form with your details. It’s so easy and quick, you’ll be done in 5 minutes. Click Here.
DIGITAL | For a digital subscription you can purchase it through Zinio direct here or through the Inspirations APP which can be downloaded via the iTunes and Google Play stores, by searching ‘Inspirations Magazine’. |
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CALL US | If you are not sure what option is best for you, have some questions or just like to talk to someone rather than type, we’d love to hear from you. You can call us from anywhere in the world on +61 8 8293 8600 anytime and if we’re not in, leave a message and we’ll get back to you. For anyone within Australia, call us on 08 8293 8600.
Otherwise email anytime us at
subs@inspirationsmagazine.com.au
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Digital Patterns Recently Added:
Me time, needlework time, cruise time, stitch and chat time, all rolled into one!
From May 15th – 22nd 2016 you can embroider on a five-star luxury cruise down the Mekong. Once you’ve experienced this exotic destination you’ll be hooked, and will want to join the regulars who return each year.
Email our hostess with the mostess Laura at laura@inspirationsmagazine.com.au today for a copy of our 2016 brochure. Ready to book? Click here to sign up online.
| QUOTE:
" The painting studio gathered dust as I sat in my knitting chair, spinning out one colourful web after another. Cocktail parties & even my beloved English country house weekends became a bore if I couldn’t take my knitting along."
~ Kaffe Fassett ~ |
What: Slipstitch
Where: Latrobe Regional Gallery, Victoria Australia
When: to 17 Apr
Details: Click here
What: A Stitch in Time – Home Sewing Before 1900
Where: Victoria and Albert Museum | London
When: to 1 May
Details: Click here
What: RSN | Peacocks & Pomegranates Exhibition
Where: Hampton Court Palace
When : to 22 Jul
Details: Click here
What: Bacchus Marsh Quilt In
Where: Bacchus March Public Hall – Main Street, Bacchus Marsh
When: 19 Mar
Details: info@bacchusquilters.org.au
What: Pulled Thread Strawberries
Where: Pacific Northwest Needle Arts Guild | Seattle
When: 26 Mar
Details: Click here
What: Mollymook Embroiderers | Free Introductory Lessons
Where: Uniting Church Hall | 24 Wolseley Street, Milton New South Wales
When: 1 Apr
Details: Click here
What: Muchas Manos Workshop | Beaded Lotus Flower Pincushion
When: 2 Apr
Where: San Diego, California
Details: Click here
Send us details about events, exhibitions and celebrations happening in your place of stitch and we’ll include them in Embroidery News. Contact us at embroiderynews@inspirationsmagazine.com.au
Happy Stitching
The Embroidery News Team |
ISSUE 36 | MARCH 18, 2016
Needle felted
