"Helping Lines" for embroidery,  14th century inspired pattern - surface couching on red silk,  14th century projects,  Embroidery,  Medieval Embroidery,  Projects,  Surface Couching

Sneak peek at my next embroidery project – a 14th century inspired pattern worked in surface couching .9

2015-07 - Racaire - 14th century - surface couching embroidery - medieval embroidery - hand embroideryYesterday, after a weekend filled with fishing and hanging out with some of our good friends, I finally got back to work at two of my embroidery projects again.

First I managed to flatten the seams and also the rest of the fabric of the 14th century XL hood. And I also ironed the lovely purple wool fabric which I got for the appliqué embroidery.

Well, I admit it – I am not really a fan of ironing but sometimes ironing can be quite helpful like in this case. Now, that all seams of the hood are pressed and look proper, I am finally able to continue with the next step for this project – developing the pattern and cutting the fabric for the appliqué embroidery.

And as cutting the fabric for the appliqué embroidery is a crucial step, I am still a little bit hesitant to move on to this part of the 14th century XL project for my friend. Especially as I just have a rather small piece of purple wool fabric for the appliqué embroidery and really don’t want to mess it up. But I am sure that I will be able to overcome my struggle soon and I am sure that, like always, whatever I decide will be fine. Nevertheless I need to make a final decision of how I want to cut the fabric. 🙂

And as my other current project – my 14th century pattern worked in Surface couching embroidery – doesn’t need any cutting at the moment, I decided to make up for the ironing and to have some fun with one of my favorite embroidery techniques – Surface couching.

The middle detail part of the main framework of this 14th century pattern consists of many curves and peaks, as you might remember from the last picture I posted. All this curves and peaks slow down the embroidery progress a little bit but, nevertheless, I was able to make some good progress concerning the Surface Couching embroidery.

And now please enjoy the progress pictures of the newly added embroidery! 😀

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The detail in the middle already looks very promising, doesn’t it. 😀

And here a picture of the same part for you – just taken from a slightly different angle:

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Btw. can you see the little bit of blue thread on the pictures above? It’s the last remainder of one of my “helping lines”.

Now you might ask – what are “helping lines”?

Well, after I mounted the silk fabric on top of the linen fabric, I used some blue thread and made several lines of running stitches. This lines of running stitches fulfill two special jobs at once:

– First they connect the silk to the basic fabric underneath, keep the silk in place and prevent it from stretching and moving while working at the embroidery.
– Second, as I placed them along the middle lines of the fabric from which I worked out my pattern, they also show me where the middle lines – once executed with tailor chalk – are, even long after the tailor chalk already faded away.

And every time before I get close to embroider over one of my “helping lines”, I take one of my embroidery scissors and cut away a suitable piece of it and pull it out. Though this “helping lines” are very helpful for orientation purposes and to keep the fabric in place – you really don’t want them to show up in your final embroidery. 🙂 

And now back to my embroidery – I want to finish this part as soon as possible… 🙂

Best regards Racaire