Dec

13

December 13, 2007

You’ve never seen it all

Filed Under Borders, Embellishment, Fusible web, Machine appliqué, Raw edge, Threads 

Mistress of machines Janet showed me a border she’d made for a round robin. I couldn’t believe it. Yet another edge treatment for fusible appliqué!

At first I thought Janet had used the machine embroidery technique that I’d seen on her pieces in the past. I asked her to describe how she’d done this beautiful stitching. Here’s what she told me.

Usually, when machine embroidering, Janet hoops the fabric. This time, since the oak leaves and acorns were fused onto the background fabric, there was enough stability so that she could skip the hoop. Instead of stitching back and forth a little at a time to simulate three strands of embroidery floss, Janet did a free-motion stitch traveling in one direction all the time, and went around each motif two or three times close to the edges. The veins on the leaves were done the same way. She used variegated Star cotton thread from Coats & Clark, which is one of her favorite threads for her machine work.


Here’s the project so far, with just the center and Janet’s fabulous appliquéd border. Janet told me I could put this picture up, but shh! don’t tell the person whose center that is, or we’ll get busted. :)

Until next time,
Kay

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