The Garden of Earthly Delights

I spent last weekend in Miltenberg at the Garden of Earthly Delights event. It was an arts and sciences event where sca artisans showcased theid work and shared knowledge. I met many new and old fiends from all over Europe, learned new things and got to teach other people on the fine art of embroidery. Merry time was had by all. I sincerely recommend this event in the future for all who want to share knowledge on A&S and meet like minded artisans.

This was my table. I got to choose my table first from all available tables, and choose one in the corner where there was light due to a huge window. After I put my display up, someone moved three big piles of chairs right in front of me, so I was kind of hidden in the corner. But I had light to do some embroidery, so I didn't mind.

Katheryne's Pouch

I had the opportunity to give this present to Katheryne in person, when she visited the Garden of Earthly Delights event. That is the best part of this - giving the final product away and making someone happy. It was nice to have an excuse to give her something. ;)

Here is first a picture of the second finished embroidery (as always, click to have a closer look.):

A detail, I'm very happy about the way the pelican turned out. Unfortunately the shine of the white silk doesn't show well in pictures:

The finished thing, both sides:

Embroidered with silk on linen, split stitch and laid work. The upper part of the pouch as well as it's lining are silk. The cord is also made with silk. I run out of silk thread, so I could not make nicer finger loop braiding cords. Some tassels would have been nice as well, but it'll do without them. The size of the pouch is about 15x22cm

Let's put the gear on reverse.

I had a discussion with a friend of mine about the reverse sides of embroideries. He was upset, that people were looking at the backsides of embroideries to determine the quality of work. His oppinion is, that one should not judge the backside, because surviving period embroideries usually have a very messy backside. I would like to discuss this.

What we can see, when we look at the backside of an embroidery? Sometimes it is "messy" with threads going here and there and knots sprinkled all over. Sometimes it is almost as neat as the right side of the work and no knots anywhere. Which one is better? And is it at all relevant?

The reverse side can tell a lot about the embroidery. How are the stitches really made? Is the work done systematically or has the embroiderer jumped from one corner to another? Is there excessive use of thread where no-one can see it (waste of money!)?

But is a messy backside a flaw? If the right side is beautiful, why should we be concerned about the backside when we know that medieval people were not? Of cource, if there is too much material on the backside of the work, it can make a difference on how the embroidery appears on the finished piece.

It all comes down to one question: Which is more important factor, authenticity or craftmanship? If authenticity is more important, we should indeed try to make the backsides of our embroideries messy! If craftmanship is considered to be the more important factor, we should also take a look at the backside to give us more information of the actual work process.

Is a neat backside better? In my oppinion it doesn't matter. I try to keep the backsides of my embroideries neat, but that is just the way I like it. And judging the work by it's backside? The judging criteria include many things. The quality of the work is only one of them. And the backside of an embroidery is only one little piece of the thing called the quality of work.

So by all means take a look at the backside of an embroidery, if it is not covered. But do not judge a work by the appearance of it's backside!

A preview for you

Here is a peek of what I'm doing at the moment. I had a very lazy summer, but now I'm working again. I'm embroidering a heraldic pouch. It'll be a present again, this time for Mistress/Mistress Katheryn Hebenstreitz. The first side is finished, and it bears her device. On the other side will be a pelican in piety surrounded with a laurel wreath. I decided to use my old style on this, because I wanted to have a work to calm my mood and make me happy. (Embroidery Zen...) Silk on linen, split stitch and laid work, 15x15cm.

What do you think? Should the stems be a little thicker?

Die Schultüte, the old German tradition

My daughter will go to school tomorrow. First day, first class. She is very excited, as you may well imagine. When we moved to Germany, I learned about an old German tradition of a big bag, cone shaped, that one gives to a child on their first school day - die Schultüte. It was traditionally filled with candy and toys to make the school taste sweet. Nowadays there is more school things and toys than candy, but the tradition lives well and good. So this immigrant mom made one for her own child. They are used only one day, so these bags are usually made of cardboard and paper. What do I do? Shall I cut and paste a DIY kit which are sold everywhere? Nope! I bought a brown cardboard cone, and embroidered a cover for it! Here are the pattern and the finished Schultüte.

Serious business, this photographing thing. (Picture taken with an empty schultüte, she'll get the filled one in the morning.)

I boldly ripped the pictures from free colouring page pictures that I found from the net. As the fabric I used an old baby bed linen, that gave me a ready made nice border on the open edge. The weave of the fabric was too tight for embroidery, so I had to fight to get the needle through with every stitch. Annoying. I used split stitch and running stitch with some old fake silk threads that I had once bought from a flea market. The unicorn and the fairy's tiaras are embroidered with fake gold surface couched with white sewing thread. Every fairy princess has her own colouring.

Proud Mama Vol II

My 5-years-old daughter finished her embroidery, which she started last November. Isn't it fine? :-D Embroidered on cotton with cotton and polyester threads and glas beads.

The other side. Surprizingly neat.

I'm such a proud mama at the moment. I need to first iron this and then frame it.

A present to my dear friend: A Sweete bag

I haven't posted much for a while, because I have more than one project on the making, and not many of them are ready. But this is. I wanted to give a present to a dear friend. So I spied what color her new Tudor garb will be, and made a sweete bag to match it. This is my inspiration picture:

Then my version of it. A little bit simpler, and the materials are not the same. This is emroidered on silk with fake gold, glas beads and silk thread. The same embroidery is on both sides of the bag.

A close-up of the emroidery:

And the side seam is covered with the same "gold" thread:

I'm very satisfied at the result. I had done beads only once before, and this was my first attempt on Elizabethan gold embroidery. I liked working on this one, and I'll propably do more of the same style later. It took me all together one week to make this.