Miniature Embroidery

Our last Embroiderers’ Guild meeting was an all day affair, with a stitching workshop in the morning and a fascinating talk in the afternoon given by Hull Branch’s Alison Larkin on miniature embroidery.

In the morning she gave out kits she had made up for us to practise stitching a floral Jacobean-style motif  in a single thread of stranded cotton and tiny stitches. There were three colour choices and I went for green and yellow. By lunchtime I’d got as far as this:

The half seed stitch and half Jacobean laid work/trellis stitch leaf is edged in whipped back stitch, as are the petals in the central flower with the french knot middle – you can see the back stitched foundation in the bottom petal. The stems are split stitch and the top flower has one petal edged in split stitch over which is worked satin stitch with the other petal being whipped back stitch again.

The other leaf is half satin stitch over a split stitch edging and half outlined in whipped back stitch with split stitch veins.

Unfortunately I had to leave promptly and it wasn’t until I got home that I realised I’d left with my embroidery still in one of Alison’s hoops! This meant I really had to get on and finish the stitching to post it back to her! Not that it was any hardship at all to work on such a lovely design.

The simple straight stitches in the petals of the central flower and bud really bring them to life. The darker yellow daisy was only supposed to be a bud, but I’d stitched most of the petals before I checked the design and I liked it so decided to keep it as a full flower.

Finished and with a penny to show the scale!

I really enjoyed this little project. It was right up my street anyway as I love working small. :o)

A great day – many thanks to Alison and her fellow members of the Hull branch.