In both of these groups I have worked with reverse applique, padded applique and pieced applique. The stitches are all done in traditional embroidery stitches with two or three strands of cotton floss.
Enjoy~ Christen
The first class that I will be teaching is called “Ribbonwork Flower Gardens”, Wednesday October 31, 2012, to support my new book Ribbonwork Gardens. This is a 6 hour class that will cover twelve of the basic techniques covered in my book.
I will be giving a lecture Thursday November 1, 2012 on “Ribbonwork Gardens”, showing the gallery examples included in the book, as well as others from my collection. A small sampling of these examples can be seen on C&T’s flickr page.
I will be participating in the Mixed Media Miscellany, Thursday November 1, 2012, with my presentation: “Successfully Playing with Color”. This demonstration will open your world to the possibilities of COLOR. Teaching you how to easily create your own colors and dye baths with successful results every time.
I will be participating in the Friday Sampler, November 2, 2012, with my presentation on “Designing with Color”. Color and where to use it has always been a question asked by my students. I will give you insight on my own color theory, and how I use this in my work.
I will be teaching “Bohemian Button Bracelets”, November 2, 2012. This is a three hour class, where you can bring your treasured stash of buttons, beads and charms to create a one of a kind bracelet reminiscent of the Bohemian Gypsy in all of us.
I will be participating in the Saturday Sampler, November 3, 2012, with presentation on “What’s in Your Button Box?” Everyone has a button stash and it may include buttons passed down through the years. I will give you some tips on identifying these treasures, along with showing you samples of my own collection.
I will be teaching a three hour class called “Tandletons”, on Saturday November 3, 2012. These little threaded works of art are made from a stuffed silk bias ribbon button, and stitched with dyed cotton embroidery thread and a few embroidery stitches.
I hope to see you there!
Happy Stitching, Christen
I am so excited to share my first book Ribbonwork Gardens, by C&T Publishing!
There are 122 realistic flowers, leaves and garden extras included in the book, with experience levels from easy to advanced. The flowers are showcased in six different garden settings, offering you an array of small, medium and large flowers, each paired with a leaf to create a perfect combination.
I have included photographed step-by-step instructions (which I took), for each of the 122 examples. I have included a comprehensive cutting chart and have listed the types of ribbon that are suitable for each flower/leaf combination and included little extras such as French knots or beads.
There are over 14 basic techniques, some traditional and some that I have created especially for this book. There is a complete compendium with ribbon styles, selection and care, and troubleshooting tips with several gallery pages and examples sprinkled throughout the book for inspiration. The book is a soft cover, and will easily fit on your workspace while you learn and create.
I dedicated this book to my students, and I hope that you become one.
Happy Stitching! ~Christen
This is a class that I just finished up teaching this week. This was a really fun class, where the student learned to work the embroidery stitches using a variety of threads such as pearl cotton; buttonhole twist; rayon and cotton floss on a fabric base that will be used as needle-case.
Some of the stitches used blended thread to create new colors and textures. The dimensional embroidery stitches that were covered were bullion knot, cast on buttonhole, drizzle, woven, whipped and tatted. Traditional stitches such as the buttonhole, chain stitch, feather stitch, feather stitch leaf, French knot, lazy daisy, pistol stitch and straight stitch were also covered.
There were many hours of stitching involved, but it is well worth the end results!
Happy Stitching to all of my students!
Enjoy,
Christen
Enchanted Butterflies
Friday’s Favorites is continuing this month with Mother of pearl. This week I want to show you jewelry that I have made with MOP buttons, charms and beads.
Enchanted Butterflies is an adaptation of my “Entwined Treasures” pattern. The base is created by entwining and stitching silk cords, into a base. This base is then embellished with buttons and charms, and the beads are attached with the peyote stitch.
Mother of Pearl Button Bracelets
Button bracelets have been around for many decades. You may have one of those cuff bracelets that your mom made with an elastic crochet or stretchy gimp base that is encrusted with vintage buttons and beads.
These two bracelets here are a take-off on those original bracelets.
I chose to use a ribbon for the base (because I don’t like the elastic), using a button for the closure. The top bracelet, which is a sample of my “Klimpt Kollage Kuff” pattern, is encrusted with buttons, while the buttons are stitched in a design on the bottom bracelet.
Hopscotch
The neck-piece here is made from the tie that my dad wore at his wedding. The buttons are vintage carved Mother of pearl with celluloid discs.
The pin base is a wide ribbon, encrusted with Mother of pearl buttons and buckles, celluloid buttons, and roses that I made from gimp and vintage zippers.
Pearl's Delight
This necklace incorporates small mother of pearl buttons with beads, strung on #10 Soft Flex.. The beads are amethyst, fresh water pearls, mother of pearl and seed beads. This necklace and the bracelets below were created to wear with “Pearl’s Delight” jacket ensemble, that is covered in vintage lace and vintage Mother of pearl buttons.
Mother of Pearl Bracelets
These bracelets are all made from vintage Mother of pearl buttons. The top and bottom bracelets are samples from my “Bohemian Button Bracelet” pattern, these are strung on Soft Flex as the necklace above. The middle bracelet is a sample of my “Button Bracelet” pattern using the peyote stitch.
Vintage at Heart
These are two pins that I made using vintage Mother of pearl buttons. The pin on the left is made from muslin fabric and is covered with buttons. The pin to the right is made from silk fabric with a piece of vintage lace, the buttons are all carved.
Vintage Mother of pearl buttons are still around in some abundance, what will you make with them?
Enjoy what you do, it’s good for you! Christen
Free-form Peyote Stitch
Friday’s Favorites is all about the free-form peyote stitch. The peyote stitch is a traditional stitch used by Native Americans in a ceremonial ritual. There is some controversy in using the name of this stitch in beadwork today, but because I have no alternative word, I use it here with care.
The stitch is formed after a row of stitches are added onto the needle and thread; the stitching is then reversed with one bead added onto the needle and passed through a bead in the original row; additional beads are added in this manner. In the free-form stitch beads are added at random in singles or quantities creating a flowing organic form. The beads used are seed beads of all sizes (4-15 in my case), square, triangles, Czech glass beads, buttons, pearls, semi precious beads and basically anything with a hole in it.
Winter Solstice
Winter Solstice was created using the free-form stitch adding and lengthening as needed. Here I have incorporated fresh water pearls, vintage shell and glass buttons, and vintage glass sew-throughs with vintage and new seed beads.
close-up
Here is a close-up of the center, showing you the variety of pearls, glass buttons, glass sew-throughs and seed beads. The light blue beads (almost gray) are vintage beads found in the Hudson Bay area, they are over 200 years old.
Summer's By the Sea
Summer’s By the Sea was created using the same techniques as above, incorporating shells that I had found on Catalina Island as well as on the beaches of Southern California. Here I have incorporated vintage glass beads, vintage glass charms, abalone beads and chips, fresh water pearls along with the vintage and new glass seed beads.
close-up view of free-form peyote stitch
Here is a close-up of the wonderful button shells that I found on Catalina Island.
Jeweled Pi
This is a close-up view of the Jeweled Pi bracelets, which is one of the patterns that I teach and sell. I have incorporated large Pi or shell discs, along with buttons, jade pieces, fresh water pearls, semi precious stones, and seed beads of different sizes.
Tatiana's Enchantment
This necklace is from my Entwined Roses class, which incorporates ribbon worked flowers and leaves and the free-form peyote stitch. This class and the Entwined Treasures class both use silk cord and rayon cords as a base for the neck-piece. The flowers, buttons and beads are stitched on and around the base of cords which give a certain amount of stability and help to defray any tension problems that can arise when stitching without a base.
close-up view
This is a close-up view of the center, showing you the ribbon worked flowers that lay amongst the bead-work and buttons.
Woodland Elf
This is a close-up of my Woodland Elf necklace, which uses the Entwined Roses pattern. This is a wonderful collection of treasures: tiny sea urchins, vintage troca shell whistle buttons, fresh water pearls, jade charms, ra ku buttons, bronze charms from Big Sur, a dyed gourd, shell flowers….. and more.
Beadazzled Somemore
This is a close-up view of the Beadazzled Somemore class and pattern that I teach. The free-form stitch is attached to the fabric at intervals, and then stitched using the same techniques as a regular peyote stitch.
Ocean River's Bracelet
The Ocean River’s Bracelet uses the same concept as the Beadazzled Somemore, using a ribbon base to work the free-form stitch onto. This is a class that is on the current Winter Schedule for Joggles.com.
When all is said and done I enjoy using this stitch both in the structured and unstructured forms, both having their merits in history and style. Happy day to you, enjoy what you do and make everyday count. Christen
Friday’s Favorites (and every day for me) are silk ribbon embroidery projects that include ribbon worked flowers and leaves. This type of work incorporates two different techniques, embroidery with silk ribbon and flower or leaves stitched from ribbon. If you are unfamiliar with these techniques it can be confusing to identify one technique over the other.
In the above image I have used both silk ribbon embroidery and ribbon worked flowers made from silk habotai and silk satin ribbons. The base of this particular piece is composed of precious bits and pieces of lace that are stitched to a base of silk fabric, then dyed along with a few of the ribbons used for the flowers. The silk ribbon embroidery was stitched with 2mm, 4mm, and 7mm silk ribbon.
This pillow is an example of silk ribbon embroidery. In this technique a needle (chenille) is threaded with silk ribbon, and is then stitched through the fabric to create the embroidered designs. All of the stitches were stitched with silk embroidery ribbon, in sizes 2mm, 4mm, 7mm, and 13mm, and silk buttonhole twist and stranded floss.
This brooch is an example of flowers and leaves made from ribbon. These ribbonworked flowers are stitched from ribbon in sizes 1/4″ to 5/8″, in a variety of styles and fiber content. Ribbonwork differs from embroidery because the individually stitched flowers are created by threading a needle with sewing thread, cutting the ribbon the exact length for each flower, then stitching the ribbon to form the flower. Each flower or leaf is then stitched in place with a needle and thread.
This is an example of a brooch that is embroidered with silk ribbon and silk threads, with a few ribbon worked flowers and leaves added to the top outside portion of the brooch. I have also incorporated a rococo trim around the outer edge of the brooch.
This purse is an example of silk ribbon embroidery on an embroidered silk fabric with silk dupioni fabric on the outer edges. One of the wonderful qualities of silk is that it takes the dye so beautifully, and is very vibrant, yet still feminine. What makes silk embroidery ribbon so lovely is that it is beautiful even when worked in the most basic stitches such as lazy daisy, straight, and French knot stitches.
This purse appeared in the March/ April 2007 issue of PieceWork Magazine. I wrote an article on silk fabrics, and this piece was included as a project. Here I have combined both ribbonworked flowers and a few silk ribbon embroidered stitches.
Happy Stitching to you! ~Christen
Aubrianna in Fall Fashion
I decided to create a doll sporting “Fall Fashion” with pumpkins and acorns adorning her skirt. I added a few of the pumpkins that I made last week, along with other fall items such as the pine cones, pheasant feather and leaves.
Enjoy- Christen
The Castle Door
I thought of an image of an old castle door that had been weathered, with a big door knocker, a brass knob and big hinges. I searched Ebay and found this large old key that is used for the hanger here; I also found a few old skeleton keys to add in here and there with my newer keys and heart shaped locks. The base is machine pieced and machine quilted. The charms, keys and buttons are attached with embroidery floss.
Happy Stitching! ~Christen
Group of Butterflies
Friday’s Favorites today as you can see is all about butterflies, a few moths may have crept in here and there, but their shape is just as lovely. I love the shapes, colors, and variety that you can find both in real life and in the wonderful things that I can use in my art such as charms, buttons, beads and lace.
embroidered butterfly
Here is a variety of just those things, whether they be sequined or beaded; carved from bone, jade, or mother of pearl; whether they be copper, brass, gold, or silver; enameled or painted I love them all.
The necklace in the middle as you may imagine is called Enchanted Butterflies and is worn with the ensemble Madame Butterfly this embroidery here is from the sleeve of the jacket.
Speaking of Madame Butterfly we were lucky enough to watch a simulcast performance at the movie theater of the taped version from a Met performance. WOW is about all I can say except for truly amazing!
I'm NO Wallflower
This is a close-up of the work on the jacket called “I’m NO Wallflower.”
Here we have a copper and brass butterfly pin, a brass charm and a paper mache butterfly charm. These are all sitting amongst ribbon flowers and silk ribbon embroidery. Even the background fabric which is a Hoffman print is strewn with happy butterflies flying free.
Butterfly Jewelry
These pieces of jewelry are made from vintage sterling reposse charms that I believe are from China. I think that these are probably moths, but they are lovely and detailed. I glued a pin back onto the larger charm and wire wrapped the beads for earrings.
A Mid Summer Night's Dream
This close-up is from the jacket of the ensemble called “A Mid Summer Night’s Dream“.
The jacket is crazy pieced in sections which are later stitched together on a foundation piece with ribbon.
Each section is embellished with silk ribbon and traditional embroidery stitches using cotton, silk and metallic threads; ribbon worked flowers and leaves rest here and there and are adorned with vintage sequin appliques, vintage and new buttons, glass charms and beads. Here the butterflies take form in dyed lace appliques, metal charms and glass beads.
We have also planted many Lantana and bougainvillea plants to entice these wonderful colorful ephemeral flying beauties to our yard. Fly free, love what you do and see you next Friday. Enjoy- Christen
Christen's Creations 