Samines

I help your hands create something beautiful

Category: Embroidery

  • Wendy Dolan Workshop with Blackheath Embroidery

    Wendy Dolan Workshop with Blackheath Embroidery

    I did the all-day workshop with Blackheath Embroiderers; it was a thank you from our group and in celebration of our second-year anniversary since we have become an independent stitch group. The Embroiderer’s Guild closed all its branches as it did not have the finances to support the branches, we were unsure if we would survive, but thankfully everyone involved took to the challenge of meeting online during the pandemic and we have not looked back since.

    You can see from the photos of stages of layering of fabric onto the linen that will eventually become a picture of a painting I did while I was in Silicily in September 20201, the stitching is taking on a life of it’s own and the original picture that I am working from is now only a guide to the colours and not actual shapes, I am loving how the piece is developing every time I stitch it.

    My first initial thoughts were to leave the green satin on the painted background, but when Wendy Dolan had a look at my piece, she suggested to put strips of organza over the satin as then it would soften the piece and she was right in her assessment.

    I am currently working on this piece in building layers of stitching up to create a meadow, but my piece was not of a meadow, but of a green sub and flowers over the wall that was in front of my balcony I was sharing at the time.

  • Beginners Crewelwork Embroidery.

    Beginners Crewelwork Embroidery.

    Sample of piece in progress, actual design and instructions sent to the pupil.

    I had the opportunity to teach this online class on Saturday 20th June. Nancy was unsure she could do any of the stitches as it was her first-time embroidering, she normally works with tapestry yarn for her creative outlook, she learnt how to do the Pekinese stitch as well as the woven wheel and was able to tell me the steps of completing each stitch. We were both pleased with the result as it was a win win situation and lesson for both, the teacher guiding the pupil and the pupil responding to the lesson and mirroring back the technique.

  • Samines shop in Etsy

    It’s been a while since I have the Samines shop activated on Etsy. I decided to move over to Folksy as this is the UK equivalent to Etsy that is based in America. I have been slack and have let many things go and I know I will have to sort the Samines shop out on Folksy, I just have not kept up with my online presence and as a result I have not grown. So this is my renewed listing of one of the table runners, maybe I need to name those, especially when I post on social media to link everything.

  • Hackney School Girl Strip

    I am not sure I had the chance to blog about this piece as the time frame for September 2022. I thought I would blog about it now as I am improving my energy levels with long covid and I have a back log of blogs and thoughts to share with you.

    This is the screen shot from embrioderyboydave a fellow embroidery artist that I met at Blackheath Embroiderer’s. I had a break from being part of the group for about 5-8 years while I was working part time at Phrase Eight and selling at Greenwich Market.

    A visitor had come to the group asking for volunteers to submit work for the Museum of Sexual Objects and Dave’s and my piece were shown at The Horse Hospital.

    I created this piece from the news article about a 15-year-old school girl who was stripped searched by the police while she was on her period, it was an outrage and I was emotionally consumed with researching images to create this piece. It is all done in straight stitch.

  • Embroidery Diploma Grade

  • Fashion and Textile Museum  

    On Wednesday 29th June I had the opportunity to go to the Fashion and Textile museum for a meeting and one of the perks was to be able to visit the RSN exhibition. I visited this exhibition at the beginning of June when we celebrated the Queens Jubilee, this time I had the opportunity to attend the talk and hearing a little bit more of each piece and the development of the RSN, it’s the 150 years anniversary of the school.

    One of my objectives for the day was to buy either the crewel work or silk shading book authored by the Royal School of Needlework and I settled upon the silk shading book. When I got home I quickly messaged Emma who I have met through the Art of Embroidery group on Facebook, (she has kindly agreed to mentor me in embroidery). Emma then messaged back informing me that one of her pieces is in the exhibition, (as she studied at the Royal School of Needlework) I think I may have to take myself back to the exhibition to look for it.

    At the end of the tour we had the opportunity to go into a room that had more embroidery in as well as a continual video about stitch and one of the pieces on display was of Camilla, Duchess of Cornwall. The RSN had embroidered her in blackwork which is a technique in embroidery, that was first thought to be bought to England around the time of King Henry Vlll by Catherine of Aragon and I can understand why the RSN would stitch the Duchess of Cornwall in blackwork, as when Prince Charles comes to the throne, the Duchess will be then known as Queen Consort.