You may recall that I became concerned about the wall and the colours beside Aethelflaed’s riding dress. I filled in some stones, and had even more doubts.
Cheshire sandstone is an absolute horror to depict in stitch or paint – every time I’ve tried in the past I’ve missed in one direction or another. So I’m not especially concerned that this version is proving exasperating too. I just need to find a way to create something I can live with. And indeed, something that Aethelflaed can live with!
The sensible thing seemed to be to do the back panel of the dress and then look seriously at the combination. So here we are, back panel of the dress, including the bright, dramatic, interlaced pattern on the border.
I do need to retweak the highlight on the skirt, somehow, but I have dress and the border in place, and I think the wall colours are definitely going need a bit of tweaking.
So with the idea in mind of blending colours to make the walls sit back from Aethelflaed a little more quietly, I did some experimentation.
I said the next one would be rather more complicated, didn’t I..!
The pattern is vaguely floral or vaguely snowflakelike, depending on your sensibilities. Since I’ve been finding it very hard to work out which line I’ve done and which I haven’t, loooking at the front, I thought the best thing to do would be to show progress from the back. Please forgive the changing colours – I refer you to the light in rainy Decembers in England!
When I got to the middle of the sequence, I started to have doubts about how I was going to finish the pattern in a neat and tidy fashion, and I was wondering whether I was missing something or it was really going to be a bit messy on the back.
Then it occurred to me that I have a graph theorist in the house (The Australian), so I consulted him. I explained what I’d understood to be the principle, and that I was afraid I would have to have long floats on the back. The Australian looked at the pattern, pointed, and said “There’s a degree three vertex there, so yes, you’ll have some long floats!”
As indeed I did.
But it does look pretty when it’s done, doesn’t it!
You may recall that for the past few years, for the period between Christmas and New Year, I’ve bought myself a kit, or put together a kit, of something I don’t usually do, that will involve me in following instructions. So, for this year, when I went to the Harrogate Knitting and Stitching Show in November, I bought myself a “Sashiko Patch” packet, some thread, and some needles – quite long needles, and quite strong, because the idea is to rock the needle through the fabric to take several stitches before pulling the thread through – so I was told.
When I opened the packet, I discovered that there weren’t really any instructions, but as I understand it sashiko is worked in rows of running stitches that cross each other to create the finished pattern.
Or not. The first one I tackled was relatively simple, single rows of running stitches in a wavy configuration. I think the finished effect is a bit like a very stylised bark pattern, and it went quite quickly.
The next one (see the fabric in the first picture) isn’t going to go nearly so quickly…!
The first stage is to outline everything, so here goes…
Since a white veil would have been an important part of the outfit, I’ve made sure the shadows are outlined in blue. That will make the white seem whiter, making the day seem sunnier.
I’ve given her mittens, rather than gloves – that may be cowardice (no fingers to do!) – but it will make for simpler shapes. How much the Medieval Movers and Shakers will wander from a truly medieval style and sensibility, I don’t know as yet, but I’m trying to keep my wanderings within reason.
Anyway, here we are, all principle outlining completed.
It barely shows, but the stones are outlined using three different shades of dark brown. It shows a little more in real life, and it might helpd to create slightly different impressions on patches of stonework. We’ll have to wait and see about that!
I’ve left the horse’s headstall and harness unstitched – I’m going to stitch that over the top of the main horse stitching.
I’ve not really tackled the grass, even in thought. I’m intending to make it tussocky – another contrast with William Marshall, approaching his kinsman’s well-kept castle, with undergrowth kept back from the walls. But how – I’ve no idea as yet!
I have another problem, anyway. I’ve started to put the walls in, and I’m more than a little concerned that the contrast of the stonework, if I continue like this, is going to be much too high, pulling the wall forwards and dominating the picture.
I can’t have that – Aethflaed is the one I want people to see. Her work comes after her.
So now I’m wondering about blending the colours to soften the change. That feels like a rather un-medieval thing to do, somehow, so I have to decide whether that’s a point I’m willing to concede.
Having at last settled on a design for Aethelflaed, there was a certain amount of jockeying around to get the size right and everything in order to start stitching.
As you can see, I’ve got William prepared to be mounted, but he’s still unmounted, which makes him easy to compare. The direction of the designs are contrary, there will be more red and brown in Aethelflaed, and I think the white horse will be rather necessary to help lift it.
You will see that I’ve already added the guidelines for the planned basketweave underside couching. I found adding them later really nerve-wracking, so this time I put that in first, and then the important bits of design went over the top, in a different colour and more precise line..
I was able to gather some of the threads from among those I used for William, which has helped. Partly because it’s always good not to have to buy more than you need, but also because it will help the series “talk” to one another if the palette of colours has some continuity. And then some of the others were passed on to me by Sue from TortoiseLoft (thank you, Sue!).
It has occurred to me (very recently) that if I keep the same blue background in the border, that will also keep the conversation going among the designs. I’m also considering winding the roses around the barrels and skeps, again to keep the conversation going.
But finally – FINALLY!! – I’ve managed to get started!
I’ve used three different browns in the outlines of the stones of the wall, and a very dark blue-grey for the horse.
There’s much more to do, but my goodness, I’m glad to have begun. I know Aethflaed must have been feisty but her embroidered representation has been living up to every bit of it.
Definitely getting there now. The horse is madder (a bit), and shorter-backed. I think when I stitch it, I may give it a clipped, standing mane, instead of the flowing locks – another contrast with William Marshall’s horse Mars.
Aethelflad herself is taller, and the contrast is closer, in keeping with the idea of wearing a sensible woollen riding dress to visit a building site.
I’m not sure about the saddlecloth – that may be something I will choose not to include.
I wonder whether Prior Rahere and Mother Julian are going to take as many iterations?
I think I’ve got it now.
I’ve added a border, and decoration around the neckline of the dress, both of which have helped. And I’ve cut out the pile of building stone and Aethelflaed herself, and moved them around a bit to make a layout I’m happy with.
We left the second trapunto Jewel looking like this: crimson gauze over gold tissue, with red wool stuffing the outer, broken channels in the gauze, and something stuffing the central triangle from behind the gold tissue.
And it looks like a good start, doesn’t it?
But some of my more alert readers may be thinking, hang on, didn’t you say something about doing the narrow gold channels first?
Well, yes, I did, but that was when I was filling the channels trapunto-style. I decided to try something else for this next one. I used a gold metallic chainette yarn – the same for all of the gold stitching – and after some thought, picked interlaced Cretan Stitch, to create some of the effect of punched or engraved gold surrounding the gemstones. At this point you can see I’ve only done the first part of the outer line.
I had to invent something for the short sections joining the outer and inner triangles!
Finally, I decided that the edge needed a bit of help and ran a line of chain stitch around the outside.
In terms of the effect, I think this is a great success. However, I’m not sure this is the right scale for Aethelflaed (in terms of size it’s an appreciable fraction of her finished size) and the gold chainette was a bit of a pest to work with. I was stitching in public, so no swearing.
As I have thought about Aethelflaed and begun to plan the design of her panel, I’ve also begun to plan what the background will look like.
Brought up, as I was, in Chester, the obvious point in her life to choose is her defense and refortification of Chester. So the stone for the wall is the distinctive dark pinkish sandstone of Cheshire, and in reference the the beehives and boiling beer turned on the Viking assault, I have a barrel and a bee skep ready for deployment.
But I need something that I can try to place Aethelflaed against, and strong enough in colour to give me a start on picking her colours, so I’ve redone some of it to give me something to work with. Although I do feel that maybe the wall isn’t high enough.
While I’m working on the walls of Chester, I also need to work a bit more on Aethflaed and her horse. The pair of them are proving much trickier than William, mostly because examples of horsemen aren’t hard to find in medieval art. I only had to decide on a few tweaks of presentation and insert the appropriate coat of arms. Aethelflaed is being invented as I go.
In fact, the invention, reinvention, and re-reinvention continues! I think the horse has become a little too long-backed, and needs to be a bit madder. And I’m not sure that Aethelflaed is in suitable proportion to him. What I might do is go back to the original horse, and indeed, the original lady, and then work forward (yet) again, using all the information I now have.
All this planning is keeping me from stitching, and I’m getting twitchy!
I wanted to have a go at creating some Anglo Saxon jewels as a possible ornament for however I end up displaying Aethelflaed. It was enough of a success that I felt that, with some fiddling around, I might be able to produce something suitable. And since this one was very much thrown together from things I had to hand, there’s a lot of fiddling around to do!
And here you see some of it. I went looking for materials, this time, and thought it through a bit more.
So, crimson gauze laid over gold tissue, laid in turn over calico for support. The gold tissue may be a good idea for the effect in real life, but it is a complete nightmare to photograph, and I apologise in advance for the peculiar changes of colour the fabric will undergo!
I used back stitch in a single strand, rather than split stitch in two, but took more or less the same approach to the outer channels, filling them with woollen thread. I was a little inconsistent in how I did so, which is why you see little bits of wool above the gauze – something I didn’t want, but struggled not to do. There must be a trick to trapunto quilting without going permanently demented, but I’m not sure I have it yet!
I should probably also apologise for my photography..
Anyway, the next bit was why I wanted to include the gold tissue in my sandwich of fabrics. If you look at the Sutton Hoo helmet and some other Anglo Saxon items, you will see that in some cases the gems look lighter than others, and it has been determined that that is because they’ve been backed with gold foil. I’m trying to get the same effect here, but in the case of fabric by inserting the filling behind the gold tissue.
This was very nearly as unnerving a proceeding as when I was doing much the same thing at the beginning of Akhenaten. You’d think I would have learnt sense by now, wouldn’t you!
