The Floral Glove Needlecase is Finished!

At long last, after much trial and tribulation, and after completely shredding my fingers because no matter how hard I try I simply cannot use a thimble, I have finally completed the finishing on the Floral Glove Needlecase.

I’m very pleased with it, and not just because it is finished. It is my first attempt at “historical embroidery”, the first time I have used many of the techniques, and the assembly of the final piece involved my bête noire, glue.

The finishing has been full of little details, the spangles decorating the fabric, the gold lace edging the two cuff pieces, the gold-and-spangle edging we added to the silk ruffle. Then the gold twist suggesting the fingers on the hand of the glove, and two rows of gold cord covering the join between the upper and lower pieces.

I love the variety of textures in this piece, the silk thread, the purls, pearl purls, lizardines and spangles. Then there’s the ultrasuede (another material new to me!)  and the silk ruffle, and the brocade inside.

 

And I’m only about six months late in finishing it, after all!

 

I keep looking across at it, and thinking “Did I do that? Really?”

 

Floral Glove Needlecase Course Month Five

I’ve had an exasperating time with the Floral Glove Needlecase since you saw it last, what with unpicking and reinstating the gold lace (fx: growl!), and wrestling with the silk ribbon ruffle, which had to be gathered up and attached across the bottom in a sort of squiggle.

However, when I finally got all that sorted out, I screwed my courage to the sticking-point, gathered my wits, picked up my glue-pot, took a deep breath and finished assembling the separate ornamental cuff of the Floral Glove Needlecase.

So here is the cuff lining. I know that the felt isn’t centred. I was sure that it was on the brocaded silk, but by the time I had tweaked and stretched and glued, that was the best I could do. As someone who is clumsy and awkward with glue I would have prefered a slightly wider margin of fabric around the card shape, which would have made it easier for me to handle.

The front and the back (stretched over batting, heavy interfacing, and light card) are attached to one another by overcast stitching. I used a strand of one of the silk threads from the embroidery – that seemed the best way of being consistent with the materials used.

Now, as I’ve said before, I’m not good with glue and scissors, so I was worn out when I finished, and I know it isn’t perfect, but it does look pretty good, especially from a reasonable distance!

At this point Tricia’s instructions say – I  kid ye not! – “Sit back and admire!“.

So I did.

Floral Glove Needlecase – Second Stage of Finishing

There is a sparkly ruffle between the cuff and the hand on the Floral Glove Needlecase, and of course we have to make it ourselves. You can’t go to your local needlework shop and say “Half a yard of Elizabethan glove trimming, please” with any prospect of success!

So the trim is composed of a length of double-sided silk ribbon, with Gold Twist and spangles whip-stitched down one edge.

The silk ribbon is wonderful stuff to play with, smooth and supple, and with just enough body not to flop. The idea is to ensure that the spangles all end up on the same side of the ribbon as each other and as the Gold Twist, and I think I managed it (not without the occasional tweak!).

Then, we run a gathering thread down the other side and pull it up to make a ruffle. It looks wonderfully exuberant, doesn’t it, and I haven’t even set it into the shape it needs to fill on the project.  Tricia suggests leaving that stage until the various unseen bits of backing are all assembled and shaped, and since I need to buy some fabric glue before moving to that stage, that is exactly what I am going to do.

Completing this fairly simple task took me most of an afternoon.  But then, no one ever said embroidery was quick!

Floral Glove Needlecase – The Finishing Kit

Another gentle thump through the letterbox and the Finishing Kit for the Floral Glove Needlecase has arrived.

Neatly die-cut pieces of card, interfacing, and fabric, lengths of ribbon and lace… It all looks rather promising, doesn’t it!

The first thing I need to do (I’ve looked at the instructions online but not quite got as far as printing them out) is to embellish the ribbon with gold thread and spangles. I am learning from this project that the layering of intricate detail and embellishment can be hugely successful; even when you think something is as ornate as it needs to be, sometimes it looks better with more.

That doesn’t work with fashion – I remember coming across this some years ago. Even now I survey myself critically in the mirror before going out, to see whether I need to remove an accessory. And this is a link to the picture referred to in the post.

Floral Glove Needlecase – More Progress

It became clear as I was working on the medallions that I was having more trouble with this than I had with the silk work or couching the Elizabethan Twist, so I thought I would give a sort of “interim report”.

The medallions are outlined with three couched rows of slightly stretched purl purl or lizardine, one of which is wrapped with silk. That in itself was fairly hair-raising (it sounds so simple, but believe me, it isn’t!), and yes, I know that the outlines aren’t perfect and you can see the joins, but they did get neater. The man who said “The more I practice the better I get” was onto something!

The tendrils are slightly stretched lizardine again – stretched by a different amount, just to make sure we paid attention! Then the silk of the motifs is covered with couched lengths of purl, like the calyxes of the carnations.  It is surprisingly difficult to cut this stuff accurately – the instructions say to use an old pair of embroidery scissors, which I did, but I find myself wondering whether a sharp craft knife would do the job better. Certainly there would be less chance of crushing the thread. Purl is very fine wire, wound spirally around a former, and when the scissors crush it, the ends are bent out of shape and catch on the thread as you try to thread it through. Since purl is attached by threading it like a bead, this isn’t ideal; even waxing the thread only helps some of the time.

It’s astonishing to see the difference made to the medallion on the left when I added the seed pearl in the centre. I thought it looked neat and finished as it was, but adding the pearl brought the whole thing to life. Now there’s a lesson worth remembering – a small change can make a huge difference to the impression given by a piece. At least embroiderers can undo some of their additions. If you add something to a watercolour that turns out to be a mistake, there’s nothing you can do about it!

Still, I do think I am beginning to get the hang of it. Now it will be interesting to see whether I’ve slid all the way back to the start, or whether, when I continue on the next medallion, I retain some of the improvement I made yesterday.