One of the things I first worked on in the new 'workspace' back in the summer, was continuing a piece of machine embroidered tapestry. Started a few years ago as a sample (see archive dated Monday 26 October 2009), it needs finishing & now was an ideal time. It would use up many oddments of thread as well as see how the studio's lighting coped. Many, many broken needles later (plus one machine gear damaged & a repair now being needed), the piece has reached yet another level - again incomplete! The fabric has become very stiff with all its fabric layers & machine embroidery - this obviously being the cause of the above breakages! The machine embroidery has added great texture & depth to the piece as well as making it almost like a carpet! It's also inspired other uses for its ultimate use.
In order to try & overcome the issue of the needle breakages, I delved into my workbox '
archives' to try some of the
'really heavy-duty hand needles' - but still no luck. However this exercise did result in my repairing an old bag stitcher (news on this later). Anyway, pleased with the finished piece to date, here's a close-up of some of the stitching:
