Metal Work

Someone asked me about the banner quilt I have on my blog....so, since I don't have anything of interest to show today I thought I'd recap for her this piece. It measures 14" x 18" and is mounted on to foam board.


This was actually a challenge piece in 2007 for our CCC fiber group. We had to make some type of art work using metal. I use two pieces of shibori, one a silk piece my daughter gave me and a bleach resist shibori piece for the border. The black bleach shibori was from our CCC group shibori exchange we did several, several, years ago. I traced out branches and reversed appliqued the black fabric. The piece was free motion quilted then the leaves were added.


I took a leaf pattern, which was actually a cardboard advertisement from a company in Canada, and traced onto a lightweight metal. I just cut out the metal leaves with my craft scissors. Each leaf was then stitched down and I added some black fabric paint as shadows behind some of the leaves. This piece hangs in my living room and I was happy with the way it turned out.

Metal is such fun to work with. I've used metal in some of my smaller journal pieces and in one of my Art Diary pages. I've also used it as a binding on some smaller pieces and ATC's. I'm not particular with the type of needle I use but I prefer not to use a large need (90) as it tends to leave holes bigger then I care to see. As far as threads, I've used Signature and Sulky with no problems. Metal comes in so many different colors and weights and there are some really good books out there on different techniques working with metal. 'The Art of Stitching on Metal' by Ann Parr is a good reference books. She has lots of techniques and examples for stitching on metal and for adding color to metal.

This is a picture of page 3 in my Art Diary. If you click on the picture you'll see each item has metal sewn into it or is metal as a stand alone embellishment. The top right piece was put through my crimper to get the texture for the leaves. This was a fun piece to work on. Guess all my pieces are fun to work on for me!! It doesn't take much to make me happy does it!

Temps in the 60's again yesterday and supposed to be in the mid to high 50's today. Just beautiful fall weather so far. Enjoy it while we can. Of course, Bob is golfing this week, no surprise there!