Gnasher

all finished. I will make a kit of him eventually.

I did think he needed some white twiddles around the yellow, but when I did some I picked them out (I know, me unpicking, it does happen every now and then, but mostly am too lazy.

manticore progress

I didn’t want to do his snack/severed leg in any sort of ghoulish green, rotting flesh kind of colour, because nowhere to the bestiaries say that manticores are carrion eaters,(and he looks like he probably has a sensitive tummy)but it seemed wrong to do it the same colour as his face. In the end I settled for this lilacy pink, which has just enough of a hint of blue to it to look unhealthy without going the full zombie.

Sutton hoo

So I listened to the popular consensus and went with the sutton hoo panel, which turned out to be right because there was a lady in the living history camp doing a version of spagetti dog.

Although on reflection working with silk filament on watered silk taffeta might not have been the sanest choice for a public event, even though I was working in the ballroom rather than outside in the breeze (I was there storytelling, but I needed something to do with my downtime) and there might be a few *cough* tangles at the back *cough*

I did a bit of the gold so people could see the eventual aim, but made sure to do bits that wouldn’t interfere with progress. everyone agreed with me that this panel depicts a man getting his ears licked by puppies.

That watered silk taffeta is REALLY hard to photograph though, I think I’m going to have to set the proffesional on it when it’s done

maasiek

still needs gold

hat

my favourite everyday hat was looking a bit sad because the band had gone all grubby (I’d put the old band on the day I bought it about 15 years ago, so it had a good innings) so whilst wiating for a certain someone to get dressed (I don’t care what people say about women taking forever to get dressed, I’ve never met a man yet who is ready on time), so I refurbished it this morning before going to the flower show

obviously its a silk band

while I was sewing I watched the queen of the south, and now that she’s queen of her own cartel all her minions keep calling her “hefa” which I know is spanish for boss, but I keep hearing “hieffer” and if you call a woman that in these parts you better expect a bit of a Will Smith reaction!

new frock

It’s on the child manequin because the growd up one died, so it looks a bit big.

This what happens when lockdown deprives you of regular fabric shoppings trips – let this be a cautionary tale!

SO I just liked these big hippy trippy quiliting panels, I liked the bolf colours and the swirlies, so I bought them.

which was a problem because I don’t quilt, so I made a dress.

I’m told I’m not allowed to wear it in public unless I change my name to starchild, so I’m threatening to wear it to Harrogate flower show next weekend (He is campaigning earnestly for the boring black dress with poppies on)

Spring lamb

I went for a zigzag pattern underside couching in white gold to evoke tufts of spring grass, and then decided his daffodil needed a little silver outline.

He’s available as a companion kit to the Winter dragon on my shop

https://www.opusanglicanumembroidery.com/shop/opus-anglicanum-kits/4?page=1&limit=60&sort_by=category_order&sort_order=asc

funny face

An interesting excercise. On saturday I was teaching an online class for the Ashmolean, the dragon queen in opus anglicanum that I posted here late last year. Becasue I’ve already done this face twice, once as a video to send out for class and once for the installation at Caernarfon castle, I decided that to make the geometry more visible on the zoom feed (because no matter what camera you use as a feed the images on zoom always seem a bit fuzzy to me, they aren’t exactly HDTV ) Hence I worked the constituent parts of her face in separate colours.

She looks somewhat modernist, almost picasso-ish, and amuses me greatly – although I’m glad she is simply a throwaway demo project as I can see some rather imperfect stitchingon her nose now I have a decent photo. In my defence the camera tends to impede my view when I have it hovering over the embroidery like this!

lamb with…daffodil

I thought it was lamb with mint sauce but someone says otherwise

lamby lamb

This one of those cases where you have to photograph at an angle to get the effect of light and movement on silk.

Gareth thinks he’s really cute and then I told him I was going to use very pale gold for the background and he complained I was gilding the lily (Or the daffodil in this case) because he hates all gold!