The next stage….following on from a workshop with Kay Leech (https://feltingandfiberstudio.com/2025/02/27/decovil-explorations-part-1/ )
This is where I left you – at the end of the workshop and having started some hand stitching.
I was pleased with what I had taken home although it was so very far from complete. Then I noticed that some of the applied elements were lifting off the glue. From workshop discussions with Kay in this regard, she had not had any problems over the years with her vases despite them being well and truly man-handled, but….she had fairly heavily machine stitched her work!
With this in mind, it was decision time – do I continue with the hand stitching or, almost start again by machine stitching it all. The latter demands time (a precious commodity at the moment!) at my machine, the former I can do whilst finally relaxing of an evening. Finally, I made the decision – I would not be happy if elements continued to lift, so….
Change the number of hours on the clock to 36!
Not totally happy, I removed some of my hand stitched elements, before then machine stitching the various ‘stone’ textures in different ways on the fabric, netting and tissue paper pieces.
The final elements for machine stitching were the white mulberry paper pieces. I loved this ‘holey’ paper and thought that I should create circles to reflect the holes. But….I was not happy with my first attempt. The needle holes really punctured the white mulberry paper and somehow didn’t look right. We all learn from our mistakes….so out the stitching came!
I don’t do FME every day and certainly don’t stitch small circles, so I practiced on a scrap patch and actually decided I liked the back ‘bobbin’ side better. Whereas the front just produced holes, the back with a seemingly tighter bobbin tension, created a more interesting texture with ‘lines’ which being more prominent, took the eye away from the holes.
Mmmm….now I had a problem….The mulberry paper pieces were randomly placed and were not visible from the reverse side of the Decovil, but it was important to me that I got the circle stitching in the right place to echo the holey paper.
Woohoo….by sheer chance I discovered, thankfully, that the Decovil is surprisingly not totally opaque as it first appears. So, I traced the pattern on the reverse side with a heat sensitive pen (Frixion), by holding the work up to the window (the sun provides a great light box – I was lucky as the continuous morning rain and clouds had vanished about 30 mins before!).
To get a clear run with the circle stitching, I then decided to totally whip out all the remaining hand stitching….oh well – it should make for a better finish!
Before undertaking the circle stitching again, I decided to close the ugly, offending former stitch holes by carefully dampening the mulberry paper and ‘nail-wiggling’ (smoothing) the surface gently. It worked a treat. But when the paper was totally dry it had decided to remove itself from the Decovil glue – no problem – just iron it back in place!
At this point you might already be ahead of me!
I took the piece to the machine to ‘reverse’ stitch the same piece of mulberry paper (now on the underside) ….there was NO pattern marked on the back….REALLY?….I could have sworn I had done it!….
….I’d completely forgotten I had used the heat sensitive Frixion pen which, I’d inadvertently ironed off 😜 so it was back to the window!
Circle stitching was definitely a challenge as the Decovil was not in a hoop (I think it would mark and stretch the material) and is quite ‘slippy’. Another problem is that the needle picks up the glue after a while, so it is not as free-running as normal sewing. Kay recommends using a special needle and had given each of us one for our machines.
12 Detail of the circle stitching texture
Now I’m happy that I have everything anchored – I can entertain, once again, hand stitching whilst relaxing.
The intention of the workshop had been to create a vase for which Kay had been saving (and cutting to size) empty plastic bottles. From the beginning I’d already cut my painted fabric to allow me to wrap both a narrow tall and wide short bottle to create a set of two coordinating vases.
Now, having solved the peeling-elements problem by machine stitching, I started to have further wonderings, better described as ‘construction’ thoughts….”If my calling was to loosely interpret stone, then I could veer away from the vase being a simple wrapping around a cylinder”….Mmmm!
More research was required. So back I went to various ceramicists’ creations….more pages were printed for inspiration….definitely food for thought! 🤔
As this post (written a while ago) goes live, I realise it will be 6 months since the workshop. Where has the time gone? It has simply evaporated! My Decovil creations are complete….sadly….only in my head!
In order that you are not all left hanging for another 6 months I’d best find some precious time (maybe by looking under my Decovil stones 🤣) and finish this WIP hoping you will tune in to Part 3.