Quilted Tyvek Squares

I love to design using different techniques and materials - mixed media & skills.

Here are some sketchbooks I have decorated with quilted Tyvek squares

These spiral-bound Pink Pig sketchbooks, stocked by Colourcraft, have handmade coloured silk covers (front and back) and 35 leaf quality 150gsm cartridge paper (made from acid-free pulp purchased from accredited and sustainable resources). 
This picture does not really show how fabulous the silk cover design on the notebooks is, you really do have to hold one in your hands to appreciate it!
They come in some gorgeous colours, I've used the Berry and Lime Green, and a wide range of sizes, I've used the 21cm square. 
Not all the sizes and colours that Colourcraft actually stock, are listed in their website dropdown options so give them a ring if you want to order from the whole range.

For this project, I started with a couple of squares of Tyvek fabric.

These were stamped with a couple of my favourite polymer stamps:  patterned heart and leaf. I mounted the polymer stamp on a acrylic block and inked them with StazOn ink. As the ink is solvent-based, I can paint the Tyvek squares straight away using eco-friendly acrylic paint in leaf green and purple

While the slightly diluted paint was still wet, I sprinkled on a little Brusho SprinkleIT: iridescent violet on the leaf and metallic pearl on the heart.

Once this was dry, I layered the Tyvek on top of black cotton fabric with some quilting batting behind. I chose a couple of variegated threads.

I sewed around the outside of the Tyvek squares with a zig-zag stitch. This holds it firm for the next stage: free machine embroidery of the heart and leaf.

Then it's time to heat distress the Tyvek, using a heat gun. NB. Work in a well-ventilated area. 

I made a heating mat from a folded newspaper covered in kitchen foil. I used a couple of pins to hold the quilted squares to the mat. 

Once cooled, I flattened the squares with my hands, before trimming and using double-sided tape to mount them on the sketchbooks.


For more detail, on this process, you can watch the film from my YouTube Channel.

Mixed media Butterfly

If you have seen my Insta feed recently you will have seen the pictures of butterfly in my garden, including one landing on my foot. They are the inspiration for this mixed media post where I use free-machine embroidery with fabric paint. 

I remember a lady at one of my free machine embroidery workshops being really surprised when I said I wasn't good at drawing. Art takes so many forms, and to be an artist doesn't mean you have to be good with a pencil!
So to help me, I found a non-copyright image of a lovely butterfly (American Monarch Butterfly, Danais Archippus to be precise) and printed it onto soluble paper.

I then laid this onto some cotton fabric and fastened it into an embroidery hoop.
The paper not only guides my stitching but adds stabilisation for the dance black free machine stitch I added.

I lowered the feed dogs on the machine and used an embroidery foot. The butterfly design gave me a guide for stitching.

See this in action 

Once the black was stitched, I ran the fabric under the tap and the paper dissolved.


 Whilst the fabric was still wet I used fabric paints to add colour to the butterfly with a fine brush - lemon yellow and gold. 

You may remember that last month I  made a screen from Tyvek Paper. Tyvek paper makes a great stencil and I used my Tyvek leaf stencil to sponge on a delicate leaf green.

I then used a foam brush edge to add some gold fabric paint. 

Once the design is dry, iron fix the fabric paint on a hot setting for 2 minutes or bake at 140°C for 4 – 5 minutes.

Snowflake Stitching on Soluble Film

We are down to single figures for daytime UK temperatures now, no snow yet but definitely chilly. I had better hurry up and finish knitting my fingerless gloves!

This week I’m making a stitched bowl, one made up almost entirely of my stitches, but using soluble film as a base. At the end of the process, leaving a little of the film in the stitches (but not to show) will give the stiffening for a bowl shape.

I am going to use a snowflake stamp to create an image in Angelina fibres to inform my stitches on soluble film. You could use any other stamp or even go straight to the stitching!

Stamps are best mounted on a stamp block. They just stick on their own but can be peeled back off again.

I selected a couple of the Angelina fibres from the cool assortment and heated the iron to medium heat. I placed the stamp block on my ironing board with the snowflake stamp uppermost and inked it using an ink pad. Before the ink dries I laid the Angelina fibres over the inked stamp. Making sure to cover it with baking parchment first, I then pressed the fibres onto the inked stamp, counting to 10.

It's hard to show you the effect from my photos 

I then cut out the stamped snowflake in the Angelina. This was placed within the centre of a folded piece of soluble film with a fine layer of turquoise mulberry silk hankie. I snipped a few further bits of the Angelina into the soluble film “sandwich” before placing it in an embroidery hoop.

I used a marker to draw outwards from the snowflake points to further guide my stitching.

 Free machine embroidery stitching using satin and metallic threads outlined the snowflake and then filled in the circle. If you’d like to come to a workshop to learn free machine embroidery stitching get in touch.

Once I was happy there was sufficient stitching to make a complete bowl, I released it from the hoop and cut away the excess soluble film from the outside of the circle.
Tip: save scraps of soluble film, you may try to mend pieces of the water soluble film with an iron (changing its thickness by gluing layers together, and as a possibility of using the leftovers by joining the pieces until the resulting piece will be big enough to be hooped again). Overlap pieces of film inside a sandwich of baking parchment. Use a warm iron and a little steam for a few seconds only.

This is what the stitching looked like before dissolving the film.

Dissolve the film by swishing the stitching in warm water. Remember for a bowl you want to leave a little film still in the stitching.

And this is what the stitching looked like after dissolving the film. 

I left it spread out over a plastic bowl overnight to dry.

This is what the stitched bowl looked like after drying and with some light showing through to show you the detail.

These bowls are great for storing jewellery and are very lightweight gifts to post.

As well as bowls, this method makes great brooches.

I would love to see your creations.

Helen x

Creating Texture

Have you discovered Texture Magic yet?

This week I have been quilting with a layer of shrink fabric interfacing and then using the steam from a steam iron to cause it to shrink and create an interesting texture on my silk Autumnal fabric. This is the real colour of the fabric, I'm not sure what happened to the colour on the other photos which went very pink!

Sew texture magic to the back of your fabric, apply steam and the fabric shrinks approximately 30% in all directions creating a beautiful textured effect. The result is permanent, washer and dryer safe.

I made a sandwich by placing my fabric face down, adding batting and then a piece of the polyester Texture Magic interfacing. The instructions tell you not to worry about any wrinkles in the Texture Magic as they will disappear after steaming, which is indeed the case. I smoothed it outwards as I pinned from the middle of my piece.

Quilting

My fabric has three-inch stripes so I chose to use these as a guide for my first quilting of straight lines to form a 3” grid.

 The instructions say you get more texture the closer together your stitch lines are, so I think this distance is the maximum to get any texture.

Inspired by all the berries around, I chose to free motion quilt round(ish) shapes with a variegated thread with blues, plum, berry pink (Mettler silk finish “Berry rich” 9816). I free-motion quilted alternate squares of my grid.

In the remaining squares I hand quilted a cross in the centre using bright orange (Aurifil 50wt 1133). I measured and marked the centre of the grid with the air erasable pen. I then added a bead to the centre of each cross from the red mix of Indian beads.

Steaming

I laid the fabric on my ironing board with the Texture Magic side up and set the steam iron to a hot steam setting. Similar to the hover technique for the Tyvek Autumn leaves I made earlier this month, you need to hold the iron close to but not touching the interfacing in order to get the texture and dimension effect (rather than pressing it flat).

As it is steamed it puckers and pulls in until it reaches the point it doesn’t pull in any more.

My hand slightly quilted squares puffed up more than the more heavily machine quilted squares.

Sewing

I’m planning to make a bag with my piece of textured quilt, but I'm tempted to make a cushion cover as the fabric would go well in the Ecclesall Textile School sewing lounge!

This will have to wait though as I have three customers sewing projects to complete and several workshops to lead in the next couple of weeks.

I will post my finished project on my Instagram feed for you to see.

I would love to hear about your adventures with Texture Magic

Helen x

Autumn Colours: Tyvek Leaves

I don’t know if you are one of those folk rubbing your hands together in glee at the thought of Autumn? I tend to reluctantly face the fading of summer as I love long days and sunlight. However, I do love some aspects of Autumn, log fires and the changing colours of the leaves to name a couple.

So in crafting, it is autumn leaves I turn to for inspiration at this time of year.

In July I shared how I use painted Tyvek sheets for the sky in textile art landscapes, but once painted there is so much more you can do with Tyvek! Amazing things happen when you apply heat.

(You can apply heat using an iron, craft heat gun or a soldering iron.
Take care not to breathe in the vapours, working in a very well ventilated area and wearing a respirator if doing more than a small piece. At my workshops we are able to use the conservatory for the heating part, working by the open French Door).

The first step is to paint the Tyvek paper sheets. Water-based paint acrylic paint is fixed when completely dry whereas watercolour will dissolve in water. Don’t dry on paper which will leech the colour from the sheet, I painted one side a reddy brown and then waited for that to dry before turning over and painting with a mixture of green acrylic paints. But if you’d like some Autumn sparkle, before each side dries, Spray on a little water and then sprinkle on a little Brusho SprinkleIT. I used gold and copper. The great thing about using Tyvek for this project is that the paint does not go through so each side can be different.

Look at the lovely effect, you get on Tyvek when it’s dry:

You can either draw on a leaf freehand or if you, like me, are not so confident in your drawing skills, draw around leaves. Mark on some veins too.

I then sewed the main stem and centre vein using satin stitch over paper-covered wire. Variegated thread looks good. Because each side of the Tyvek was a different colour, I used different variegated threads in the needle and bobbin.

Sew the veins with a straight stitch or free machine embroidery.

Sewing on clusters of beads with invisible thread adds more sparkle! There is a pack that has some gold and pinky colours in that work well.

I painted the exposed paper covered wire and then sprayed the leaves with gold Brusho Shimmer spray for even more Autumn glow.

Now to apply heat. This will distress the Tyvek, causing it to bubble, curl, and produce holes. The leaves will become firmer, and look more realistic. The trick is to not distress it too far so you are left with no leaf.

Protect your iron and ironing board with baking parchment, placing the leaf between two pieces.

Use a dry iron but don’t press! Hover the iron over the sandwiched leaf. Note my hand position for how I find it easiest to do this. Keep checking how the leaf is applying short bursts of heat until you are happy.

I added a few extra holes with a craft soldering iron. I made a pad to do this on with newspaper with foil on top.

Here it is held up to the light.

I then curled the wire stems around each other to create my Autumnal table decoration. I think it looks great on a mirror tile as you get the reflection of the underside.

I couldn’t resist taking it outside to the garden to see how realistic it looked. What do you think?

Happy autumn, Helen x

Botanical Textile Art

I'm so excited to be part of the Colourcraft Design Team. As a textile and mixed media artist, fabric and/or thread are involved in most of my projects, but not always. My first blog shows how I have coloured fabric to create a Botanical fabric picture.

I just love seeing all the flowers in my garden right now. On a sunny day, I’m even tempted to take my sewing machine outdoors, but usually, our climate is such it’s safer to just take hand sewing outside so you can quickly move inside in if it clouds over. This piece involves both machine stitch and hand stitch for the flowers, so we are good whatever the weather.

The first stage is to prepare the canvas.

For a vintage feel, I took three floral pieces from my fabric stash and joined them together.
It is worth remembering the golden ratio. This rule of thirds states that if you divide any composition into thirds, vertically and horizontally, then place the key elements of your image either along these lines or at the junctions of them, you’ll achieve a more pleasing arrangement and more interesting and dynamic compositions.
So I didn’t have any of my patchwork divisions in the centre (vertically or horizontally) and the botanical focus of my final composition is in the is about two thirds up and left. I include a pattern to print and use if you wish.

Once I had my fabric patchwork piece, I wanted a more subtle floral vintage background so painted on white gesso.

To avoid brush marks, and for speedy application, I used a foam brush

Gesso is an excellent base coat primer and is non-yellowing and non-cracking. One coat is enough and dries quickly. Previously I have tried building up the effect I wanted with diluted leftover white matt emulsion paint, but this wasn’t as quick to apply or to dry.

The bonus of the primer is that it stiffens the patchwork too so you don’t need to use an embroidery hoop when sewing. As long as you haven’t got a fine needle in your sewing machine, it works just fine.

If you want a distressed look you can scratch away some of the dry primer with either a piece of sandpaper or a metal pot scourer.

For the flower petals I used some old cotton lining. (just wash new cotton fabric well if you are using new) and after laying it on a plastic sheet I sprayed it with water and then sprinkled on my chosen Brusho colours. Spraying with some more water created the mottled hydrangea petal effect I was wanting. Hydrangeas are more blue or pink depending on the soil but with art, you can choose to have both.
You could use the BrushoMist Sprays instead in violet, rose red, ultramarine for example.

I dried and ironed my cloth ready for the later stage of creating the flower head.

Draw out your composition or print my design. The final design will be a mirror image.
I traced the design onto Stitch N Tear, although because of the primer, you don’t really need the stabilising properties and could use paper. I find it easier to tear away than paper though. 

Having the design on the wrong side, I did my first machine stitching along the outline of the vase on the wrong side. I chose to do this with grey thread (top and bobbin) and without the feed dogs. I love the freedom of this free machine embroidery but it is worth practising if you are new to this technique. I do run workshops in South Yorkshire if you are interested.

I then turned the canvas over and repeated stitching the vase, using my first stitching as a guide.

I chose to add a couple of light highlights to the vase to create the reflection on the glass. I used a light variegated blue, white yellow thread and a satin stitch.

You could use paint to create these instead.

I used a watered down blue Brusho to fill the bottom of my vase with water.

The next stage was to add flower stems and leaves.
These can be made from fabric (trace onto Bondaweb and apply to the wrong side), by stitching the outline (as I did for the vase), or by printing the leaf onto the canvas (with a stamp).

More free machine stitching adds vein details to the leaves.

The hydrangea flower head was next. I poked a few pins through from the wrong side, using the pattern to guide where the flower head would be.

Having applied some Bondaweb to the reverse of my petal fabric and removed the paper, I cut 1.5cm squares.

These were placed face up (Bondaweb down) on the right side of the canvas in the marked flower head area. I left areas of canvas showing through my overlapped square arrangement. Placing baking parchment over, I ironed these in place with my mini iron.

On the wrong side of my canvas, I stitched around the hydrangea heads. This is easiest done as two figure of eights returning to the centre. I used a variegated thread ( top and bobbin) in hydrangea colours. The idea of this bottom layer is to give the impression of depth of the flower head, and you will find that the flowers don’t match up with the squares, but that is fine because there is a top layer to add.

For the top layer, I cut 2cm squares from my fabric (no Bondaweb this time). I folded each square in four and then held the smaller square at the point where each fold meets, to cut away either side making a curved petal shape. When you let go, you have a four-pointed flower shape. I saved my offcuts as I think they will be great for a future buddleia botanical project!

Using my cut out flowers and my variegated (purple, blue, pink) thread, I sewed the top layer of flowers on by hand with a cross in the centre and further stitches in between. I added beads too for further dimension. There are some lovely hydrangea Indian beads for this. I also used the white beads and green embroidery thread for the gypsophila stem. It’s great when the weather obliges and I can sit and hand stitch in the garden, but whatever the weather, I can get a flower fix by botanical textile art. A great feel good kick!

I tried out several frames for the hydrangea and used this silvery Ikea frame. You can use a frame you have and add a metallic finish as I did recently for a recent felted project.

I would love to see any floral projects you have been doing, please share them.

Here’s to time in the garden

Helen x

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