I've been working on stripes this week and came up with some new options that will be great in the striped quilt I'm working on. I'm dyeing on both Kona Cotton and on a poplin that I've fallen in love with. More stripes are coming, and soon they'll be available for sale to quilters. Sign up for my newsletter for a sneak peek, coming soon.
Stitch a Day 2017, Day 42
I'm finding some little spots to add variations in scale. The small triangular piece of cotton is a leftover scrap from a piece my daughter did years ago in the Pre-College Summer Program at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. She used steel wool to rust dye cotton which I dumped into the indigo vat. There are little pieces of her all over the jacket. It will be lovely to brush up against them and think of her as I do. And knowing her, I expect she'll be wearing it once it's finished.
Stitch a Day 2017, Day 41
Needing a bit more color I found some dyed bits left over from a project of my daughter and some hand-loomed Indian cotton.
Stitch a Day 2017, Day 40
I found a stash of Japanese prints I'd lost track of and found they work well. Once again I'm struck by the different cultural applications of indigo. So far on this piece I've got Japan, India, Africa and the Foothills of L.A.
Stitch a Day 2017, Day 39
I'm making good progress, but the daily photos are seeming a bit redundant. Oh well, it's more important that I do it than that I talk about it.
Stitch a Day 2017, Day 38
I found on old color card from years ago that had little 1" x 2" swatches that are perfect to fill in the tiny little areas that pop up around pockets. They're too small to effectively turn under the edges, so I'm stitching them on flat. I figure they'll be sufficiently stitched through to eliminate them coming away at the edges.
Stitch a Day 2017, Day 37
That's the bottom of the jacket, with the inside of the back showing through. I'm still undecided if I'll cover the inside with fabric as well. I'm afraid it might be too heavy for my mild climate, but I still can't decide if I like the brown showing or not. Time will tell.
Stitch a Day 2017, Day 36
This piece of cotton was one of my first attempts at pole wrapping, known in Japanese as Arashi Shibori. I love the process and have amassed quite a collection of poles of different diameters and lengths to accommodate different widths of fabrics. The Japanese, who have made this process into a very precise art form, typically use narrow fabrics that are pieced together to form traditional kimonos. I am not terribly precise, for now at least, and love the random nature and surprise at the moment I pull the fabric off the pole. I've gotten more disciplined with my oxidizing and rinsing, so I'm now able to get much crisper lines and whiter whites than this piece has. I'm using it here to cover a pocket.