cloissoine effect

Lunar Moth - in progress


City of dreams

I need to outline with embroidery, but don't want to 'solidify' and lose the ephemeral effect. Still pondering...

Belt and braces...

... and still I'm convinced my trousers will fall down - metaphorically speaking.

I have a tendency to be overly concerned with strength of construction. Following Jude Hill's work http://spiritcloth.typepad.com/spirit_cloth/
is teaching me the beauty of raw edges and the effects of age and wear on fabric. I would never before have raw-edge appliqued - certainly not something as flimsy as habotai. But I love the effect, and the fact that if and when it frays, I'll repair with embroidery.


a scrap of painted or dyed silk habotai, stitched in place with two rounds of running stitch in embroidery thread.

Lunar bear

Recycled painted silk/viscose velvet.

How I wish I'd kept a journal back then.
Erica would have been 9, 10... maybe 11. She'd been unwell, or upset, or deserving of a treat - I don't remember - but it occasioned a trip to Hobbycraft where she saw a silk scarf kit. She sketched the designs and came home to design her own gutta-outlined and painted silk scarf, backed with silk/viscose velvet:

She wore the scarf with pleasure and pride, until I would imagine it was no longer considered to be cool.

Lunar bear is made from the recycled velvet.

If at all possible I want to include Erica's habotai paintings in the quilt - but it will require thought about how to use such lightweight fragile fabric.