a great resource

I've just found this
http://www.antiquepatternlibrary.org/html/warm/catalog

Its an american site dedicated to putting as many vintage patten books and leaflets on line as possible, for free use by embroiderers and craftworkers world wide.

It has some amazing 19th century drawn threadwork patterns- go and have a look!

Caution, deadline approaching...!

We met at Hillsborough  last week to show off what we'd done  so far towards the exhibition, and decide how much more needs doing.  It's always surprising how different our approaches to the same subject can be.  These are a few of the pieces , in various stages of completion.... Its going to be a really interesting show. I should add that NONE of these are mine, they are not ready for public exposure yet..... but watch for the next post.....

Return to UFTM

Valerie invited us back to the Ulster folk and transport Museum, and generously let us  rummage around in the archives- some  of the photos in the collection are just stunning.

She also pulled loads of beautiful pieces out of the colllection for us to see. They made me wonder about the hundreds and thousands of hours spent  over the years by women  just stitching away.......Hours we now spend in front of screens , TV, computers, kindles.....!

This piece of drawn thread-work was a sample piece for one of the large departnment stores

after all the time painstakingly creating this incredible work by hand, a customer could wander in and just chop off a sample from the end!

There were samplers , and little garments, whitework quilts...

I left with a head full of ideas - which was the point of the excercise