Hands On Encrusting

This month to follow on with our study of Texture, the group focussed on Encrusting.  To get started, Christine T. provided a stimulating JOLTZ exercise consisting of a circle divided into pie shapes.  Each participant was asked to fill in one pie segment within an allotted time (2 minutes) and then pass their "pie circle" onto their neighbour.  With each successive addition, we were asked to make sure that our additions connected to the one previous.  Sounds complicated?  Well here is what was generated.

Our apologies for the quality of the pictures, but pencil markings were difficult to capture.  You can however see that an interesting array of mandalas were created.

Cathy G-B followed this up with a detailed discussion about Encrusted.  Definition?  Cathy provided several:

1. Cover (something) with a hard surface layer
2. Form a crust
3. Covered with something hard or decorative
4. To decorate by inlaying or overlaying with a contrasting material

This last definition suited our purposes well.  Cathy had asked our members to consider a theme and  bring various items that would reflect our chosen theme along with two pieces of fabric within which to envelope our articles.  For example, a theme of seashore could include sea shells, pebbles, etc.; a theme of hardware could include bolts, screws, washers, etc.

Here is Cathy giving a demonstration of the various stitches that were used to encrust our various objects.

After some preliminary stitching, the group got to work trying out the various stitches that will be used in creating their encrusted pieces.

Some of the stitches used were:

1. French Knot
2. Colonial Knot
3. Scroll Stitch
4. Seed Stitch
5. Bullion Knot
6. Raised Cup Stitch

There are many others that can be used to decorate, but these were the basics.  If you are interested in exploring more stitches, there are several good websites that provide excellent tutorials.  Pintangle is one such website that has an excellent Stitch Dictionary.  Mary Corbet's Needle 'n Thread site has some excellent video tutorials.

Have fun exploring and we look forward to seeing what your encrusted pieces look like.