Machine embroidery week 3

During our final week three of machine embroidery we were introduced to  the double needle and sword need which are used in conjunction with the pin tack foot. This is a very sensitive technique and the stitch that comes out is very dependant on the material used. For example on a thick heavy weight fabric such as wool flannel it is the widest 4cm needle that is used as the thinner 2cm needle would simply sink into the fabric and not create any tuck on the wool flannel, it is also very important to use two of the same type of threads in the machine so that it doesn't tangle however the spool can be changed to a thicker hand stitch thread. This technique is very time consuming and so would be impossible to create another fifteen samples in one week.



For this first sample I concentrated more on mark making with the medium 3cm double needle and the tailor tacking foot, I took inspiration from my photographs the tailor tacking representing the speckles of on the concrete. I feel that the composition of this sample could be greatly improved, for example if the fabric was fully covered in the tailor tacking and double needle.

This is what I would class as my strongest sample I decided to go for a oblong shape rather then a square, I chose to use a black velvet as this this material works amaizingly with the double needle as it sinks into the pile and a slight line is created, the light hits the velvet which hints to subtle colour changes. I used the smallest double needle and sewed on the bias which tucked up the velvet to give a springy feel. Using this double needle technique on the velvet has in essence created a new fabric with a completely different surface and texture. This is something I found very interesting and is something I would take forward in future samples.

For this sample I continued with the idea of creating a  new fabric and so I got some water soluble and double needle striped black and white lines vertically and then horizontally to create a check pattern this also relates to my photograph of bricks as it follows the same pattern. This sample was quite time consuming as I had to firstly sewn each double stitch individually and then had to was the water soluble off, this was quite arduous as it took a few washes to get the water soluble out however it was well worth it as the new fabric had nice soft hold and weight.

 

This is an example of the sword needle, the chosen fabric worked really well with this technique and created an almost lace effect. Yet again I created a repeat pattern with this sample and kept to a muted cream which I gained from previous weeks samples. It has a quite organic look which is something that really interested me and would like to take forward into hand stitch. 

I defiantly think that this is my strongest set of samples as I feel they are finished to a high quality and the use of materials is carefully thought about.