Wednesday 3 January 2018

new learning

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The variety and application of techniques in many vintage books is truly impressive. I hope to spend more time browsing through and working some patterns from them.
The Priscilla Tatting Book #3 (free download from Antique Pattern Library) is one such.

Tatted Medallion with Woven Center (Fig 69)
This square medallion is inset in fabric and also linked into an edging for the ‘Centrepiece in Tatting and Weaving’. The weaving between adjacent medallion in the circular edging is even more impressive. 

I chose to tat the square with 3 strands of Anchor embroidery floss. 
The sides are just over 2 inches long. 
There is a central picot common to the 3 large rings at each corner.
Isn’t it a beautiful arrangement?!

But what interested me more was the woven center - something I hadn’t attempted. I chose 2 strands threaded through a tapestry needle for weaving.
Found this interesting and informative article by Georgia Seitz - Tatting with Needle-Weaving Centers  
I tried to follow the Priscilla instructions as well as those in the article, but somehow couldn’t figure out where the needle 'returned to' for the support lines.
So here’s what I did :
  1. First, I pinned down the square in order to keep it taut.
  2. Then inserted a pearl-headed pin in the center of the negative space.
  3. Now, starting with the tail in the center, I went through a picot to create a support beam, and back around the central pin, before moving to adjacent picot in one direction….
  4. After the last beam was done initial weaving was easier with the pin still in place. After a couple of rounds, I removed the pin and continued the under/over movement.


This is my one-n-only first attempt at weaving outside of embroidery and will take some practice to get it tidier. But I’ll get there some day!
Combining tools and techniques creates interesting texture and designs, and widens our scope.

hope your new year is off to a creative start!
weave dreams into tatting !

12 comments:

  1. Interesting medallion:) Happy New Year!

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  2. Hmmm... mid-comment, everything disappeared! Is that a hint that I was writing too much? ;-)

    I tried a little needle weaving a while back, but I was not at all pleased with my results. I like your idea of putting a pin in the middle to work around. I saw something within the last week that showed weaving around a couple of toothpicks. It reminded me of something my daughters had done in elementary school. There's so much out there to try!

    Please keep exploring new ideas and sharing them with us! I do enjoy reading about new possibilities, even if I never try them out!

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  3. I was going to say here in the US most everyone is taught weaving throughout school it is great and I love tatting mixed with any thing and Pricilla like Ninetta said we should start a club of her works!

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  4. Interesting. I think Anna Burda had patterns with needle weaving in the centre. I like the bright colours you used. Yes, always good to extend the possibilities.

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  5. Interesting technique! I love and used it (in my "Tatting parure") to fill plastic rings covered with double stitches.

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  6. Interesting post, not tried embriodery in tatting, but I have seen it in the Anna magazines that were published in English many years ago

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  7. Thank you everybody for your lovely comments and observations :-)

    Annetta, hope to see a lot more of your tatting this year :-)

    Diane, great to see you back, refreshed! I’ve done spider webs in hand embroidery backed by fabric, never in an empty space. It’s a good way to fill up large spaces and lend support to the lace.

    Carollyn, the entire time I was struggling with the support lines, I kept thinking of Ninetta and her exquisite net lace! I like the club idea but don’t want to be tied down – there are so many old designers/books to plunder still ;-P

    Jane, I had to fall back on embroidery threads for the colours ;-P

    Daniela, I looked for your parure – nice idea there !!!

    True, Margaret, this is a very old ‘technique’ really. Now we simply substitute it with a central medallion to fill the space, and tat around it. But I remember a French blogger doing quite a few projects with the combo recently.

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  8. Happy New Year!!! Pretty medallion with interesting technique used in center which fills up empty space. Lovely bright colors too. Wish I add such add ons to my work too.

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  9. Oh I know what you mean I was dreaming cause i find myself going back to her pattern many times.😄

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  10. Wish you lots of creative tatting, Usha :-)

    Finally some vibrant colours, right Sue?!

    Carollyn, when somebody gets hiccups, we say that s/he is being fondly remembered... Ninetta must be plagued by them right now ;-P

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