Embroidery

I also really enjoy needlework of all kinds. I do blackwork, counted cross-stitch, tent stitch, laid and couched work and have done a little gold work.

Elizabethan coif

My most recent peice of embroidery is this embroidered and beaded coif that I made as a gift for her Excellency Baroness Chretienne. It was originally just going to be a gift, maybe for 12th night but as things worked out I was able to present it to her on her stepping down as Baroness of Southron Gaard.

It is embroidered all over with Harrington knots, Chretienne's device, in a very dark blue cotton and then the gaps in between are filled with stylised carnations or pinks - which are enhanced with clear glass beads. Its a period design taken from the Carolingian Modelbook - a fantastic source for 16th century counted embroidery designs.

More hats and headwear

Baronial Seamsters Guild Project: Southron Gaard 'Tapestry'

This was a project to create shortish sections of wool embroidered linen, each showing scenes from Southron Gaard's history. The idea was that they could all be joined together to make one long hanging a la the Bayeaux Tapestry. My peice shows two scenes from the visit by King Patrick and Queen Adrianna: the boar hunt and the feast. This event was important to me personally because it was my first royal visit (the first by a Queen of Caid) and because I was awarded my Award of Arms at the feast.

Completed in 2005.

Two embroidered kercheifs

A while ago I completed this blackwork kerchief (right). I did it really as a something to do project and it took me a couple of years (you've probably noticed by now that I take forever to finish anything). I realised afterwards that I had done the design much finer than the original but I really do like it at this size. The original had the spaces between the knots filled with flower shapes, a bit like the design used in the coif above, but I'm glad that I didn't do that on this one.

Actually before I did the blackwork one I did the red-bordered which is embroidered in cross-stitch in red, grey and gold. Both designs are taken from The Carolingian Modelbook and are period designs.

Table rug

On the right is a table rug that I stitched several years ago. It is based on the cushion in the Treasury of Enger, fourteenth or fifteeth century in Westphalia. I changed the abstract tree design to a simple cat/panther shape as the panther is my badge. It's done in three coloured wools and in brick stitch.

Viking Coat

The embroidery on Sigurd's Viking Coat is based on the very famous embroidery from the Mammen find in Denmark, now held at the National Museum in Copenhagen where I took a few pictures of it.

My version is more colourful (the original has been reproduced in yellows, golds and dark brown) if less even. I wanted to use my own spun and dyed wools which I had in red, gold and blue.

Embroidered tunic

I vastly prefer to make things that will be used than to frame them and put them on the wall. I have embroidered quite a few garments for Sigurd, starting with this tunic (right). The embroidery is mostly couching and stem stitch and the design is based on a Viking period bowl. Unfortunately this tunic gave up the ghost a few years ago and the embroidered peices were transferred to a new linen tunic which has made its way through a few too many washing machine cycles leading to the shrinkage of the wool in the embroidery.

Opus Anglicanum Purse

Years ago I made this laid gold purse. It took me about two years and I don't use it much now as it is rather delicate. The ground is blue Thai silk backed with linen and then it was embroidered with silk thread and gold thread was couched to make the background in a diamond pattern. The reverse is embroidered with my badge, a black heraldic panther.

Silver-Black-worked shirt

These silver on black 'blackwork' shirt cuffs were finished just in time for Sigurd to go to Estrella War in 1994. They are done in silver thread on a fine black linen over two threads per stitch. I found that it was really hard to see the black threads so I did the work in the day when I could hold the cuff up to the light.