I’ve always liked printing, whether it is screen printing, lino, stencilling or using a Gelli plate, there is something magical about lifting the fabric or paper to see what has happened underneath. Magic! This week I started to prepare for a class I am involved in at the end of July for Sian Martin’s Distant Stitch Summer School students. My course is titled Edges, my former C&G students will recognise the title, and it is a series of design workshops I really enjoy and which always produce lovely design ideas for stitch and textiles. It is still a work in progress as I need to add more stitch but the printing is finished. The fabric was a medium weight cotton about 50cms x 50cms so quite a good surface area to work with and the slightly heavier fabric meant it took the printing easily. On this occasion I used a square Gelli plate which worked well with the square format of the fabric. I decided to go with a ‘hot’ colour scheme, pinks, reds and oranges, although some of these will be enhanced with stitch, but I used an aqua blue as an accent colour. The idea behind the colour scheme were the wonderful colours of India.
After printing I used Bondaweb to add little bits of fabric, I also used foil in a few areas, not too over the top, and to date have added some areas of free machining. One area of sheer fabric was cut back, reverse appliquè style to reveal the printed colour beneath but more stitch is required. This then is where I have got to……
When I see this it makes me want to take a much larger piece of fabric and create a banner or hanging – what do you think?