Embroidery and Tapestry Weaving Part 2

Copes and chasubles, bedspreads and curtains, are often to be seen decorated with some repeating form. Fig. 11 shows in outline a conventional sprig that is repeated in this fashion over the surface of a famous cope in Ely Cathedral. Fig. 12 is an example of a sprig of flower taken from a XVIIth century embroidered curtain; similar bunches, but composed of different flowers, recur at intervals over this hanging.

It may interest the practical worker to know what are the different st.i.tches used upon this figure. The petals of the top flower are in chain st.i.tch in gradated colouring, the centre is an open crossing of chain surrounded by stamens in stem st.i.tch in varied colour, the outermost leaves are outlined in stem st.i.tch with an open filling of little crossed st.i.tches. The petals of the lower flower are worked similarly, and the centre is carried out in chain st.i.tch and French knots. The leaves are filled in with ingenious variations of these st.i.tches.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 12.]

The repeating element is perhaps a symbolical figure, a heraldic shield, or it may be some geometrical form that supplies the motive. Fig. 13 is a conventional sprig of hawthorn that ornaments in this way an altar frontal at Zanthen. It is by no means necessary that the element which repeats should be always identical; so long as it is similar in size, form, and general character it will probably be the more interesting if variety is introduced.

The principle of repet.i.tion is again found in fig. 14, but with an additional feature; a sprig of flower is used, with the further introduction of diagonal lines, expressed by leaf sprays, which are arranged so as to surround each flower and divide it from the adjoining ones.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 13.]

It is advisable to s.p.a.ce out the required surface in some way before commencing to draw out a pattern; for carrying out fig. 14 it would be well to pencil out the surface as in fig. 15; a connection between these two will be perceived at a glance. This s.p.a.cing-out of the required surface in one way or another is of great a.s.sistance, and may even prove suggestive in the planning of the design. It helps the regularity of the work, and order is essential in design as in most other things in life.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 14.]

Another very usual expedient is that of introducing a main central form, with others branching out on either side and symmetrically balancing each other. An example of this is given in fig. 16. The symmetry may be much more free than this; a tree is symmetrical taken as a whole, but the two sides do not exactly repeat each other.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 15.]

A plan very commonly employed is that of radiating main lines all diverging from one central point. Fig. 17 shows a design following this principle; there is infinite variety in the ways in which this may be carried out.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 16.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 17.]

Another method would be to plan a continuous flowing line with forms branching out on one side or on both. Figs. 18 and 19 are border designs, for which purpose this arrangement is often used, though it can also well form an all-over pattern; sometimes these lines used over a surface are made to cross each other, tartan wise, by running in two directions, producing an apparently complicated design by very simple means.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Figs. 18 and 19.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 20.]

Designs may be planned on the counterchange principle. This is a system of ma.s.s designing that involves the problem of making a pattern out of one shape, continually repeated, and fitting into itself in such a way as to leave no interstices. The simplest example of this is to be found in the chess board, and it will easily be seen that a great number of shapes might be used instead of the square. Fig. 20 is an example of a counterchange design carried out in inlay; for this method of work counterchange is very suitable. On reference to the chapter upon this work another example will be found (page 181). Fig. 21 ill.u.s.trates the same principle, further complicated by the repet.i.tion of the form in three directions instead of in two only.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 21.]

A method of further enriching a straightforward pattern, covering a plain surface, is to work a subsidiary pattern upon the background. This is usually of a monotonous and formal character in order not to clash with the primary decoration, though this relationship may sometimes be found reversed. It has the appearance of being some decoration belonging to the ground rather than to the primary pattern; in its simplest form it appears as a mere repeating dot or a lattice (see fig. 22), but it may be so elaborated as to cover with an intricate design every portion of the exposed ground not decorated with the main pattern.

Many other distinct kinds of work might be mentioned, such as needlework pictures, the story-telling embroideries that can be made so particularly attractive. Embroidered landscapes, formal gardens, mysterious woods, views of towns and palaces, are, if rightly treated, very fine. In order to learn the way to work such subjects we must go to the XVIth and XVIIth century _pet.i.t point_ pictures, and to the detail in fine tapestries. The wrong method of going to work is to imitate the effect sought after by the painter.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 22.]

It is a mistake in embroidery design to be too naturalistic. In painting it may be the especial aim to exactly imitate nature, but here are wanted embroidery flowers, animals and figures, possessing the character and likeness of the things represented, but in no way trying to make us believe that they are real. The semblance of a b.u.mble bee crawling upon the tea cloth gives a hardly pleasant sensation and much savours of the practical joke, which is seldom in good taste; the needle, however, adds convention to almost anything, and will usually manage the bee all right unless the worker goes out of the way to add a shadow and a high light. Such things as perspective, light and shade or modelling of form, should all be very much simplified if not avoided, for embroidery conforms to the requirements of decoration and must not falsify the surface that it ornaments. Shading is made use of in order to give more variety to, and exhibit the beauty of, colour by means of gradation, to explain more clearly the design, and so on; it is not employed for the purpose of fixing the lighting of the composition from one point by means of systematically adjusted light and shade, or of making a form stand out so realistically as to almost project from the background.

In avoiding too much resemblance to natural forms it is not necessary to make things ugly; a conventional flower implies no unmeaning straightness or impossible curve, it may keep all its interesting characteristics, but it has to obey other requirements specially necessary in the particular design. Another point to be noted is that, since there is freedom of choice of flowers and other objects, only those perfect and well-formed should be chosen; all accidents of growth and disease may, happily, be omitted; if anything of this kind is put in it helps to give the naturalistic look which is to be avoided. Both sides of a leaf should match, though it may happen in nature, through misfortune, that one is deformed and small.

In figure work, which, though ambitious, is one of the most interesting kinds of embroidery, the figures, like all other things, must be treated with a certain amount of simplicity; very little attempt must be made to obtain flesh tones, roundness of form, perspective, or foreshortening.

The work should be just sufficiently near to nature to be a good embroidery rendering of it. However, without overstepping the limits there is a great deal that may be expressed, such things as character, gesture, grace, colour, and so on, matters which are after all of first importance. Detail, if of the right kind, may be filled in, but it is wrong to attempt what is to the craft very laborious to obtain, for this would be misdirected energy, which is great waste. A right use of the figure can be seen in the XIIIth century embroidery pictures, which, covering mediaeval church vestments, often display episodes from the lives of the saints. These are some of the masterpieces of the art of embroidery; observation of nature is carried to a marvellous pitch, but the execution never sinks into commonplace realism.

Certain restrictions are always present, in making a design, that must be conformed to, such as, the limit of s.p.a.ce, the materials with which the work is to be carried out, the use to which it will be put, and so on. These, instead of being difficulties, can afford help in the way of suggestion and limitation. A bad design may look as if it obeyed them unwillingly--a form is perhaps cramped, perhaps stretched out in order to fit its place, instead of looking as if it naturally fitted it whether the confining lines were there or not. In the early herbals, ill.u.s.trated with woodcuts, examples can be found over and over again of a flower filling a required s.p.a.ce simply and well; fig. 23 is taken from the herbal of Carolus Clusius, printed at Antwerp in 1601 by the great house of Plantin. The draughtsman in this case had to draw a plant to fit a standard-sized engraver's block, and he had a certain number of facts to tell about it; he drew the plant as simply and straightforwardly as possible, making good use of all the available s.p.a.ce, the result being a well-planned and balanced piece of work, with no affectation or unnecessary lines about it.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 23.]

Fine colour is a quality appreciated at first sight, though often unconsciously. It is a difficult subject to speak of very definitely; an eye for colour is natural to some, but in any case the faculty can be cultivated and developed. By way of studying the subject, we can go to nature and learn as much as we are capable of appreciating; even such things as b.u.t.terflies, sh.e.l.ls, and birds' eggs are suggestive. Again, embroideries, illuminated ma.n.u.scripts, pictures, painted decoration, may be studied, and so on; in fact, colour is so universal that it is not possible to get away from it. Unfortunately we are sometimes forced to learn what to avoid as well as what to emulate.

Colour is entirely relative, that is to say it depends upon its immediate surroundings for what it appears to be. Also it has effects varying with the material which it dyes; wool is of an absorbent nature, whereas silk has powers of reflection. It is a safe plan to use true colours, real blue, red or green, not slate, terra cotta, and olive.

Gold, silver, white and black, are valuable additions to the colour palette; it should be remembered about the former that precious things must be used with economy or they become cheap and perhaps vulgar.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 24.]

For getting satisfactory colour there is a useful method which can at times be made use of; this is to st.i.tch it down in alternate lines of two different tints, which, seen together at a little distance, give the desired effect. Backgrounds can be covered over with some small geometrical pattern carried out in this way, such as is shown in fig.

24, perhaps using in alternation bright blue and black instead of a single medium tint of blue all over. At a slight distance the tone may be the same in either case, but this method gives a pleasantly varied and refined effect, which avoids muddiness, and shows up the pattern better. This same method is used for expressing form more clearly as well as for colour; waves of hair, for instance, are much more clearly expressed when worked in this way.

CHAPTER IV

St.i.tCHES

Introduction--Chain St.i.tch--Zigzag Chain--Chequered Chain--Twisted Chain--Open Chain--Braid St.i.tch--Cable Chain--Knotted Chain--Split St.i.tch.

It is necessary for every worker to have a certain amount of knowledge of st.i.tches, for they are, so to speak, the language of the art, and though not of first importance, still there is a great deal in st.i.tchery. The needlewoman should be absolute master of her needle, for there is a great charm in beautifully carried out st.i.tching; also a good design can be made mechanical and uninteresting by a wrong method of execution. The simplest and most common st.i.tches are the best, and are all that are necessary for the doing of good work. Work carried out entirely in one st.i.tch has a certain unity and character that is very pleasing. There are a great number of st.i.tches in existence, that is, if each slight variation has a different name a.s.signed to it. The names are sometimes misleading, for often the same st.i.tch is known by several different ones; descriptive names have where possible been chosen for those discussed in the following pages.

A worker may find it useful to keep by her a sampler with the most characteristic st.i.tches placed upon it; a glance at this will be suggestive when she is in doubt as to which to use, for it is often difficult to recollect just the right and most suitable one at a moment's notice. It is necessary to learn only the main varieties, for each individual worker can adapt, combine, and invent variations to suit a special purpose.

The direction of the st.i.tch is important; tone, if not colour, can be very much altered by change in direction; also growth and form can be suggested by it; for instance, lines going across a stem are not usually so satisfactory as those running the length of it; these suggesting growth better. Folds of drapery are often explained by direction of the lines of st.i.tching quite as much as by gradation of colour.

With reference to the st.i.tches described in the following chapters, the worker is advised to try to work them by simply examining the diagrams, and, if in any difficulty, then to refer to the printed description, for such directions are apt to be tedious. The simplest way to master these is to let some one read them out step by step, and to work from dictation. It should be remembered that the use of a particular thread often makes or mars a st.i.tch, some requiring soft silks to show them to advantage, whilst others may need a stoutly twisted thread.

Chain st.i.tch is universal, and one of the most ancient of st.i.tches. It is the most commonly used of a group that might be described as linked st.i.tches. Much beautiful work has been carried out entirely in it, and when a monotonous even line is required, this is a most suitable st.i.tch to employ. It is equally in request for outline and filling in, and its chain-like adaptability makes it specially good for following out curved forms or spiral lines. Tambour st.i.tch is practically the same in result, though worked in quite a different manner, for it is carried out in a frame with a fine crochet hook, instead of with a needle. This makes it quicker in execution, but more mechanical in appearance, so it is not to be as much recommended.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 25.]

To work chain st.i.tch (fig. 25) bring the needle through at the top of the traced line, hold the working thread down towards the left with the thumb, insert the needle at the point where the thread has just come through and bring it up on the traced line about one-sixteenth of an inch further along, draw the thread through over the held down thread.

It should show a neat line of back-st.i.tching on the reverse side. The chain can be made broader by inserting the needle a little to the right, instead of at the exact point where the last thread came through. Care must be taken in the working not to draw the thread too tightly, as this st.i.tch is inclined to pucker the material, especially when it is worked in curved lines.

A flower and leaf worked with a solid filling of chain st.i.tch are shown in fig. 26. The dark outline of the flower is in back st.i.tch, the centre a ma.s.s of French knots, and the stem in stem st.i.tch. By working the petals in curved lines in this way the shape is well suggested, and the play of light on the curves is particularly happy, especially if the thread used is silk or gold. Another slight variation from this would be to work the lines of chain st.i.tch in different shades of colour, and so get each petal gradually either lighter or darker towards its base; this gives a very pretty effect. Fig. 27 shows an oak leaf carried out in this way, the lines upon it indicate the way in which the st.i.tches would be worked. The rule in solid fillings is to work from the outside inwards where possible, and thus make sure of a good outline.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 26.]

In the Victoria and Albert Museum there is a white linen dress[1]

daintily embroidered in chain st.i.tch. It is an excellent example of a kind of design suitable to this st.i.tch; the leaves and flowers are carried out in lines of chain st.i.tch following the outline, and in these lines use is made of strongly contrasting colour to both show up the form better, and also decorate it. The leaf in fig. 28 is in style somewhat similar to this, and is intended to be carried out in two distinct colours.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 27.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 28.]