Hand Embroidery Data Samples

This week our task was to produce samples samples samples! I enjoyed linking my embroidery techniques to my data, as I didn't know how I could do this until I got stuck in. It took me a while to get into the swing of things, but I managed to link my data well!

As I have two tangents to my project, being chromatography, and oil and water, I am very glad that I had both of these ideas to work with. The circular patterns of the oil and water provided a good base for stitch, whilst I could also use patterns from Chromatography. I also did Chromatography on paper and fabric and used these in my samples. I'm now glad that I can link the ideas that I had from both of the tangents in my work back together in my embroidery samples to show development.

At one point in my sampling, I started to zoom into some of the patterns created by my resist chromatography, and represent this in stitch.

One of my favourite experiments from my sampling involved doing Chromatography on Scrim. It's an easily manipulatable fabric, meaning I could pull holes in it easily, and stitching on top of this proved to be one of my favourite techniques, tying my whole project together.

I'm happy with the samples that I have produced but after doing these samples I felt as though all of my ideas were exhausted and stuck for inspiration. After various feedback sessions this week my ideas have been growing and for my next ten samples I am going to employ some of the following ideas:

• Use stitch to show the path of chromatography (e.g.take it out of the water half way through and sew where the ink is up to)
• Stitch a piece in white first and then add chromatography to see how it affets my work
• Only put chromatography on part of my fabrics and add stitch to emphasise its pattern (e.g. just a little dot of chromatography)
• I'll also try dipping an inked sample in water, letting it dry and then trying to re-do the chromatography with the existing line of ink.
• Try resists on fabrics