Certificate Module 5 Chapter 5 Part 5 Another quilting sample

My inspiration for today's sample was a photo I took of a stone wall.

5.5.14  Stone wall

I had used Photoshop to change the mode from coloured to greyscale and to posterise the photograph to simplify it.  What I liked most was the colour variation on the stones and the texture around and between the stones and it seemed to me that trapunto quilting was ideal to portray this.

I chose for backing and top layer a thin, loosely woven cotton that had been a sheer curtain in another life.  I wanted it to be semi transparent so that the stuffing would show through.  I machine stitched around the stone shapes and filled the spaces around and between the stones with free machine embroidery.

Next I considered the filling and I decided on tea.  I opened a few teabags, a mixture of black and green tea, cut a slit in the back of each shape and filled it with tea, then stitched up the slit.

The image below, 5.5.15, shows the result.

5.5.15 after stitching and stuffing

Finally, I tried to get the effect of the variation in colour of the stones by painting over each "stone" with warm water.  Once it had dried I was a bit disappointed as the effect was too subtle and so I then tried dipping the whole sample in water and then letting it dry.  This gave a much more pleasing effect.

5.5.16

I feel that this sample makes much better use of the trapunto technique than my first attempt.  The loosely woven fabric was quite difficult to handle when stitching up the slits in the back and it was a painstakingly slow process to try to spoon the tea (using the handle end of a teaspoon) into the small shapes, but I am pleased with the results.