Wednesday, February 23, 2011

Turntable Embroidery Lands in New Zealand!

My turntable embroidery arrived safely to the warm and fabulous Jo in New Zealand.  Yippee!!


The Phat Quarter Music Swap (on flickr, sponsored by the Mr X Stitch blog) was a blast and I strongly encourage others to join in future swaps. This was my first time and I was just blown away by the gorgeous, creative pieces that the participants created.  Check out some of their work here. 




This piece was so much fun to stitch up. Inspired by The Record exhibition at the Nasher Museum (for which I recorded the audio guide), I sketched up several turntable and record designs in my sketch book.  Just doodles. 




However, I was insanely unrealistic about how long the piece would take to stitch. The finished piece is framed in a 9”x12” (23cm x 30 cm) frame. What the hell was I thinking?! For two whole weeks, I was stitching every night after work for a few hours and all day long on the weekend.  I’m not kidding.   




My neck and shoulders became mine fields of knots.  I developed freaky calluses on my finger tips.  I drank lots of booze in an effort to relax my muscles.  I listened to several hours of the “Stitching and Junk” pod cast from Mr X Stitch, which is hysterical and kind of rated R. Good times! 






But it was so worth it to make something for Jo.  She is such a good soul… so kind, so supportive and so creative.  It’s especially nice to make something when you know the recipient will really understand the work that went into it. 






And I really pushed myself, playing with color and stitches.  My favorite stitches have to be the woven spider wheel stitches that I used for the volume button and other buttons.  Jo said that they make her want to push the buttons! I want to make a whole piece of just these woven spider wheel stitches.   




And I really like the effect of the back stitch fill stitch on the record itself.  Although that is what took the longest to stitch. 


The back



OK, enough excitement here from me.  I’m a freaky geek! 

8 comments:

  1. This is beyond awesome! O, you are such a clever lady and a supreme sewist!!!!!!!Thank you thank you thank you thank you xxx

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  2. A vinyl fan says: This is ravishingly beautiful!!!

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  3. That is AMAZING! and yes, beyond awesome!

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  4. Thank you SO MUCH, Giggly, Jo, Rico and Robin!! It was a blast to make and I'm so grateful for your comments!! You are TOO KIND!

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  5. This totally rocks!! Even the back looks awesome! A favorite for sure!!

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  6. Looks so great! And so creative!

    I ended to your profile throught Postcrossing and got card from you today (my nickname Groky and I´m from Finland).

    You have very cool crafts! Best wishes!

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  7. It was so great to meet you at FO/Suzy's birthday party! You have some amazing things on your blog, I can't imagine the time it takes to do all this meticulous work. My favorite is the turntable, of course, it's just gorgeous!

    ~Laura

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