One of my favorite embroidery pattern books is Yumiko Higuchi's Zakka Embroidery. Zakka embroidery is a mix of Japanese and Scandinavian styles to create minimalist embroidery motifs. Designs can be completed using one or two thread colors and some combination of eight embroidery stitches. The designs are adorable, and most take only an hour or two to complete. I like doing Zakka embroidery when I need a break from having to select all the colors or feel like I'm getting too lost in my own design work. Yesterday was my 226th piece for this project (I think that's right), and I've designed 98% of the pieces. Today, I wanted a little break to just make something pretty.
I also wanted to try out embroidering on tulle. If you've seen embroidery on tulle, the designs look like they're floating; it's absolutely stunning. Originally, I planned to stitch the tulle separately and then attach it to the calendar, but my design didn't transfer as well to the tulle. It was hard to see, which could be my transfer pen, but also the type of tulle I have. Instead, I transferred the design to my base fabric and then stitched through both the base fabric and the tulle. It's not exactly the right way to do it, but I still like the end result. A standalone tulle piece is on my list of projects to do once this year is done. I think I'm up to 50 projects already for next year (this may be a slight exaggeration, but only slight).
I made two minor changes to the pattern: I used a different color and I used 3 strands for all the stitches. The surface area I work with is smaller than what would normally be used for the regular design of this pattern, so 6 or 8 strands would have looked heavier than I wanted for this piece. If I were doing this on a larger piece of fabric, I used the strand count referenced in the pattern.
Happy Sunday!
Details:
Stitches: back, straight, satin stitches, lazy daisy + satin stitch, French knots
Thread palette: DMC 718 (3 strands)
Pattern information: "Mimosas" from Zakka Embroidery by Yumiko Higuchi (page 117 for the full pattern)
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