A bit of extra decoration for the autumn

First, some admin business. Christine S., if you’re there, I can’t send you the free design because you don't seem to have given Typepad your e-mail address, so I don’t know where to send it. And for everybody – if I don’t get back to you with the free design, there’s always a good reason!

Right – back to design matters. A while back I was talking with a local artist who said she was off to a workshop called “Metallurgy for Fabric Artists”. This sounded really interesting and I was reminded of some of my past attempts to include unusual materials like gilt and plastic in some embroidered pieces

I had just finished a set of simple colourful birds (which I’d done to cheer myself up after a lot of serious, dark pieces I’d been working on for an exhibition) and I thought they might look good with some extra decoration. I stitched all the birds on a long strip of felt, and they looked more or less OK

The whole panel, undecorated

But I thought maybe some beading might help. I could, of course, have stitched beads on with needle and thread, but that sounded like too much hard work, so I found some tough PVA glue and some fine forceps and got to work

What you need for some simple bead decorations

It worked remarkably well. The glue really stuck the beads on firmly and I couldn’t pull them off even when I tried. I think the beads might even survive gentle washing, but I haven’t tried that yet

Some of the decorated birds

It’s a subtle effect, but it works. The panel got a lot of attention at last week's exhibition, and people couldn't resist running their fingers over the surface to feel the beads (and it's a tribute to the toughness of the glue that all the beads survived this attention!) Next time I might try something a bit more glitzy – maybe sequins or pieces of shiny gold metal