Crewelwork

Some of the new crewelwork cups I was working on last month:

The sgraffito ones had some glaze crawling, but these puppies turned out fine. I took them along to Fresh Fish, and they went over well enough that I’ll make more for shops and fairs and fun. The designs are all based on crewelwork embroidery patterns, which I have grown to adore over the course of the teacup project.

My introduction to embroidery came through my Oma, who was in many ways the iconic grandmother. She lived in an old farmhouse and had a huge garden and made preserves and was constantly working on one textile project or another. Her favourite embroidery style was counted cross-stitch. Indeed, she gave me a cross-stitch kit for Christmas one year. It was a picture of two happy pink pigs in a bubble bath that said “Don’t hog the bathroom!” It took me years to finish it, but I did. Crwelwork and cross-stitch don’t have a whole lot in common, but all the same. I learned early on to hold an appreciation for the time and effort that goes into creating imagery with needle and thread.