City Scape - Adding Oil Paint Stick

   I  decided to add some color to the background and foreground. I used oil paint sticks for this. Oil paint sticks are just that, oil paint in a stick or fat pencil like shape. The oil paint is a solid, not something that you would be able to squeeze out of the tube. You apply it by scraping the oil stick with a stiff brush and then brushing the oil paint on the fabric, or you can rub the fabric with the stick directly. I do it both ways. I use a stiff paint brush to spread the oil paint around on the fabric. I used a combination of dark and light blue and pale yellow on the background areas. I always let the oil paint set or cure for three days before I do anything else with the fiber art piece I am working on. Below are progress photos showing the stages of the tie scape as I added the paint.































   This is the way it ended up. On my next post I'll show you the next steps for this project. Thanks for visiting my blog!

City Scape Background Quilting

After I put some stitches through the ties, I needed to do something with the background area. I decided to add some building shapes in the area of the tie buildings. You can see the outline of the buildings below.









For the sky, I just did a horizontal back and forth stitch, suggesting some clouds.






Below the buildings I did some linear stitching at different angles.

My next step is to jazz up the background fabric a bit. I'll show that on my next post. Thanks for visiting my blog!

Embroidered Building Facades

Red and Blue City Scape

This is a city scape made primarily with men's ties.  I have stitched the ties down to the background, and my next step was to add some embroidery stitching to the red building fronts. The red tie fabric looked a little too plain, in my opinion, so I wanted to add something to jazz up the front of these buildings a bit.

I am not a master embroiderer, so I rely on the simple stitches that I know well. I don't even know

their official names, but I use a cross-stitch, a buttonhole stitch and a straight stitch. The stitching was done with embroidery floss.  I've shown a couple of detail photos here, above and below.

The embroidery stitches stand up on the surface of the tie. I have also done some machine quilting stitching on the ties themselves to enhance the appearance of the top. This machine quilting often goes around the areas where I've embroidered and makes that location stand out more. In other instances it secures the ties to the backing fabric and batting so they don't look like they are puffing out too much.  Decorative stitches built in to my machine have also been used on a couple of buildings as well.  It's on to the background next...






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My "Attitudes!" Exhibit - One Week Until the Show Opens!

"On the Boulevard"

I'm proud to have my "Attitudes!" series in Mancuso's World Quilt Florida Exhibition. The show opens one week from today, on January 18th and runs through the 20th. It is at the Orange County Convention Center in Orlando Florida (9800 International Drive). I wish I could be there to see it! I'm very grateful to Mancuso Show Management for the Opportunity!

Thanks for visiting my blog!

This is a partially finished city scape that uses men's ties for the buildings. I have cut the ties in various sizes to make the buildings. I am using three different ties in this piece. I also am using solid blue and black commercial fabric for the building shadows and the top of one of the buildings.

The tie pieces are placed on a hand dyed men's handkerchief. The dye color is a light blue. I have placed the handkerchief on a commercial striped fabric. There is a piece of batting and backing fabric under the striped fabric.

I cut the tie sections and arrange them in a way that looks interesting. I use a bit of glue to hold them in place, and then begin sewing them down. I sew them with my sewing machine using a buttonhole, zig zag or decorative stitch. The stitching goes around each of the shapes. This stitching is done through the tie, handkerchief, striped fabric, batting and backing fabric. Here is a picture of the back with some of the stitching visible:



It's not particularly neat looking. I intend to use these as pillows, so the back will be inside the pillow and won't be visible. My next step is embroidery work on the buildings. Thanks for visiting my blog!