The Big Night

It's all over! The textile project has officially been unveiled. It was quite a show - probably 150 people present and lots of speeches heaping accolades on Juliet and Iris, which they had definitely earned.

Good wine and nibbles too. I was rather embarrassed at having a fuss made about my contribution. Juliet and Iris gave me a bunch of flowers and a voucher for the Thread Studio. Wow! I never expected any more than a mention in amongst the many who contributed.

The panels looked fantastic. When we arrived (rather early) they were flat against the wall and I wish we had taken a photo then. There were so many people milling around that it was hard to get a good shot.

This is the best of a rather poor lot. Kevin's will be better, I hope.

My part is done

and the Melville Textile Art Project is almost ready for the official unveiling on Thursday.

We had the last two panels to finish off today: we needed to trim and hem the sides, then do the tops and bottoms. Iris was with us today. We had just finished cutting the sides when we got a phone call. The guy installing the hanging mechanism had arrived at the Civic Centre , and we needed to take the finished panels down to check that everything was OK. It was a thrill to see a completed pair of panels hung, but rather boring as holes were drilled for the rest of the hangers. I kept thinking that I was wasting my time and should be sewing.

Juliet agreed and took me back to her house where I set about hemming the sides of the last panels. I had finished three edges by the time Juliet and Iris came back. The hangers were all installed, but one of them was not right, so it was going back to the workshop.

We finished the sides, then pinned the two panels together and, after measuring three times, cut the tops and bottoms. By then it was 6 pm. Juliet says she will finish the two panels completely tonight, so they can hang all of them tomorrow when the hanging guy brings the faulty hanger back. I am not needed, thank goodness, so I can finish off the fan at last!

Here is the first panel pair with the hanging guy preparing to install the second hanger.

The End is Nigh!

Full day's work today on the project.

Yesterday I called in to Juliet's after the Innovative Stitches session (great workshop on box making - thank you so much Helen) and found her worried about the wagyl tail. It didn't look right. We had trimmed quite a bit off the right side in order to finish the edges and we had not thought about how that would affect the overall appearance. We decided an equivalent trim on the left would do it, I took it home, cut the new shape with the soldering iron and finished it.

Today the binding was partly sewn on and we cut the tops and bottoms of the eight finished panels. Tomorrow Juliet will finish the tops and bottoms and the binding. This leaves 2 panels to go which we hope Iris will have finished by tomorrow afternoon. The wagyl bit is cut so it just needs to be sewn on, sides cut and stitched and then top and bottom finished.

Tuesday should see it all done. I am taking tomorrow off for a family gathering.

Countdown

I returned the blue panel to Juliet. She was a little stressed.

The guy who is doing the hanging mechanism was supposed to have it ready by today. When Juliet rang him he was rather offside - couldn't get it up before Wednesday next week. OUCH! that meant there would be less than 24 hours to correct any errors before the official opening on Thursday. I think Juliet vented a bit and he will now have it ready on Tuesday.

We will be working hard all over Easter. Tomorrow I will help with measuring and pinning to correct length the finished panels and with pinning and stitching the bindings that outline the wagyl. Whatever we don't get done we will do on Sunday.

Today I went shopping - everything is closed tomorrow. I got all the food stuff we will need for the weekend. Time to fiddle with fibre.

I started free machining leaves on vilene 541 for "THE FAN". Murphy's Law - the metallic thread broke and got sucked into the machine's innards. Lots of searching with torches and tweezers. Thread still lost. I rang David at Bestway for help and took it in for emergency surgery. Thanks, David. I wish these new "you beaut" machines were easier to fix when you had thread tangles and tension problems.

Finished 2 leaves and started the third. Thread problems again, so have stopped to let the machine recover.

I am doing a workshop on Saturday morning. Of course I hadn't checked the list and I needed some stuff from Jackson's (art suppliers). The machine problem meant I could detour and get what I needed - well, mostly. Bunnings is open all weekend for the rest.

Eight days to go

before the Melville Textile Art Project has its official public presentation.

Juliet finished the bindings on the blue panels yesterday. They look great and no-one (who doesn't read this blog!) will know that these are in any way different to the rest. I brought one of the blue panels home to modify the wagyl section so it finishes before the edge. In its previous incarnation it would have ended up in the binding.

A fairly simple job - unpick the previous stitching, tack a new cutting line and cut with the soldering iron, then restitch. Not so simple. I had tacked with black polyester thread and the soldering iron melted it as well, making ugly black bits along the edge. Freehand cutting was needed to get rid of them, but it's finished now.

Today we cut and tacked the edges of the red panels, and tacked the orange ones we cut the other day as well. Juliet reckons these are straightforward and she should finish them tomorrow. Four of the five panels almost finished.

The next major task is the bias binding to outline the wagyl. Juliet will make these strips, then I will help her pin them in place for stitching. I think this will be Sunday's job.

I went to aquarobics this morning for the first time in over a week. I thought I had hurt my back, but I now think I may have had a virus. Feeling good now, though.

On the edge

Juliet and I tackled a very important step in the project on Sunday. The finished panels have to have the edges cut straight and then be hemmed.

We carefully pinned the two green panels together, measured not once but three times and cut. They looked good. The process had taken nearly three hours though.

I took some of the offcuts home along with one of Juliet's samples to test settings on my machine to see if I could replicate the required hem. I was able to obtain the required depth quite easily, but had problems keeping it straight. I probably need to use a walking foot because Juliet has a Pfaff and is not having any problems.

Today we did the orange and blue panels. Pinning, measuring and cutting the orange one went well and was accomplished in far less time than yesterday. However the blue panels were a major problem. They were the first ones done and have quite narrow edges - too narrow for the hem allowance we are using. What to do? We decided that there was just enough fabric that the hem could be substituted by a binding and that this wouldn't be too noticeable. So we cut the edges. Amazingly all the layers were included, though it was by the barest whisker in a couple of spots.

We tacked to hold it all in place and called it a day. Only 5 and a half hours, but we did have couple of breaks - for lunch and for a quick trip to Textile Traders for some T-pins. Somehow we managed to buy some fabric too. Silk chiffon at 50% off. We are going to do some nuno felting once this project is out of the way.

Juliet is going to work on the panels tomorrow. I am going to the Art Gallery with my sister. Guess who will have the easier time?

Working . .

The background fabric piece for the fan is finished. I cut out a window of paper to look at it and I think it's really good. Monoprinting the organza overlay hasn't worked so well so I will have another go. I have starting the stitching for the top layer and so far all is well.

I finished writing the instructions for the workshop project on Saturday and went to OfficeWorks to photocopy them and the workshop notes. Also did some photocopying of images to try a technique in the latest Cloth Paper Scissors magazine of using transfer dye to transfer photocopies to fabric. Don't know when I 'll get around to that!

Then I went to Juliet's to pick up two of the project panels and the fabric she has dyed for the Wagyl pieces. She found some plastic webbing and it has worked so well as a resist for Genesis dyes. The fabric is a polyester so it can be cut with a soldering iron so the edges are sealed and don't fray.


When I came home I got right into it. I cleaned the outdoor glass table which gets really dusty, Kevin found me a large piece of particle board for protection and I was away. It was a bit fiddly pinning the pattern to the fabric to ensure it wouldn't slip, but the cutting was a piece of cake. Now I have to stitch the cut pieces to the back of each panel with invisible thread.

I can see a bit of multitasking happening over the weekend.

Stamping Update

I did another set of stamping samples for the project. The present thinking is that stamping heat activated disperse dyes directly onto the panels is fraught with danger, so I did some to try behind the panels.

I used a black dye and the same stamp, but tried to get a more consistent application. I really didn't like the paper when I had finished - it was very patchy and the stamp edges far too definite. However, I ironed it onto the organza. Maybe my heat press doesn't get hot enough (though it was hot enough to burn my arm when I was trying to position the paper and fabric). It took more than a minute and a half to get a distinct print. I also found it hard to manoeuvre the A3 size litho paper and the half metre of organza. I made two prints with the press, then grabbed my homemade ironing board which is a bit bigger than A3 and heated up the old non-steam iron. It took less than 30 seconds to print the rest of the half metre with the iron set on cotton.

So I did the second piece and took the bits around to Juliet's. The prints were less patchy when placed behind the panels, and back to back even better. BUT the total effect was to dull the area where the Wagyl is to be, rather than make it a feature.

Back to the drawing board. Iris called in and the consensus was that the stamped fabric just wasn't going to work. So then we spent nearly an hour playing with various combinations of printed and plain fabric but nothing appealed to all of us. The girls are going to have a think and I have the weekend off to do something else.

I am playing on the computer with a series of photos for possible printing on fabric for a piece for Stitched and Bound. Also came up with an idea for Quilt West. Need to spread out my black and white fabrics for that one. As usual I will be pushing to meet the deadlines.

Catching up

I have been really slack about posting, but I HAVE done some fiddling with fibre.

Monday I played with my 4D software and developed designs for a name badge and for a monogram. This is the monogram design.



I would like to say I did it all by myself, but that would be untrue. I found an online lesson and followed the steps. I am going to try modifying the technique though. I think the background is a bit too stiff.

I have done the transfer printing samples for Juliet and Iris. I delivered them to Juliet this evening and looked at all she has done. She has been direct dyeing polyester with disperse dyes for the green and yellow panels. She has succeeded in dyeing close to 20 metres of white polyester organza in a range of cool and warm greens, graduating from light to dark. I LOVE a particular olive green she has achieved - I will ask her for the recipe.

Many of my printing samples were crappy because I wanted to achieve results quickly, but it is very interesting to compare samples that Juliet did using an ironing press with those that I did using an iron. I have an old non-steam iron with a flat soleplate. I never ironed a sample for longer than 15 seconds. The resultant transfer was comparable to a sample that Juliet did some months ago which took more than a minute using a press.

Since the panels are at least a metre wide and the Wagyl segment is in the upper middle of each panel, using a press will be problematical. I think ironing is the answer, but obviously more experimentation is needed.

AND I did 4 sessions of water aerobics this week! No walking though.

Transfer Dyes - Stamps and Stamping

Today I stamped a pile of papers using the stamps I made on Wednesday for the Melville Textile Art Project. I used black only because this may be the single colour to be used for the Wagyl, but I am also going to try other colours as well on the samples I made.

I was very unhappy with my papers. There are distinct edges to the stamps and it is very difficult to control the amount of transfer dye for each print, so the impression varies. I decided to try printing them anyway, but I was reluctant to mess up the samples I had made. I nipped down the hill to The Fabric Shed and bought a metre of beige organza. The organzas that the project is using are being held behind the counter and I had a discussion with the saleslady about the project's progress. She is looking forward to seeing what comes of it all.

I had stamped some pattern vilene and greaseproof paper as well as the usual photocopy paper. Because the Wagyl section will be larger than A4 in some places, Juliet and Iris had been thinking of making just one transfer for each panel, so vilene seemed to be a possibility.

It is not. The surface is too absorbent and it's also quite thick so it doesn't get hot enough to sublimate the dye. I will try again, but today's experiments weren't too impressive.

I printed a 20cm strip of the beige organza with various papers, including the vilene. All except the vilene worked well and the stamp edges are far less obvious on the printed fabric. The uneven dye deposit didn't seem to make much difference either. Greaseproof paper transferred really well, so I have joined two pieces together with masking tape and stamped this larger piece.

I will try printing it tomorrow. If there is not a visible line where the sheets are joined this could be the answer to the Wagyl problem.

Making Samples

Juliet and Iris are beavering away finishing the construction of the organza panels for the Melville Community Textile Art Project. They have decided that it it is actually quicker to do the construction themselves than have helpers. I wish them hassle-free success.

One part of the panels is is still in flux. Pieces done by a Nyoongar women's group have been arranged to fit into a Wagyl (Rainbow Serpent) shape that moves across all panels.

There have been several ideas mooted on how to do this. Piecing was ruled out very early, as was applique. It is now intended to stamp the shape. They are using disperse dyes since the panels are being constructed from polyester organzas.

I was given a job yesterday - I had been offering my services on a regular basis.

I am to make a couple of stamp pads and stamp lots of papers with transfer (disperse) dye in various colours. The idea is to see whether the Wagyl looks better in just one colour across all the panels which are different colours, or if it would look better if the stamping were in a darker shade of that panel's colour.

Today I made two stamp pads and assembled sample pieces of organza for the stamping. There are 7 different combinations of base fabric to be tested. I have completed six - I am so glad that I do not have to use the pojagi-type seams of the real panels. I have been stitching bits together, then stitching the seam allowances flat. Messy, but quick.

Tomorrow I will finish the last sample, then I will start stamping papers. Won't get much done because I have other things I have to do, but at least it is a start.

More work on the assembly

There were four of us this morning, so Pam and Iris devoted themselves to the orange panel while Juliet and I focussed on getting the blue ones finished. All panels will be assembled in two parts to allow for some tweaking of length when they are all ready to be hung.

There were three units to be joined together to make a row which would then be joined with the last completed row. The units were fiddly since they had to match up with their partners on the other panel. Two units successfully joined. Then we realised that the middle unit was going to be too short to allow for future tweaking, so another piece had to be inserted. This was not easy.


Each "pojagi" style seam has 3 rows of stitching so there was quite a bit of unpicking to be done before another piece could be added and all the lines of stitching replaced. However it was done. Picture above is from an early sample.

One more unit to be attached. A seam was carefully matched and I stitched together the two pieces. The seam allowance was trimmed to .5cm. Then we realised that the final piece had been reversed and the bits had been sewn wrong side to right side instead of both wrong sides together. More unpicking and fiddly sewing, but it was finished before I had to leave for an appointment.

Juliet had finished attaching the bottom hem pieces and said she would get the last seam done before she packed up. I hope she did - I don't want to see those blue panels again till the very end!

This was the last assembly session till after Christmas. The big launch is in March. I think there will be a few full-on days before then.

Melville Textile Project

I trotted off this morning expecting to see huge progress having been made in the two days I couldn't go last week. Unfortunately the blue panels are still proving hard to finish.

However Juliet and Iris decided to make a start on the orange panels and by the end of the afternoon we had made visible progress with about a third of one orange panel assembled.

No photos again. Sorry.

We were able to leave everything set up because the hall wasn't being used this evening. That's a huge bonus because it takes so long to set up and then take down.

Melville Community Textile Art Project

Assembly of the panels is proving to be a very time and thought consuming process. This is Iris contemplating today's progress.


We did, however, make some progress and it looks as though tomorrow we will have definitely one, and possibly two, panels done. Only eight more to go!


Each of the inset pieces has some sort of story. Juliet spent a lot of time on Norm today, and I will try to get a picture tomorrow. This is a piece done by members of the Embroiderers' Guild. The pojagi-style seams look great but they are really slow going. I only managed to finish two blocks today - nine seams in total.


Tomorrow is the last day I can go this week.