Product Description

Kay Dennis is passionate about Stumpwork. This intricate, raised and padded embroidery has its origins in the seventeenth century, and is enjoying a revival amongst embroiderers and lacemakers. It is wonderfully versatile and will appeal both to the novice and imaginative needleworker. Using a mix of flat, padded, wired and free-standing elements, it employs a wide range of embroidery techniques. This comprehensive and colourful book covers both basic and needle lace techniques - sections on each containing a series of elaborate step-by-step demonstrations showing how to work individual techniques, followed by a project combining all the methods. Kay takes inspiration from a variety of sources and her designs include animals, flowers, fruits and insects - popular motifs in the seventeenth century. She also creates contemporary designs and there are advanced projects on landscape and figurative work. A gallery of Kay's work is included to stimulate and inspire the reader.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #21939 in Books
• Published on: 2001-09
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 80 pages

Customer Reviews

A must have for all stumpwork beginners
This is the first stumpwork book I own. It explains all the basic techniques for getting started, such as how to prepare the fabric, which fabric to use when, which materials are necessary, and which materials are good to have as well - useful if you want to start on a budget. She includes several tips and tricks she has learnt that will help you to have a more professional finish - the type of things you may only learn from experience and sometimes you wish you had known up front. She includes information on how to sew basic starting stitches such as couching, satin stitch, and button hole stitch, and some more advanced techniques such as making cordonnets, needle weaving, and how to make heads and hands. These are all explained with step-by-step colour photos to give you all the detail you need, as well as additional line diagrams for complicated stitches. (I find this useful to see exactly where the needle has to go, and it is sometimes easier to see from a line drawing than a finished sewn piece.) She includes several patterns and inspiring photos of samplers she has made to motivate beginners and experts alike. I feel confident that I can tackle a project combining advanced elements because all the techniques are explained in a basic way from start to finish. Kay Dennis is an enthusiast who shares obvious love for the craft, and I think this is a great book for those who want to explore embroidery and get into stumpwork, needle lace, and other surface embroidery techniques. The title says it is for beginners (which I am), but I think even an experienced person would get inspiration and ideas from this book too!

An excellent book for beginners and inspiring for experts.
I found this book had all I needed to know to work all the patterns given. The photographs were excellent and the description extremely clear. I also felt inspired to learn more about this fascinating craft and will look around for even more courses to attend. Complete beginners would have no trouble in following the instructions and I am sure would produce very good pieces.

Good overview
This was the first stumpwork book I bought and although it answered many of my questions I did subsequently feel the need to buy A-Z of Stumpwork, so I guess it leaves some gaps. Nonethless it is well illustrated with good instruction together with a showcase of some fabulous stumpwork designs.