Explorations, Episode 5: This Shirr is Fun!

Explorations, Episode 5: This Shirr is Fun!

I'm working on an art quilt that doesn't have to be completed until August, and to get ready to work on it, I'm making scale-size practice pieces, each inspired by a different image.  The idea is that making these practice pieces will help me decide which of four images to use for the final piece.

I finished my first scale-size practice piece last week, and the results were... so-so. You can read about that here:  http://stitching-it-all-together.blogspot.com/2018/03/explorations-episode-4-first-practice.html


Today, charging on, I'm working on a second practice piece.  This one will be based on this image:

This image, I have to admit, is the very one I intended to try when I entered this contest.  I always wanted to try to replicate that exquisite foam, as elegant in its way as the ermine trim on a royal robe.  For this exhibition, I'm required to use felting and thread painting.  The ripples on the right will be felted, then embellished with thread painting and beads.  As for the foam, I'm planning on making that out of some kind of silk.

For that purpose, I acquired

Silk habotai 
Silk gauze   
Silk chiffon  
Silk crepe de chine 
Raw silk
Smooth raw silk
Lightweight raw silk.  

I'd already made a pattern for this practice piece, and I started  construction by felting the sand ripples on the right:

You see that piece of green yarn?  I used that to measure the length of the line of foam.  Starting at the upper right there, and going down to the lower left, the line of foam is 32 inches long.  I adjusted this to 36 inches long, which definitely couldn't hurt.  The width across is about 8 inches at the widest.  I multiplied that by three to give the foam some gathered fullness.  So the width of the piece of silk I would cut to make the foam would be 24 and its length would be 36.  

Which of all those silks to try?  At random, I put my hand on heavy silk crepe de chine.  I cut a piece 24 inches by 36 inches, taped it down to my table, and drew lines across it where I would put large stitches which I would then gather.  Actually, this is called shirring, a type of gathering. It shirr is fun.

 I took a marker and drew lines about every eight inches across this piece of silk.  Then I machine basted across these lines and pulled up the machine stitches to gather it.  But the machine stitches broke from the pulling, so I had to rip them out and start again.  This time, I added more rows, to make them every four inches instead of every eight.  And you know what I did then?  I hand basted these lines, using double threads, and shirring each line in two separate zones:  for each line, one set of gathering threads from the right to the middle, and another set of gathering threads from the left to the middle.  This way, I would have the flexibility to gather the "foam" loosely on one side and more tightly on the other if I so chose.

See what I did?  Each line of marker is being gathered in two separate zones.  I can adjust the gathering threads to take on the look of the foam.

As a preliminary, I gathered all the lines of thread:

 and spread the newly-shirred piece of silk onto the partially-felted sand ripples:

I think they're ballpark, and not bad for a practice.

Now I have to take that silk and paint it in colors such as those found on the foam in the photo.  I got out my Jacquard Lumiere paints

 

...and came up with some colors that I think are plausible for the foam:

  I think these golds and tans are a good start.  So in order to apply these colors to the piece of silk that will become the line of foam, I have to gently undo the practice shirring without pulling out the gathering threads, spread the silk out flat, and paint it with these colors, all mixed with GAC 900 to prevent all the color from soaking right through the weave of the silk.  Painting is going to be my next step.

This shirr is fun!