Hello my Crafty friends! Hope you are doing well wherever you are!
Today I’m going to share my thoughts on an embroidery book written by Trish Burr. If you follow me on Instagram you might have seen that I completed my latest hoop with a various flower selection which templates can be found in her book…and this is just the beginning! There are so many more templates and projects available to make!
Book layout
“Needle paining embroidery” book contains 15 projects that are grouped into three levels of difficulty taking you from being a complete beginner to an intermediate embroiderer. Before you even start, the author walks you through the basics of embroidery, such as fabric choice, thread, needles and other tools that might be helpful, so you can gather everything you would need to start the first project.
The next chapter of the book introduces you to the long and short stitch, which is also known as a satin stitch. Since this type of stitch is used throughout of the book, you can find clear illustrations and step by step instruction on how to get started and tips and hints on how to get the best result and what to avoid. There are other embroidery stitches used to enhance the designs, and you can read the precise description of the technique in a Glossary section.
The following chapter’s focus is to start practicing the long and short stitch by embroidering small motifs. This part of the book was the most insightful to me, because I finally started to understand the idea of a needle painting. Simply put, needle paining is an embroidery approach that uses long and short stitches to blend variety of colors and shades in a way to give an impression of a painting. To achieve this result single strand of an embroidery thread should be used, making the process time consuming….. but don’t get me wrong, it is so worth it!
Once you complete all the practice motifs, you should be brave enough to tackle the first project in the book: Cerise anemone flower. It is the red flower on my embroidery hoop and it was the perfect project to get me started, which was scary at first considering the motif is filled using 11 colors! A little disclaimer here, the book provides exactly which DMC thread colors are used for individual projects, however I have a bunch – about 100 – random unbranded colors in my stash, so trying to match the shade wasn’t always as easy, hence some of my flowers look different.
Final thoughts
I had managed to make the majority of projects for first two levels of difficulty. The remaining few projects are on my to do list before I move on to the intermediate level. The projects in the last chapter include only birds motifs and I am far from being ready to tackle them and this time.
This is a second beginner friendly booked for hand embroidery that I have tried so far, and out of them it is my favorite.
If (like me) you are looking for to start hand embroidery or take your existing skills to another level this is a great book to consider.
Stay safe!
Monika xxx
Thanks for this blog post, I will definitely be considering hand embroidery for my future crafting!
Happy to help. It is a fantastic book to get started.
You’ve chosen a really good book for beginner shading projects. About 18 months ago, just before the pandemic hit, I was preparing to teach a stitching friend how to do shading with one of the level one projects (Alpine Rose). Because we couldn’t meet in person I posted the lessons on my blog ‘The Sharp Needler’. If you’re interested check them out.
Thank you. I will definitely check it out 😄