Tuesday, February 25, 2014

Several years ago I was commissioned to create a series of illustrations of birds, somewhat in the fashion of a field guide, for Sublime Stitching, a fabulous contemporary embroidery company whose motto is "This Ain't Your Gramma's Embroidery". Indeed it is not! This rough sketch was the first series I submitted, and it was rejected, not because the drawings were bad, but because they were too complicated for embroidery patterns - the illustrations needed to be simpler and more stylized. I redid them, thankful for the lesson in simplicity, and you can see the finished pattern ("Songbirds") here. Check out all the other patterns - the Artist's Series contains some very zany creations!

2 comments:

Way Out Wear said...

When I first saw the pictures, I thought 'gee they'd make great embroidery patterns" - too funny. I'm a big fan of Sublime Stitching and can see why she didn't feel they were right for her customers, but they are still very useful for the more advanced stitcher. I would use them. Thanks for sharing that wonderful little tidbit, it's interesting how things sometimes get interconnected

Andree Tracey said...

That's so interesting that you thought of embroidery when you saw these sketches! I'm not surprised that
you are a fan of Sublime Stitching with the work that you do - isn't that a great site?