'Jungle Book' slip case - palm tree branches

I thought this was going to be fiddly, and it was!

The branches themselves were straightforward enough, using lengths of pearl purl:

The leaves were a little trickier.  These are in wire check purl, which is smoother than the bright check purl of the trunk, but not as smooth as the pearl purl of the branches, and so give a nice contrast to both.  As I want the leaves to look passably organic, I didn't measure and cut exact lengths but was deliberately more random.  I'm not sure if that made it easier or harder!

Anyway, here's the first branch, so you can see how it's working:

And all the branches completed:

And some final beads on the turrets that I ought to have done earlier but forgot about:

That ought to be all the embroidery completed, but there's something I'm not happy with.  I've been trying to convince myself that it was fine, but it isn't.  More work needed.

'Jungle Book' slip case - tree trunk

Onto the palm tree.

Using short lengths of bright check wire (the same as for Mowgli's hair), I added the trunk of the tree as a series of short sections:

The zig-zag finish of the wire gives a nice rough effect to it which I like.

I've also stitched through the design for the rest of the tree, as you can see.  I think it's going to be a bit fiddly!

'Jungle Book' slip case - Mowgli

As it's a bit complicated, I'll be doing the central section a bit at a time, starting with the little figure of Mowgli, seated at the base of the tree.

Here he is outlined in running stitches, ready to be stitched over:

The figure is quite small and quite a fiddly shape, so I've decided to keep things simple and just use chain stitch in Gutermann metallic thread no. 24 to outline it:

As the figure is shown from behind, howefer, I've added a bit of detail by filling in his hair with chips of bright check purl wire, and a staff of wire check purl:

Mowgli is sitting in some grass, for which I've couched one length of the same thread as the building:

He's sitting under a palm tree - that's next!

'Jungle Book' slip case - the top of the building

The top section of the building is in two stages, but I forgot to take a photo of the first one - the outer edge in gold only - so here it is with both that and the inner detail couched with the same blue as the base:

To finish it off, I added some beading: red seed beads on the top of the domes and in the little bulges on the sides, and gold seed beads at the very top:

The 'building' motif forms a frame for the central area, and I'll be starting that next.

'Jungle Book' slip case - turrets

The turrets on the top of the building are in two stages (or three, really, but the last one won't happen until all the goldwork is done).  The base of the turrets are in the same red as before, and here they are:

The domes are in a new colour, a strong green, Madeira stranded cotton no. 1304:

The domes:

There are also features on top of the domes (I'm not sure what to call them.  Finials, maybe), and they're in gold, with no colour:

The very top bits will be done later.  The top of the building next!

'Jungle Book' slip case - the sides of the building

The sides are in gold, without the colour, so I'm couching the gold thread with regular sewing thread, Gutermann no. 488:

The outside of the sides:

and the inside:

It's starting to get a bit of shape to it now.

'Jungle Book' slip case - the base of the building

Time for some goldwork.  For the building motif that forms a frame for the main design in the centre, I'm couching imitation Japanese gold thread no. 8, using bright colours for the couching thread.

Starting at the bottom, I'm using a nice bright blue - Madeira stranded cotton no. 1102 - for the couching:

Here's the bottom section:

The next level up is in red, no. 0211:

And done:

The couching stitches are enough to give a hint of colour without taking away from the gold.

Druid banner - the completed embroidery

As promised, here's a photo of the completed embroidery on the banner:

You can probably spot the pins round the edge which means it's being damp stretched and therefore I've started making it up, but I'll describe that process properly once I've got a bit further.

Druid banner - lettering: outlining OBOD

The gold kid letters look fine by themselves, but I think they would look better more sharply delineated.  To achieve this, I've outlined them in the same dark green passing thread I used for the spirals on the lower half of the trilithon.

Close up on a pip, you may be able to see that as before I've used two lengths of the passing thread, couched closely around the edge of the gold kid piece:

And the letters outlined too:

If you compare to how they looked in the previous post, you can see that they appear much stronger now.

The text around the top next - there's rather more of that, so it's going to take a bit longer to do.

Druid banner - lettering: OBOD

With all the letters cut out, I can start attaching them to the fabric.

If you can remember back at the start when I ironed the transfer onto the linen used to line the top fabric, the design came out back to front, such as the letters 'OBOD' (in a Gaelic font) here:

I also said this didn't matter; the reason why not is that when I stitch over the design to mark it onto the front of the piece, it comes out the right way round:

That's a bit faint, but hopefully you can see that the letters are the mirror image of how they appear on the back.

As well as the letters, there are also a series of 'pips' around the edge, between the two sets of text.  Here are most of them, stitched on:

I'm using a proper leather needle for this; it passes through the kid much easier than a regular needle, and is far less likely to cause splitting.

And now, 'OBOD':

I think it looks good!  It could look better though, with something added...

Druid banner - the entire central design finished

A major landmark for the banner today, with the entire central design finished.  Last time, I'd completed the goldwork detailing for one leg of the appliqué trilithon; here's the other one:

That shows the perspective effect much better, with everything coming from the centre of the circle.

The detail on the top section completes it:

So, and with apologies for the photo, here's the completed thing:

That's still not all work completed though.  What's next?

Druid banner - goldwork detail

The spirals are all done on the applique trilithon, but that's not the finish.  You may have thought that they looked a slightly odd shape, not really rectangular - this is because they're not 'flat', but have a perspective effect, centred on the centre of the spiral design, where all the gold 'rays' are coming from too.

So, to make this more obvious, some detail needs to be added.  I'm doing this in goldwork, using the same threads as for the rays.

First, I outlined the edge of the first 'leg' of the trilithon:

As with the rays, this uses four strands of the gold thread, couched in two lots of two.

I then added a vertical line in gold, to highlight the perspective:

It makes a big difference, doesn't it!

It should make an even bigger one once the other leg and the top are done - they're next.

Druid banner - all the spirals finished

This is a big step in the banner's progress - I've finished all of the spirals!

There weren't that many left to do, comparatively speaking, but it still makes a big difference to the piece.  The remaining spirals were in green, as mentioned last time, and over the bottom half of the appliqué "trilithon" motif.

Here's the left leg of the trilithon completed:

And the right leg:

And that's the lot!

Well, it's all the spirals done, not all the design completed, and not even all the central area.  So what do I have left to do on it?  Find out next time!

Druid banner - starting the green spirals

Not far to go with the spirals now, with just the green ones on the appliqué to do. As with the blue, this is a darker colour and solid, not variegated: Fir Tree Green metallic passing thread couched with Gutermann Sulky 1051:

As usual, I've transferred the design from the back to the front with small running stitches:

This won't take as long to couch as the blue spirals for the obvious reason that there are a lot fewer of them, so hopefully you'll see them finished soon.

Druid banner - blue trilithon spirals completed

I'm still making good progress, and have done all the blue spirals for the top half of the trilithon.

Here are a few more than last time:

And the rest:

The bottom half will have green spirals - I'll start them next.

Druid banner - blue spirals on the appliqué trilithon

Lots of progress to show you today!

The white appliqué trilithon looks very stark on its own, but it's not staying like that.  I want to integrate it into the overall design by continuing the spiral pattern over the top of it.

As ever, the first step is to go over the design on the back with small running stitches to transfer it to the front, and this time it's actually visible:

You can already see how it's going to work!

I'm using Benton & Johnson metallic passing thread in "Ocean Blue", couched with Gutermann Sulky machine embroidery thread number 1250.

This is plain rather than variegated, and a slightly darker shade than the one used for the background.

And as I've been busy, I've even more to show you - some of the spirals already done:

You should be able to see how the design works across the whole piece.  It's coming on!

Druid banner - rays of light finished

Finishing off the gold rays of light today, with the ones at the top of the design.

A few more, over the blue part of the central section and to the left and right:

And the ones above the trilithon:

Finished!

It's the trilithon itself, next.

Druid banner - rays of light update

I'm making good progress with the goldwork 'rays', though they aren't quite finished yet.  I've done all the ones on the lower half, though.  Here are the ones in the central section:

And all work so far:

Druid banner - rays of light

With the background spirals completed, I can start to overlay other design elements, starting with rays of light.

These are straight lines radiating outwards from the centre of the spiral circle.  They're worked in imitation Japanese gold no 8 from Golden Threads, couched with Gutermann Sulky machine embroidery thread no. 8007.

As before, I transferred the design to the front using small running stitches, which this time show up in the photo (just):

I'm couching over these lines with four lengths of the gold thread, in two lots of two.  Here are the first batch:

And some more:

All work so far: