A Common Thread- October Finish

Common thread October

For my collaborative project, A Common Thread, with artist Neicy Frey, we decided to go a little easier on ourselves for our October challenge. I definitely took on too much for our September challenge. We decided on a slightly smaller-sized project this month- 20 x 20″ square.

Our embroidery stitch this month was the Whip stitch. Let me say I am loving the humble stitches we have chosen for each month and the deep thinking I’m doing about each stitch. Unexpectedly fun!

 

whip stitch

 

The Details

Initially planning out my piece, whip stitches immediately brought to mind string quilts. Maybe it is the similarity of shape in each strip of fabric to the stitch itself, I’m not sure. I decided to play with some string piecing. All using thrifted blue men’s dress shirts.

I kept the overall palette tight and focused on the shapes. The colors reacted nicely together in the end too. I didn’t want this one to be bright scrappy, as has been my usual style lately, and didn’t really focus on color value between the blocks. It was really an instinctive cut and sew exercise, done right by the sewing machine.

The blocks finish at 5×5″. I ran out of blue shirting to use, but instinctively decided to add in a thrifted piece of cross stitch linen (all of this came from my stash). I fussy cut from two different areas in the piece that I felt fit with my blocks, and included them in the layout.

Finally, I added in some actual whip embroidery stitches around the cross stitch pieces to finish.

 

Common thread October

 

I chose not to add a traditional binding around the edges like I would for a quilt. These will go in 20″ square white frames. I prefer framed pieces like this to have a facing instead of a binding. Not sure what I mean? Victoria’s tutorial is what I follow when making a facing. It makes a super clean finish.

 

Common thread October

 

As always, you can read the full story of our collaboration here. You can see Neicy’s response to the Whip Stitch for October on her IG feed, or on the #commonthreadcollab hashtag.

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