Free antique embroidery pattern book online

I have been downloading files for the last hour and the printer is going to be running hot as soon as I finish writing.

An 1886 catalogue of embroidery designs from the New Sample Book of Our Artistic Perforated Parchment Stamping Patterns , has been put online. The catalogue is from J. F. Ingalls of Lynn, Massachusetts who established a mail order business. The patterns are in the public domain so stitchers are free to use them. Although they are large files don’t miss them if you are interested in vintage embroidery design, crazy quilting, or redwork. They are large scans but it makes them all the more useful to stitchers!

For anyone who has looked at American antique crazy quilts many of the motifs are instantly recognisable. So much so, we really could play “hunt for the missing classic” in this collection. If you are a crazy quilter and collect motifs to embroider download them and see if you can find any “classic” missing. Motifs include all the traditional motifs used in crazy quilting embroidery such as lettering, flowers, fruit, vegetables, wheat, birds, including storks and owls. Kate greenway motifs also feature along side other nursery rhyme figures. Also you will find oriental and art Nouveau motifs and a number of different types of peacock feathers. Motifs of knives, forks, spoons, crockery, vases of flowers, baskets of flowers, fans, hands, musical instruments, cats and kittens, dogs, horses, boots, anchors, horseshoes, mice, roosters, spiders, spider webs, butterflies, bugs, dragonflies, and bees. There are even a page or so of stitch diagrams used on crazy quilts. There was not a “classic” I could not find.

I thought I had found two motifs not represented until I realised that there are three links to listed graphics. Just the make it clear (and so no body misses out) there are 254 pages of motifs in the pattern book. Each page consists of between 10 and 20 motifs per page, so it is a huge collection Part 1 is here and part 2 , followed by Part 3 . If you are stitcher of course you will find these free patterns useful. If you are interested in the history of crazy quilting and the motifs or antique needlework, and the history of embroidery patterns you will find this resource invaluable.

If you are a crazy quilter please spread the word about this resource on blogs and discussion lists as this really is a fabulous resource. While you are at it is there anyone who can think of a traditional crazy quilt motif that is not represented in this collection? I think there are few hats but that is all I can think of. Leave a comment if you notice any missing classics.

Thanks goes to Exceedingly Curious for hosting the patterns and thanks for the link goes to Dawn of On the banks of Bay Creek who dropped me an email to give me the heads up on this.

 

Ribbons and Trims a review

I opened the inside flap of Ribbons and Trims to read Refresh. Restore. Reinvent. OK I thought I could do with a bit of that! Then I realised Annabel Lewis was actually using ribbons, trims and cords, to revamp common items in the home which is possibly easier than revamping me. Since I am quite a greenie I settled back with a cuppa and read the book.

This is not the run of the mill book on recycling but if you want some contemporary DIY ideas Annabel Lewis, illustrates how curtains, blinds, bedcovers, cushions, throws, lampshades, and furniture can be given a fresh new look with a bit of imagination and the addition of ribbons and trims.

This book offers 25 projects with clear instructions. Regular readers will know I am not a great fan of project based books, or the fad for quick and easy projects that dominate the market. In fact I often simply don’t bother to reach for them on the book shelves as usually a book of projects means there is very little real information to be gleaned from between the covers. However, Annabel Lewis is the founder of Europe’s the ribbons and trimmings company, V. V. Rouleaux and her experience with passementerie shows and the reader gains as a result.

When it comes to actual information that can be applied to other projects the book is well balanced. About a third of the content contains useful information. This is much higher than most books that are project based. For instance there are clear illustrations of various ribbon types from your bulk standard satin to the more exotic like woven jacquard are listed beside their possible uses. Ribbon techniques such as fraying and ruching are covered as well as illustrated examples of making ribbon roses and rosettes. But that is not all you can do with ribbon as techniques for sewing, layering, and weaving ribbons are covered too.

In the cords and trims section reading became very interesting for I can now identify different trims and cords that I have often used but never knew the name of! Techniques in this section include wiring cord, knotting, creating decorative tufts and tassels. I think the techniques illustrated here is where the book comes into its own. If you have ever wanted to know how to create a turban style knot clear step by step instructions will take you through the process. Frogging and other knotting techniques are also covered clearly as well as a number of different tassels. Wiring Beads, you may be familiar with but have you ever thought of wiring shells, buttons and feathers!

As far as the eye candy goes it is beautiful. Ideas abound and imagination is stimulated. The ideas for revamping furniture and creating soft furnishings are the strongest part of the projects book. Ribbons and Trims is a paperback of 160 pages that unlike many project based books the information between its covers means it has a shelf life, as when the projects go out of fashion there is still content enough for me to refer to it again.

 

A fabric book that made me think

Rene’s fabric book Strolling the block is one of the best examples of “life writing” in fabric that I have seen. Each page of the fabric book is devoted to a month capturing her reactions to and the after math of the Katrina Hurricane. Thanks Rene for leaving a comment and guiding me to it!

I often ponder the notion of autobiography. In the past scholars of the genre encompass within their field of interest non traditional literary genres such as memoirs, the diary, letters, confession, oral history, daybook, documentary and travel writing. In this field however, another concept has gained currency. Scholars use the term “life writing” to describe non literary texts such as oral histories and readers here would be interested to discover that things like quilts, journal quilts, the Bead journal project, family photograph albums, scrapbooks and blogs could be described as form “life writing” as they are a type of memoir and represent personal histories. If anyone want to dig further into this I have been exploring articles and resources like this It’s a huge field but an interesting one.

 

Look who is lucky

Jerry has just returned from Paris and look at what was in his bags for me. Two books to add to my library picked up at the V&A as he had 24 hours in London and a huge 2 kilo bag of vintage buttons found at a market. Jerry has photos of the ‘button stall’ his blog that made me drool and I am sure it will make you salivate too. The beads which were purchased at the same stall are vintage too so I am happily sorting goodies.

The other gift I am actually reticent to use as it is a very old. Jerry found a very battered and cheap copy of a 1902 edition of Les Pamphlets Libertins contre Marie-Antionette in other words it is about the revolutionary broadsheets that criticise Marie-Antionette. The book itself has a broken spine, is heavily foxed and I don’t think there is a page in it that is not torn, many are cello taped together and the cello has stained the pages. Other pages are worn or damaged in some way.

I use ephemera in collages – and I like to use the real thing not digital copies. Jerry spotted this gem and bought it home for me to cut up! But I am not sure I actually can. I have no hesitation in chopping contemporary stuff or even tatted and damaged books printed from the 70s on but older material always hurts.

The material however is so interesting particularly since it can be incorporated in so many ways to talk about many ideas. Revolution, early celebrity, women in history, poverty, gluttony; the list goes on. The material in short is just great and its agony to use it, yet agony not to use it! This book is useless as a book as it is so damaged. What do you think? Should I use it? Is it a crime?

 

Images in old books

Anyone interested in the history of illustration, is a collage artist or simply using images as a design source will love Liam’s Pictures from old books The site houses over 1680 images scanned from old books that are mostly public domain. There are some total gems to be found in this collection so don’t miss it.

 

I love the postbox

I am a bit like a big kid when I spot those little cards that inform me that a parcel is waiting to be collected at the parcel counter. I scurry in to post office and wait impatiently in line to see what it is. On Friday it was actually Jerry who checked the box but as he came through the door I spotted the parcel and was a little crest fallen as judging from the wrapping it looked like a magazine. I was to be proven wrong as to my surprise the contents was a book on Tilleke Schwarz

Tilleke Schwarz has to be one of my favourite contemporary textile artists. Tilleke had dropped me an email to say she was sending me a copy of her book but when I opened it I was more than delighted with the book. Tilleke has every reason to be proud of this and the quality of the production reflects her as high calibre textile artist.

The book arrived on Friday and I settled to read it yesterday. I was not in the least disappointed. For anyone expecting a projects based book or an instructional how-to book you will not find it here. This is definitely in the Art book genre and steers right away from any notion of craft.

The introductory essay is written by Dr Jessica Hemmings and the book is bilingual written in both English and Dutch. By far the majority of the 80 pages or so of this paperback are filled with eye candy. Page after page of details of Tilleke’s work with accompanying descriptions delight, surprise and inspire.

In speaking of Tilleke’s samplers Dr Jessica Hemmings observes that:

Tidy rows of stitches are replaced with abstract, layered compositions, “Home Sweet Home’ and similar aphorisms of domestic duty are transformed into a jumble of politically correct phrases, computer codes and malfunctioning technology signals; and a delicate pattern of carefully coordinated threads is exchanged for boldly coloured background cloth and unruly metallic skeins. That said, these textiles have far from severed ties with their historical counterparts. Through a cacophony of text and image each continues to build upon the considerable legacy the sampler commands the story teller. But in place of traditional alphabets or apples are nonlinear post-modern narratives that speak of “modern society and the strange way we deal with mass communication”

What I like about Tilleke’s work is that she captures the mess of daily life. Initially I was attracted to her pieces because she often incorporates computer jargon in her pieces but that was simply my initial surface attraction. As I looked more at her work I realised that in these autobiographical statements and visual representations of the everyday she used her thread and needle to draw. To my delight not only is Tilleke’s work annotated with brief comments about her sources for imagery and text but some of her drawings are featured in the book too.

If you are interested in this publication you have to contact Tilleke Schwarz directly on this page. The book is not available on Amazon.

Other than receiving my copy as a gift from Tilleke I am not affiliated in any way. If you are interested in contemporary embroidery I unhesitatingly say take a look at Tilleke Schwarz’s website and if you like her work don’t stop there, add her book to your personal library as it will prove to be an inspiration for years to come.

I have just recieved an email from Tilleke to say that her book can be ordered from the Twistedthread website too

 

Encyclopedia of Needlework online

I discovered Therese de Dillmont’s “Encyclopedia of Needlework” on project Gutenburg.

This book is a needlework classic so I was delighted to discover it is freely available. I trawl old books like this for stitch varieties and stitches that are no longer in common use. Often too stitches are referred to by different names. Usage or a particular name for a stitch is always an interesting topic to attempt to trace. Source material such as these publications are relevant to anyone who has an interest in textile history but also much of the information they contain is still applicable to practice today.

 

Free Needlework books from Priscilla Publishing

The Priscilla Publishing Company published needlework books from the 1880’s to the 1920’s. Many of these are online in the Priscilla Publishing Company : Antique pattern library one of the highlights for me is the Priscilla Bead Work Book. Much of it is on beaded knitting but there are lots of ideas here that can be applied to a contemporary piece. There a number of vintage cross stitch designs on this site too.

If you are a paper arts practitioner, many of these books have fantastic adverts either front and back. Don’t miss them! The Priscilla Embroidery Patterns, Simple, Dainty, Up-To-Date Designs - Fall and Winter Catalog 1915-16 is a great resource for collage work.

These patterns are hosted by the Antique Pattern Library . If you are unaware of these folks you should really check out their catalogue as all their patterns are free.

 

Free Ebooks of Needlework designs

This French site houses some delightful old embroidery patterns . These books have been scanned and are free to download. Most of them are cross stitch designs particularly of alphabets. Anyone who loves old samplers will like these but there are some designs for other counted techniques too.

On another note I wanted to wish every one a happy and safe Easter Holiday weekend

 

Free Needlework book online

Art in Needlework by Lewis F Day and Mary Buckle is a 326 page book published in 1907. This complete book is online and free to download from the Internet Archive site. You can download it in PDF format or if you just want to browse the book first and have a fast connection you can use the Djvu option.

I trawl old books like this for stitch varieties and stitches that are no longer in common use. Often too stitches are referred to by different names. Usage or a particular name for a stitch is always an interesting topic to attempt to trace. For instance, for those who are interested in the buttonhole/blanket stitch debate this book refers to buttonhole. Personally I think it is simply a case of which side of the Atlantic you were taught to stitch on.

This book is of particular interest because often the back of the stitch is illustrated and covers topics such as Japanese Laid work, Gold work, Applique, Cut work, and a gem of a section titled “Embroidery in Relief”.

There are also some simply classic quotes. Even then the argument that needlework was an art raged. This made me smile.

Check out page 230

What one misses in the work of the present day is that reticent and unpretending stitchery, which, thinking to be no more than a labour of loving patience, is really a work of art, better deserving the title than a flaunting floral quilt which goes by the name of “art needlework” – designed apparently to worry the eye by day and to give bad dreams by night to whoever may have the misfortune to sleep under it.

Check it out you mind find you want to invest in some ink and print it out.