Gone to seed

I’ve been carving out some time to start another little house.

Over the summer I have collected some seed heads and grasses, mostly the quiet humble hedgerow ones on my walks. This year, a field we walk through several times a week had the longest grass I remember. I think today’s snow will have finally flattened it but it’s been chest height for months, lovely to walk through and have hands out to brush against.

My jug of seed-heads have slowly dropped tiny seeds on my shelf over a few months, creating their own little design. You think you have a seed-head that’s done it’s thing, it is as it is, but the imperceptible changes of on-going seed dispersal are fascinating.

This is a familiar process. It’s my fifth little house and fabric roll. So began the observations, mark-making and pattern-finding.

Papers and fabrics are dyed and painted, and marks of varied sized made. This time I have tried to get a little more movement into the piece with the direction of some of the stems and stalks in particular.

It’s now waiting for the adjoining fabric roll which will take me several weeks to stitch. I wanted to get to this stage so I can sofa-stitch during the dark evenings. It’s relaxing but with just enough creative decision-making as I work.

This time there are a few changes, I’ve used some gifted vintage lace to create various seed heads by selecting parts of the motifs or lace design and dyeing them.

They are now in small bags so I don’t lose them! Another first is using some machine-stitch to create the sweep of the stalks. I just felt that hand-stitch wasn’t going to be quite right for uninterrupted lines. As I’m stitching onto muslin without any interfacing or lining it’s very flimsy so it’s sewn with paper.

Well, it’s under way! I will be back with some photos in a few weeks once finished.

I’m hoping to share the story of my sculpture in the New Year – writing it up now and finding a base is taking a bit of time time.

Wishing everyone a Happy Christmas wherever you are.