To begin this first piece, I thought id use the couching technique. firstly I drew out the design I wanted based on the mixed media photography/digital illustration of the neon lights in my bedroom.
I used a removable friction pen for this as the marks can later be removed by ironing the piece.

Next, I used pink wool and orange embroidery thread to couch the outline of the neon light. I really liked doing this part, I found it very therapeutic making all the stitches evenly spaced apart. I really like how the small orange highlights from the couching stitch add little hints of extra colour around the wool.

For the word in the middle of the sign, I decided to use fluffy wool to get the glowing effect as is in the reference used. the fluffy wool did confuse things a bit when trying to make the couching stitch as it covered some of the stitches and it was hard to see what I had done before. Despite this, I think the desired effect has been reached an I like the overall look it has made.

In this video I am ironing the fabric to get the friction pen marks off the fabric to make it tidier looking. I always like to watch when I am doing this part as I find it very fascinating how it just disappears.

This is the final outcome of my couching stitch piece, I really liked using this technique and would consider doing this and using it again for my own personal projects.

I wanted to further my couching technique so I decided to make a small bowl/basket out of rope and wool with the same technique and wrapping the wool around multiple times to eventually get to a bowl shape.

This is the finished basket piece, I quite like the bright colours used and I think I could use this technique to create larger scale pieces in a similar fashion to this.

For blanket stitch, I used a piece of fabric which I dyed in the natural dyeing workshop. I used the blanket stitch along the edges of the piece and eventually it developed into a small pocket/purse.

This is the final piece, I added a button and a little loop for closing the piece, I don’t soo blanket stitch very often in personal projects so this has helped me neaten up my technique.

I tried hand appliqué here, I organised a pattern of different fabrics with different prints on them, I wanted the piece to be bright and fun which I believe I achieved in making this.

This is the completed appliqué, I like the way I have sewn down the pieces in that the stitches are not just around the fabric, but they are also a part of the design too. I have used both wool and thread to add variety of textures in the stitches to make different pieces stand out.

I tried some fabric manipulation here, I tied coins into a piece of fabric and then boiled it in water for around 45 minutes to make it gain the shape of the coins, I then let it dry and applied inks to colour it, I have included a video of me adding colour to the piece above.

This is the finished piece of fabric manipulation. I think I could’ve added more colour to it although I feel like a lot of it had faded through the drying process which I hadn’t planned for.