Tutorial - covering a button for use as a flower centre

I've been preparing for a series of workshops making various fabric flowers, so while I was thinking about tutorial sheets for flower kits, I thought I'd do a little tutorial here too.

As I prefer to sew rather than glue, the flower centres need to cover the inner ends of the petals well, and buttons are often better than beads for this. I also find that buttons can sometimes look a bit plain, depending on the fabric used. Then, there's the problem of finding one in a colour which works well and which is undamaged. Layering buttons can work well - a larger, but damaged one can go under a smaller one. But the law of the stash is that however many you have, there's never exactly what you want. Covering a button can be a good solution.

First, decide how large a centre you need and find your button, and a scrap of fabric big enough to wrap around it. I'm using a circular button, as that's easiest. So, a circle of fabric at least twice the diameter of the button. The heavier your fabric, the bulkier it will be, so allow a little more.

Here's the button (these are 1 cm squares on the cutting mat). It's not a bad colour, but has been damaged by the button machine when it was attached to the garment.
I'm going to cover it with stretch panne velvet. It doesn't fray so much as lose bits, but for this purpose, I don't really need to turn the edge under as I take small running stitches around the edge of the fabric circle.

Pull the thread to gather the edge slightly and with the fabric wrong side uppermost, put the button in the centre.

I want a 'domed' rather than 'dished' centre, so I've placed the button with what was the top towards what will be the back of the button.

Keeping the button centred on the fabric, pull the threads tight and take several stitches to finish off. I like to leave the thread tail with the knot loose, and then tie both ends of the thread together when I've gathered the fabric, then sew some stitches to keep everything secure.

There, finished!

Flower Power

I LOVE flowers. Their varied colours and forms are so beautiful, they always brighten up my day. My Mum, who has lovely green fingers (even though they look a normal colour usually!) started teaching me the common names for the wildflowers we would see when out walking when I was little. I used to love standing under blossom on trees and getting petals in my hair. Flowers seem to feature in most of my happy memories.

I  went through a phase in my late teens of wearing real or synthetic flowers in my hair, on my lapel or hip at every opportunity.   Then for some reason, I stopped making and wearing flowers and spent more time growing the real thing.  In the past couple of years, I've rebelled a bit. Why should wearing flowers be relegated to little girls and weddings?

Belly dancing provided the perfect excuse for a bit more bling.  American Tribal Style and Tribal Fusion dancers often use flowers as part of their hair styles and they look beautiful.  I had some artificial flowers on hair elastics which I liked, but found that the plastic base was forever digging into my head and catching on my hair, veil, whatever.  This lead to some experimentation with cheap artificial flowers, which I always thought should be bigger, fuller, more glittery. 

Artificial flowers made from fabric, ribbon or yarn have a long history, and although they go in and out of fashion, their popularity over recent years shows no sign of decreasing. Over the past couple of years, I have been looking at the plethora of techniques for making flowers from fabric, ribbons, lace and yarn. There are tutorials all over the place for lots of different styles of flowers.  Most do not take much fabric, so they are perfect for using up scraps, or upcycling old bits of clothing. They don't have to look realistic, or even symmetrical or tidy, to be effective.   I've found that, although it's slower, I really do prefer to sew than use glue.

A couple of years ago, I did a 2 hour workshop for Learning Pembrokeshire, where we made some pointed-petal flowers and looked at gathered and rolled strips, and pom-poms.  It was a great success, with participants bringing their scrap fabrics and sharing them. I found that going around the table and repeating the same instructions with everyone was no problem.  I think handcrafters in general are patient people. Everyone went home with a flower and all seemed to enjoy themselves. Since then, I have offered short daytime adult ed courses in making fabric flowers through Learning Pembrokeshire. They are really aimed at people who do not use the computer much or who prefer face-to-face, hands-on learning. None of the courses have run, as they haven't attracted enough people. This is a problem with almost all of the adult ed classes at the moment and has been getting steadily worse over the past couple of years.

Still, I live in hope, so to support the next class or workshop proposal, and because it's April and flowers are popping out everywhere, I decided to challenge myself and run through the various techniques I know and create a flower a day, until I have a mountain of flowers, thus dealing with some of my stash and creating some stock to sell or give away.
 
I'm not intending to post many, if any, tutorials as there are plenty out there in other blogs and on YouTube. They say nothing is new in art, so I don't expect I'll be inventing anything new and am probably not even the first to do a 'flower-a-day' challenge.

Today is Day 1. The question is: what sort of flower shall I do today?

The Tie Stash Milestone

Soon after my previous post in which I mentioned progress with my stash of ties, I popped into a favourite charity shop and came away with more.  I couldn't resist it.  I look at the colours, textures and patterns  rather than the fabric type. Most of them were silk, including another Liberty print. I wondered whether someone well-off had recently decluttered their wardrobe. As I added the details to my stock inventory, I saw that it took the total to 150.  That's right, I had just purchased my 150th tie. Not only that, but it is an Ermenegildo Zegna.  Recognising it as a 'designer' tie, I looked it up.  The cheapest I could find for sale was over £50, as they tend to be in quite a heavy silk.  This one is black with diagonals of different textures, beige lines and white dots.  I had to go an have a lie down to boggle at the fact that I had reached 150 ties, and ponder whether it might be better to sell the EZ to someone who will give it a good home (considering that I do not have a significant other to give it to) rather than use it.  I'm still thinking about it.

I felt pleased that I had started processing them with a view to making some articles which will hopefully sell and allow me to feel that I'm not just an obsessive hoarder. I noticed when I was going through them that I had several which had no labels showing their fabric type.  I settled down the other evening to unpick them and take fibres or a small snippet of fabric to burn test.  Of them all, only two looked like silk.  The rest, including one which had a brand label 'La Seta Italiana' (meaning Italian Silk) formed the shiny black beads which indicated synthetic fibres.

Since then, I have unpicked and washed all of my synthetic fabric ties (just over half the total).  If I thought the interlinings were dirty, the tippings and tie fabrics themselves were even dirtier. There are some stains which will not come out, including a yellow mark from the degraded glue on a sticky price label from an pink tie which looked as though it had been left in the shop window too long.  In between hand-washing batches of them, I had a little Google for items made with recycled ties.  There were a few tutorials for making things such as rolled and folded roses or pouches for phones or iPods.  I'd already played with making a rose from a whole tie and decided that it was too bulky with the interlining. Most of the ideas seemed to involve using the ties just as they were.  Having seen the colour of the water as I was washing them, all I have to say to that is, Eeew, yuk!  There is only one tie in my set where I could see that someone had tried to clean it - and the scrubbing had pulled threads and created a fuzzy, frayed patch right on the main part of the tie.  Judging by the smell of socks and old after-shave, most of the ties came straight from cupboard to shop.  Now the idea of using a second hand tie without taking it apart and washing it is unthinkable.

It is certainly not the easy or cost-effective option. By the time that I have unpicked, separated, washed, dried, pressed, selected for use, fussy-cut and finally created the article, I cannot charge enough to repay fully the time spent doing all this, as well as the time spent visiting the shops in the first place.  No wonder many craft-makers prefer new materials, but I like the idea of recycling these fabrics into something new or different. There's the thing with arts and crafts.  The time spent by the artist in learning their craft, acquiring tools and techniques, researching, designing, experimenting, failing, practising and creating is never truly paid for by the buyer.  Whether it's a performer, writer or creative artist working with any medium you can think of, they are working at least partly for love.  It is said that money can't buy love, but it seems to me that if you watch a performance or buy something handmade, not mass produced and possibly one of a kind, then perhaps you are buying some of the love that the artist put into their creation.

All Tied Up!

For the past year (or possibly longer) I have been collecting ties. I saw some lovely patchwork quilts in a magazine several years ago, with blocks made from old ties and I thought I might start one myself.  As I started to pick up a few ties from various charity shops, I started to foresee problems, such as just how many a double bed quilt might need, how much that would cost, and that my cats like to snuggle and it would get dirty and perhaps be difficult to clean.

At first, most of the ties I could find seemed to be rather drab polyester club, company or regimental ties. (These could be collectors items in themselves.)  Things seem to have picked up recently, and I have been finding polyester ties which look and feel like silk, wonderful textures and patterns which beg to be used in individual pieces. There are some lovely fabrics which must surely have been produced specifically for ties, as I have never seen anything similar available by the metre.  I got all of my ties out to take stock.  I now have lots of them - about 80 at a guess, all different fabric weaves, prints, patterns, except for two which are the same pattern and make, but in different colours.

All this diversity started me wondering about ties. According to Wikipedia, (neck)ties originated in Croatia (Hrvatska), the source of the word cravat, which is the proper name for the item of clothing. During the 30 Years War (1618-48) Croatian troops fighting in France wore narrow red silk scarves tied at the neck,with the ends slipped into their shirts. The Parisians thought them so stylish that they called them cravates after their originators and the look became fashionable.  They became known as ties because you tie a cravat. What I think of as a cravat is more properly a day cravat or Ascot tie, itself a precursor to the typical long tie worn every day as smart working or formal attire for men.

The typical tie was apparently designed by New York tie maker Jesse Langsdorf in 1926. The 'Langsdorf' tie is made up of three pieces cut on the bias.  This was further improved by a slip stitch method used to secure the interlining, which Richard Atkinson and Company of Belfast claim to have introduced in the late 1920s.

Apart from the diversity of patterns, I have been intrigued by the different weights of interfacings, the choice of colour and fabric for the end-linings ('tippings'), the widths, which range from 6.5 cm/2.5" to 10 cm/4" and the brand labels (or complete lack of them, in some cases). The labels are like little windows into history. There are ties which follow the rebranding of Marks & Spencer, from St Michael (and made in England or Great Britain, or U.K.), becoming 'St Michael for Marks & Spencer' (still made in U.K.), and since 2000, just Marks & Spencer (and made in China). One tie is from Horne Brothers, which went into administration in 1993.  Another is from C&A, whose last UK store closed in 2001. There is an ornate brocade kipper tie by Welch Margetson, who were taken over by CoatsPatons in 1963. There is a Liberty silk geometrical floral print, though not one of their current offering. At the other end of the scale, a tie made for Arcadia Group Limited can't be older than 2002, when that company was formed.

One tie has custom tippings woven with the brand name Chicks and an embroidered C on the front of the tie. The fabric is polyester with a bright geometrical print. There is a large, long label with 'Ties of Distinction' woven in gold lurex thread on part of the slim end which would go under the collar, but sewn through all the layers, and not sewn in straight, which made me laugh. Methinks the maker doth protest too much!

All of these ties have been sourced from charity shops, so a little at a time, they have been doing very well out of me! Most of them charge £1 or so per tie, which I think is okay providing they aren't shrunk, twisted, scorched, a mess of stains and/or pulled threads.

I took the opportunity the other day to check in a few charity shops for ties.  In one, there was one lone tie left.  It turned out that they had recently been cleaned out of ties by a lady who makes them into quilts! I went to another shop and saw they had no ties.  I wondered if the quilt lady had been in and cleaned them out too, but no! There was a box of ties still in the back room, for which they were charging £2.50 each. Too much for me, and when I said so, I had a rather sniffy reply that they were a charity, didn't I know, and some of the ties were silk and hadn't she had this conversation with me before?  Well, no, she hadn't. (I wonder if perhaps it was with the quilt lady?). Of course, £2.50 might be okay if you're a chap wanting a cheap tie, so I checked with a couple of chaps and they said no, if they were going to get a charity shop tie, £2.50 was possibly a bit much, unless it was a very classy silk. And they wouldn't think to ask if there were any in the back room. It might still work out cheaper than getting a tie through eBay, but only because postage prices have recently gone up again. (I'm sure I've had a rant elsewhere about charity shops who upgrade themselves into pre-loved clothes boutiques, dispensing with the bric a brac so beloved of crafters everywhere.  I've recently seen a few items which have been priced higher than they would have been originally. In these times, when you can buy cheaper elsewhere, where is the compelling reason to recycle and support charities? Oh, enough!)

I dropped into one of my favourite local charity shops yesterday to look for plant pot holders and came out with a few holders and, yes, a few more ties. Okay, I am now officially somewhat obsessed, a compulsive tie-buyer.  It's time I started making things from them so that they can earn their keep. Watch this space (but don't hold your breath!)

Favourite Things (in no particular order)

Sunlight on water, sequins and glitter,

Velvet and satin, silk and brocade,
Gold, silver, copper, brass, bronze and pewter,
Beads, stones and crystals, things that I've made.
Coffee and chocolate, fruits, breads and spices,
Colours and scents, Celtic knotwork and braid,
Dragonflies, butterflies, leaves in the Autumn,
Mothwings and flowers and long summer days.
Blue skies and starry nights, beaches and birds,
Computers and books, lounging, log fire ablaze,
Cats, friendships, happiness, laughter and love,
Music and singing and dancing always.