Fun with Embroidery

Lately I’ve been really inspired by some really cool embroidery projects and sites. I love subversivecrossstitch for it’s surly-ness and humor. I know a few people that are deserving of these for their next birthday or housewarming gift. Or better yet, how else could you pay tribute to your favorite teen heartthrob besides embroidering his face onto some cloth so that you can sew him onto a pillow and keep him besides your bed…forever! Rob Pat design by floresita.


So, in trying to figure out how to translate some of these fun embroidery ideas into something with clay, I decided to buy a couple embroidery rings from Michael’s Craft store and cast them in clay. My first thought was how cool could it be pierce holes into the discs and then actually sew designs or sayings into them with thread. I love that combination of materials.

Hella Jongerius, one of my favorite designers has been doing it forever.

This little tribute to Brooklyn is what I came up with for my first attempt. Whew! It took forever drilling out all those holes to spell that one little word – not to mention the huge risk of breaking the unfired clay while drilling. I quickly realized that this was not something I would want to reproduce over and over – unless I wanted to go crazy.

I had to come up with a Plan B. Instead of drilling the holes, I could try silk screening the faux- embroidery onto the clay. So I ordered one of those DIY silk screen kits online and got to work on the graphics I wanted to print onto the embroidery rings. These are some of the final results I got using different underglaze colors. Now to figure out what to do with these…