Pages

Friday 14 May 2010

A Lovely Day at the Oxford Bodleian & A Free Give Away

It was one of those magical days today - dear friends had arranged for me to have a very special private guided tour of the Bodleian Library in Oxford. It goes without saying that I have a great love for books and to see some of the very first books placed on shelves as they were meant to be with the binding to the wall and the page edges facing outwards in library halls with the most amazingly decorated ceilings was a spell-binding experience for me. We also toured the underground stacks and saw the ever-moving delivery system that guided the books from the stacks to their requisite destinations and readers above. The cherry on the icing on the cake was a visit to the Conservation Department to see work in progress on velvet bound volumes belonging to the time of Henry VIII. This is extraordinary work requiring the liaison between many talented people with understandings of books, paper, hide, cloth and metal. One thing I saw which might be useful to us all was the use of subtely coloured silk to back linen. It was astonishing to see how the linen came alive - it no longer looked flat - and I thought if new samplers worked on linen could be backed with silk in a similar way how much richer, more varied and more interesting the unfilled areas would appear. Maybe you can experiment with some scraps at home? And because I have had such a wonderful day, how can I not share it with you, particularly since I was kindly given two copies of the Bodleian Library's Textile and Embroidered Bindings? So there is a copy for one of you - just post a comment to say what your stitching dream would be and we'll put the comments in a hat and choose someone to whom we'll send this book.

37 comments:

  1. a stitching dream, hummmm so many to try and choose from. Some include handsome men handing me my floss as I end a thread (oh is that my husband?) Some find me back in time meeting some of the young women who stitched the samplers we so enjoy, asking them questions about why they choose this motif or that and what their lives are really like. The best would be to have an extra hour every day that I was able to do nothing more then stitch and create the many pieces I have designed in my mind over the last many years that have yet to see a needle and thread!

    ReplyDelete
  2. I would love to be in a place where the meals are brought to me and I could stitch all day without any sore shoulders or tired eyes! Is that a dream place or what?
    Jan Blevins, Dallas, TX, USA

    ReplyDelete
  3. My stitching dream is to have friends like yours ... and more time and bravery to be original in my creativity

    ReplyDelete
  4. Mine is not a very romantic dream...it's one where my all-too-many w-i-ps are magically finished and I can start a dozen new ones!

    ReplyDelete
  5. Stitching with friends at the ocean front Lankford Hotel in Ocean City, Md with the Salty Yarn cross stitch shop RIGHT NEXT STORE!!

    ReplyDelete
  6. My stitching dream would be to attend a stitching weekend - meeting new friends and meeting designers that I love.

    My second is more stitching time which will come true after tomorrow - I finished my degree and I walk tomorrow, hooray! I get to trade all that homework time for my needle and thread!

    Thanks for having such a wonderful giveaway

    ReplyDelete
  7. My stitching dream would be to beable to twitch my nose like the TV witch, Samantha from Bewitched, and have all of my stitching charts done and caught up. My other stitching dream would be to have a house filled with beautiful original samplers to admire and inspire me to create my own originals.

    ReplyDelete
  8. Oh Jacqueline, I am extremely envious of your excursions! How exciting it must be to be amidst all of the rich history there in England, and in a museum with books nearly 500 years old. Wow! What an interesting idea to back linen with silk, I must try that with a couple of Sarah's motifs.
    It's so generous of you to giveaway one of the copies of the book on embroidered bookbindings. I'm curious how they were attached to the actual bookcloth. Several years ago, I purchased a book repair kit from Talas, yards of bookcloth & how to books on bookbinding/repair. My dream stitching would be to re-bind my great-grandfather's 1903 Book of Mormon with perhaps a stitched ship showing the dates his parents left England for America or perhaps the lion/unicorn motif with those dates. My apologies this is so lengthy. Thank you for allowing us to visit the Bodleian Library in Oxford vicariously thru you. Dianne in Utah, USA

    ReplyDelete
  9. Apart from wishing I could stitch everything that has ever taken my eye and learn all the beautiful forms of embroidery that go with it, my stitching dream, if you can call it that, would be to find an ancestor who stitched. No one in my family has ever been interested in needlework of any kind and I like to think that way back there in the past, there is a relative who had a passion for needle and thread. I dream of finding him/her and maybe even seeing something that they created.
    Delphine

    ReplyDelete
  10. My stitching dream? To actually be the owner of a needlework shop and have a staff to run it. I could just wander in and pilfer anything I wanted...from myself...and stitch all day...

    ReplyDelete
  11. Hello, Jacqueline! My stitching dream is to design and then stitch the panels for a needlework casket using AVAS silks, goldwork and stumpwork. Of course, I would also have a custom-made needlework casket made to my specifications for the panels to be placed upon :-).

    ReplyDelete
  12. What a lovely gift, Jacqueline! My stitching dream would be to travel back in time to Colonial America to visit visit some of the schools where girls learned to stitch and to stitch along side them to discuss with what they thought about as they put their needle to fabric.

    ReplyDelete
  13. I dream of living a year in Paris and taking the professional embroidery course at the Lesage school...I dream of then going to the Royal School in the UK to study Goldwork...and I wouldn't mind moving back to Chiba prefecture in Japan to study Japanese embroidery at Kurenai Kai. I have always been fascinated by embroidered bindings and would be honored to own and use this book.

    ReplyDelete
  14. I dream of going to York England and going to their quilt museum and taking a durham wholecloth or strippy quilt class. I love handquilting and my forefathers are from this area.
    My daughter is attends a special school of book binding in NYC. I shared the articles you have had on embroidered book binding--and she has encorported these into her work. She has a letter press and ceates special one-of-a kind art-style books. I would love to be selected for the book for it would go into her collection and be a well-used treasure to continue this special work.

    ReplyDelete
  15. Please don't include me in the drawing as someone more interested in embroidered book bindings should have this. However, I wanted to say that I often put gold lame under my needlepoint to add a gleam to the piece. This is particularly effective in pieces with a lot of open stitches that don't completely cover the NP canvas, but there is no reason that a linen sampler should not have some of the same effect. Folks should try this. Tissue lame is relatively cheap and comes in a lot of colors. The edges fray but you could easily put a piece under a sampler before framing.

    Sadly, I have no conservation information about adding this fabric to framed pieces but I think you'll enjoy the effect for just the right piece.

    ReplyDelete
  16. I have been embroidering since the age of 4, I am now 51, and continually learn new things that really are old things. I do a variety of needlework and am working on a piece for church that is exceedingly large and intricate. Some future plans would be bible covers so this book would probably help me tremendously. Thank you for your excellent site, photos and information.

    ReplyDelete
  17. In my stitching dream, I would be able to stitch at the speed of light so I can finish al these lovely pieces I see!

    ReplyDelete
  18. My stitching dream would be not to have to work so that I could devote more time to stitching, even though I will never be able to finish all of my stash. I love all of the history you share on you blog. Thanks again, Stephanie

    ReplyDelete
  19. My stitching dream? Only one?

    A 48 hour day, so I can get the things done that I want to get done!

    The whole range of AVS silks - every type in every color.

    An around-the-world needlework tour, where I could photograph, catalog, and write about all the various needlework styles, haunts, museums, displays, shops, festivals, and so forth.

    More realistically: a clean and organized studio. Hm. Fulfilling that one requires some elbow grease, so I better quit dreaming and get busy!

    ReplyDelete
  20. My stitching dream would be for my husband to take my 3 girls (4yo, 6yo, 15yo) to the beach for ONE WEEK so I can stay home by myself and stitch in blissful quiet with no responsibilities and no demands to feed anyone, take anyone to ballet or pick up anyone after track practice. I could stitch on my Ann Grimshaw all day long without interruptions - wow.

    ReplyDelete
  21. My stitching dream is seeing the Loara Standish sampler hanging on my walland walking thru my house and seeing 100's of samplers hanging everywhere. I have actually had this dream :)

    ReplyDelete
  22. My dream is to visit Ackworth to see the school and all the beautiful samplers made by all those lovely little girls, I also would love to have my very own wall of Ackworth samplers, and to be able to stitch for a long, long time to go to maybe achieve some of this dream, happy stitching, Giuseppina

    ReplyDelete
  23. I think I live my stitching dream - I stitch when I want to, don't worry about what gets done and what doesn't and just enjoy every stitch. If I have to have a dream though it would be to have access to lots of old samplers to study them.

    ReplyDelete
  24. My dream is to own a needlework shop. I want big shop so I can have places to sit so I could have stitch-in's anytime.

    ReplyDelete
  25. I'm afraid I have too many stitching dreams. But I would love to be sitting beside Jane Bostocke, Martha Edlin or in a class with Juda Hayle and experience what sampler stitching was like many years ago. Another one would be stitching at Ackworth School and finally learning where those motifs originated!

    But spending a day with friends is best, what a special day for you!

    ReplyDelete
  26. My stitching dream would be to have a little cottage separate from the house. In this little cottage I would create my stitching workshop and would surround it with all the things that comfort and inspire me. It would be a place I could go to stitch, invite my friends to stitch with me, and to design pieces that are personal to me.

    ReplyDelete
  27. My stitching dream is a light filled room with flat smooth work tables, chairs that can be sat in for more than just a while and all my diverse stitching friends. We get to talk about patterns and colors and threads and stitches and along with maybe just a little gentle gossip and a lot of mutual adoration of grandchildren!

    ReplyDelete
  28. My stitching dream is to be able to fill my home with beautiful stitchery so anyone walking through my front door would know immediately what my passion in life is.

    That dream will take a long time, it seems I only have time to stitch small projects. :)

    Kisses
    Sahara

    ReplyDelete
  29. My dream is a whole week with my stitching stopping only for the ocassional meal,drink and catnap with good light background radio
    and all the accessories I need art hand

    ReplyDelete
  30. I have always wanted to stitch a replica sampler of an ancestor - to make the same stitches she did, to be thinking, perhaps, some of the same thoughts - to be in her space and time, if only for a moment.

    ReplyDelete
  31. My stitching dream is to have the time to work on all the samplers I have kitted and ready to stitch. It's likely that only winning a lottery will let that happen anytime soon.
    Deborh P

    ReplyDelete
  32. My stitching dream would be to get to go back in time as a spirit to the late 15th and early 16th centuries, so that I could mill about all classes of folks, not need to be hassled to eat or drink or sleep~ but would be able to observe what everyone and ALL classes were wearing. I think the colors and the textures would be astounding, and to finally once and for all know what everyday people wore, and HOW they wore it, and for Pete's sake, how a blasted forehead cloth was worn! I want to go in the shops and see the embroiders, and go to the guild meetings and see what the heck the talked about....I want to mingle on ships bringing cloth to America........yes, that would be my dream
    xxoxoxo rachael

    ReplyDelete
  33. Lovely books.....they are so wonderful, even just to look at and to read.
    Stitching is such a huge part of my life.....
    Cheers,
    Margaret B

    ReplyDelete
  34. My stitching dream would be a devoted embroidery-book fund... and an assistant whose job it would be to make sure my fabric was always nice and taut.

    ReplyDelete
  35. I can never post on your blog. And I do not wish to have a 'google' account or a 'blog' account - too much personal information out there as it is.

    But my stitching wish is to get the use of my left hand back so I can stitch again. I had polio as an infant and used crutches all my life until I was 55 when my "good leg" could no longer help me walk. Now I'm in an electric scooter. But I have bone spurs in my hands from 54 years on crutches. I had my left hand operated on just before Christmas to remove a bad bone spur from the base of my thumb. Now my whole hand has gone numb (tingly like your leg falling asleep) and the numbness sometimes runs up to my shoulder.

    I just want the full use of my hand back so I can enjoy my work instead of taking 3 stitches and putting it down for a week then another 2 or 3 stitches.

    marcie weiler
    denver,colorado

    ReplyDelete
  36. to sew to sew to sew... to bind to bind to bind... as a bookbinder, i love to sew much more than glue, and to embroider a cover is a dream... i wish there was more time in the day to embroider all my book covers or collaborate with my amazing mother, who is my guru, on all my projects.

    ReplyDelete
  37. My stitching dreams...

    To retire to a stitching retreat where all I do all day is relax, stitch and read to my hearts content.

    To take a trip to England, Ireland and Scotland and spend several days in each musuem studying samplers.

    To attend another seminar at the Ackworth School studying Quaker samplers and their makers.

    To have enough time in this life to stitch every pattern I own!

    Gloria

    ReplyDelete