Pottery Shapes Completed

Here is my finished Pottery Shapes piece. I am very happy with how it turned out. This started as an art group homework project. We got together and took photos of vases, bottles, baskets and anything we thought had an interesting shape. Then for homework we were to take two or three of these objects and arrange them so that they overlapped, but piece them so that you could still see the outline of the objects in the back. However, none of the objects we photographed appealed to me when it came time to actually make something. So I was a bad student and didn't do my homework.

A couple of weeks later I got a Sundance catalog in the mail. The middle pitcher in my pottery shapes piece was on the cover of the catalog. I thought it was such a nice shape and a cute pitcher. It came in creamy white and turquoise and green I think. I thought "this is such a nice pitcher maybe I should order one," until I saw the price - $90!! I realized that buying one was out of my budget, so I used it as inspiration for this piece. The other two vases were also from the catalog, but I don't think they were for sale. They were just props in a photo spread selling other objects.

I've been a busy bee while my boys are away skiing. They called about an hour ago and are going to spend another night. It snowed all day at the ski area. The roads are bad and my husband is tired, so they are just going to spend another night in a hotel and come back tomorrow. I miss them, but I really enjoy the peace and quiet in the house when I am home alone. Over the next couple of days I will be posting about all the things I was able to finish this weekend. No painting though. My back is a little better today, but still sore and I didn't want to risk overdoing it.

Pottery Shapes, Part 3

I'm still working on my pottery shapes piece. I really love the effect the hand stitching creates. I am using two strands of DMC floss on the shapes. I picked colors that closely match the fabric used. Since I cross stitch too, I have quite a stash of DMC floss. For the background I used three different variegated colors of 12 weight Sulky cotton. Here is a detail shot.

I still need to finish stitching the brown vase, the right most one. I'm not sure how I want to finish the edges, traditional binding, zig-zag stitch, pillowcase with another backing fabric and cover my stitches, ...

If you are interested in seeing the previous posts on this project, the "pottery shapes" category label will get you there.

Pottery Shapes, Part 2

This morning I picked fabrics, made patterns and assembled the pottery shapes. Now I am auditioning background fabrics. Above are the four finalists out of 20 fabrics auditioned. I tried both light and dark backgrounds in solids, tone on tones, subtle prints, and hand dyes. I have settled on a light background in tone on tone or hand dyed. I'm leaning toward the third one, but if I use it the final piece will have to be quite small since I have very little of this fabric. I think I need to go do something else and think about it for a while.

As a follow-up, I finally got the bamboo blind hung in my sewing room! It looks nice.

Pottery Shapes, Part 1

I'm finally getting around to starting the homework assignment that was due in January for my Art Group. I've got my shapes cut out of paper and arranged.

I'm also trying to hang a bamboo blind in my sewing room. This room is one of the last rooms in the house that hasn't even been painted yet since we moved in. The sellers had just primed most of the walls in the house. Let's just say that they weren't afraid of color and made bold choices of wall paint. For the past 5 years I've just had a sheet pinned over a tension rod as a window treatment in my sewing room. Today I'm upgrading!