March of the Gingkos

This month I began 3 pieces of work using the heatset Mokume Shibori Gingko leaves. I have managed to finish one of them. The other two are much larger and remain in a roughly laid out state. I ran into some indecision as to how to attach the different elements together. I decided to try one smaller piece with the one gingko leaf I had left over from the other compositions to see how well my ideas were working before committing to a larger piece of work. I used a softer polyester materiel in a pewter color for the gingko itself and sewed it to a backing of cotton to stretch it into the shape I wanted. Then I made another simple gingko leaf shape from some golden poly (flat not heatset), heat seared the edges and used it under the heatset shape to create some differentiation between the leaf and the background. I attached them together by using selective hand stitching in metallic thread along some of the veining on the leaf. Finally I attached the entire thing to an olive colored velvet ground and top stitched in some lines reminiscent of the leaf’s veining. I will probably use some of these ideas on the other two pieces in the next month.