Finishing The Kingfisher

The kingfisher has been really quite tricky, but rewarding, too.

I do enjoy these colours, for a start, and the chance to use the really glossy rayon thread that helps his bright orange breast to shine. For the bright stripe of his back and tail, I’ve ended up combining threads in the needle to get just the colour I want. Even with a full range of Madeira stranded cotton in my thread stash, the precise colour and tone weren’t quite there. There’s another variegated mercerised machine thread in the mix as well – I think the motto for this piece is going to be “Whatever It Takes!”!

When I looked closely, I realised that the lower beak and the little claws were a very similar colour. The feet have been made a little scalier by stacking single twisted chain stitches atop one another so that they narrow into claws.

I’ve made the dark line of the beak narrower by bringing split stitches close in on either side, and done a lot of staring and adding little areas – the top of his head, the white flash at the side of the head, and the tiny bit of white at the throat. When I put him wherever he ends up, that will be one of the push-pull elements that helps him to detach sufficiently from the background to do his job.

Finally, I decided that the couple of bits of dark showing the underside of the far wing did in fact need to go in – more of the push-pull.

Then he wanted a twig to sit on. When I come to set him in place, I may cut some of the fabric close or turn it under, but other parts may be left so that the blue gauze modifies whatever is underneath. Some of this twig may be undone, some of it may be enhanced and extended.

I am reminding myself that I don’t work my best when I’m fretting about the Whole Thing. I do very much better when I get started and work out the whole thing later. I need to read the book again, to see whether there are particular animals I have to include. That will be no hardship, it’s a much beloved book!

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The Kingfisher Continues

The kingfisher is proving more complex than some of the earlier animal vignettes. This is partly because the shape is complex, and partly, I think, because this is one of the elements I really want to include, so it’s hard to “play” quite so freely!

The lower stitching – part of the wings, maybe, or the tail? – is densely stitched in stranded cotton, and the head is small, tangled stitches again in stranded cotton. The original photograph that I’m using as a guide shows much smaller speckles of colour over the head, so the smaller stitches should help with that..

I’ve put a line down the beak which I need to make narrower as I stitch the rest of the beak, and I’ve started on the wing.

You can see in this close up that I’m using two strands of a variegated mercerised cotton for the wings, overlapping and tangling my Cretan Stitches to create something like the effect of the feathers. Considering that fluffy effect it has created for fur in some of the other Vignettes, I’m astonished and delighted that it’s not looking fluffy this time. The colour helps, of course, and the stitches are more closely packed, but still, I’d not realised until now just how versatile Cretan Stitch is!

I’m very pleased with progress so far. I need to find the right bright shade for that stripe down the back and the end of the tail, fit in his white collar, and the bright colour on the top of his head, and then work out how to keep the beak neat and crisp.

So far, that’s defeating me, so wish me success, please…!

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And now for a kingfisher…

Many years ago – but after I first thought of doing a panel for the Conversion of Placidus – I went to a tour of Flag Fen, guided by Francis Pryor who had discovered and excavated it. As we strolled at the side of the fen, having much explained to us, there was a flash of bright orange, and a kingfisher shot across our bows. The effect, in glorious sunshine, with our minds in the Bronze Age, was absolutely electrifying, and I vowed that there would be a kingfisher in Placidus, somehow.

Of course, that’s easier said than done!

You maybe able to see in the first picture that I’d had two goes at drawing the Kingfisher, and started to embroider the larger one. I was intending him to be in the border, so I wanted him larger than a vignette. But that was not the way to do it, he’s too long in the body, and generally adrift. So I decided to go back to the first drawing, and not worry too much about leftover drawing.

It’s always sad to be unpicking, but once I’ve decided it’s necessary, I don’t repine, or even growl (much…). The next version will be better.

So I have started agin. The kingfisher’s breast is a tangle of overlapping feather stitch and feather stitch variation using Marlitt. It’s a good, vibrant colour, and I seem to have not had too trying a time with it, all things considered. Viscose threads such as Marlitt are very lively and twitchy, and if I want a smooth satin stitch, I try to damp out the kinks. For this, not so much, I want the light sparkling off the stitches, the speckles and high spots catching the light.

Well, it’s a start!

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