module 5 - Chapter 6 - Tucks, Pleats and Gathers

6a: hand stitched regular straight tuck on fine coton fabric

6b: tucks hand stitched only at the edges to form triangles

6c: hand stitched high tucks to form triangles, these were then cut at the fold and slightly frayed

 6d: hand stitched on the bias on fine coton fabric

6e: various hand stitched pleats/tucks

6f: hand stitched coton organdie. because of the stiffer quality of the fabric the triangles form little "boxes". I particularly like the effect on the second pic

6g: machine stitched tucks on the edges of the fabric. The stitch used looks like a blanket stitch

6h: tucks formed by machine stitched curvy lines

 6i: here large holes were cut into the fabric and a big ribbon was pulled through to form the tucks

6j: the fabric was folded to form big tucks, then the triangles were stitched before being cut into shapes

6k: one of my favourites: inserted white cleaners that form tucks. This piece can be formed into a 3D shape

 6l: little randomly  placed hand stitched "X" tucks on fine coton fabric

same pic: here I tried to accentuate the shadows formed by the pleats

6m: fine machined stitched tucks on coton organdie

 6n: pleats hand stitched horizontally, then vertically on coton fabric

 6o: pleats stitched on the bias of coton organdie. These were ironed flat. Then pleats were stitched on the reverse

6p: same methos than above. This time the pleats were placed in several directions

GATHERING TECHNIQUES

samples 6q-6s: all these samples were gathered with machine stitching. Although different stitches were used, the difference is not very clear.

 6t: here the fabric is hand gathered on the bias and the pleats are ironed flat

6u: this sample is hand stitched (see diagram) and the pleats were ironed flat

 6v: hand stitched and then gathered. This time the pleats weren't ironed flat. In comparison to the previous sample the creases are less defined but seem deeper, the edges are of course less sharp

6w: here the fabric is gathered in circles with handstitching, the fabric forms little pockets

6x: the rusted fabric is gathered with hand stitched spirals. I especially like the flowing creases this method creates

 6y: a losely woven fabric was gathered, this time in circles after the "pockets" had been stuffed with brown felting wool. The tops was then cut open and the wool pulled out.

 6z: same method as above, except that the wool was just pulled through the openweave of the fabric

 6A: the fabric is gathered around a stiff plastic string. The plan was to let the fabric "twist" or spiral around, but the string was too short or too stiff for this.

6B: fabric gathered around wooden sticks.I just love the combination of the wood with the rusted fabric

6C: fabric gathered around copper wire. The pleats are finer. This sample could of course be bent

GATHERING WITH SHIRRING ELASTIC didn't prove very successful, not even with a fine flimsy fabric, no matter how I adjusted the bobbin tension and the upper thread tension.
In some cases it starts gathering and then, by magic, my sewing machine adjusts the tension to normal again.

PLAYING AROUND WITH THE PLEATER

I struggled a lot with my pleater and even broke a lot of needles when I tried to force rusted fabric through it. I finally ended up with using finer fabric like coton organdie, coton mulle or Turman coton.

Pleater 1: normal pleating on slightly rusted fabric, pleats on the straight grain of the fabric

 Pleater 2: this fabric ended up "a bit wonky", fabric used : coton organdie

Pleater 4: pleats done on the straight grain, folded edges emphasized with red oil paint and partly stitched together with red thread

Pleater 3: pleats done on the bias

Pleater 5: narrow strips of coton organdie passed through 1 needle of the pleater in a wavy movement

In the second version, the picture was manipulated in Pixlr

 Pleater 7: Turban coton pleated and then gathered with machine satin stitch

 Pleater 8: pleated, then gathered at the ends to form little fans

 Pleater 9: this little hand stitched pleated piece was done with rusted fabrics that was gathered with a chain stitch at one end. I love the organic character of this sample, it somehow reminds me of a mushroom.

 Pleater 10: here coton organdie was only gathered in the middle of the fabric that was then folded in two. Because of the stiffer character of the fabric, the creases remain

 Pleater 11 (and not 10): pleats on coton mulle, hand gathered to form a honeycomb pattern

Pleater 12: gathered only in the middle, then manipulated to form a "flower"

Module 5-Chapter 5 Quilting, Padding and Stuffing

Wadded Quilting techniques

 5a

 5b

 5c

 5d

5e

 5f

5g

5h

Samples 5a to 5 f were done using the traditional wadded quilting technique. For the 1st and 3rd layer I used coton poplin and for the  padding a thicker polyester wadding.

Straight and curved lines were used to stitch the 3 layers together in samples 5a to 5f, while I did free motion quilting for samples 5 g and 5h. In 5g I filled the spaces with more stitching so that the shapes would show more. Of course all kinds of shapes could be stitched this way, but to make the shapes really pop up, more stitching has to be done to flatten the fabric between them,
Sample 5 h was done with what is called the stippling technique.

Experimental variations

 5i: here the padding used are cut off threads (mainly embroidery), the fabric used is polyester organza, The layer have been machine stiched with a straight stitch

5j; as padding I took some jersey strips cut into tiny bits. The top fabric is a polyester one used from a table runner,, the backing fabric is a plain white cotton

5k: one of my favourite: dried grass from the garden was used as padding. The layers were stitched with a straight machine stitch vertically, further hand stitch was added for more interest.

 5l: dried leaves with a top layer of scrim. Big cross stitches were used to hold the layers together

 5m: here pipe cleaners were turned into circles and kept in place with had stitching. (unfortunately I didn't have white ones).Top and bottom layer is fine tulle.

 5n: here the padding consists of felting wool roving. The top layer is cotton organza, the hand stitch is fly stitch which causes the fabric to produce uneven ripples, an effect you can't unfortunately see here

5p: shredded paper from the office was taken for padding this sample. The layers were stitched together with a machine stitched spirals

Shaped quilting

5q: card triangles were put under a panne velvet. I first stitched around them to keep them in place and then filled the shapes around with hand stitching to make them pop up

5r: thick cords were glued temporarily in place in wavy movements. The the top fabric was stitched to keep them in place. The edges of the fabric is frayed. Further stitching could be added in the negative spaces.

 Padded quilting - Trapunto

 5s: for this technique I used white coton jersey which is a bit stretchy. the backing fabric is white coton. The circular shapes were stitched by machine,then the backing fabric was cut open to insert the padding. The spaces between the circles were filled with free machine satin stitch adjusting the width of the stitch when needed. This created a more organic look with rippled edges.

5t: A "cheater version" of padded quilting with inserted wool threads

5u: stitched lines with a heavy padding. The spaces between the padding were filled with knotted ribbon thread

5v: another sample with padding where I tried to reproduce the pattern in sample 3b. of course the space between the shapes could be filled with stitches creating even more texture.

In general one can say that practically any shapes could be reproduced with this method.
For all the padded samples I used white jersey cotton as, because of its stretchy quality,  it lends itself very well for this method.

Corded Quilting

5w: wavy stitching with a twin needle on jersey fabric 

 5x: here the stitching with the twin needle was done on the bias on a loosely woven fabric. Ribbon yarn was encased in the tunnel thus created on the back of the fabric. The spaces between the rows were filled with straight stitching with the same ribbon.

5y: a very delicate sample done on transparent polyester fabric without any thread introduced in the channel . This is not really a corded quilting sample but I like the pattern created by the stitching

 5z: stitching with a twin needle, this time I encased a fine red thread. This was not so easy as the needle often went through the fabric to the front/back

 5/a: wavy stitching with the twin needle with  a thicker thread introduced in the channel. I like the way this method caused the polyester fabric to distress in a very organic way.

5/b: i think that the back of this sample is more interesting than the front as the stitching creates an interesting pattern. The fabric used here is a coton organza

5/c: the same method used on tulle fabric, not very convincing though as this material proved to be too stiff