The Green Block

I have shown you my Pink & Blue blocks........here is the Green Block.
Parties for the very young was the feel of the first two blocks. They fit well together with half of the party verse on the blue block, the other half on the pink. Butterfly cakes & smarties round things off nicely.
The third block is quite different. I remember my Grandmothers kitchen crockery was cream with a fine green band around the edge & had a very 30's feel to it. I also remembered some bits & pieces my mother had when I was very young.....cabbage & beehive sugar pots as well as other quirky stuff. Most of this must have been gifts from the late 40's & early 50's. It was far too frivolous in nature to have been chosen by my mother......but being a practical person, who had an almost pathological loathing of waste, they were all used in the kitchen until they were broken.
I recalled them from my very early childhood, thought they were fabulous & had fun researching their beginnings on the net, at my local library & through friends who collect the wondrous & bizarre.
The photos I have included show the spotty cup as it has been coloured in stages to give a clearer idea of how the tinting process works.
All the colouring is done on unwashed calico..... This seems to be the only fabric that is made with enough sizing to hold the washes. The sizing is added to the fabric through the manufacturing process & is evenly distributed through the fibres. Its like working with a pre gessoed canvas.......
Each part of the work is hand tinted with a brush & acrylic paint mixed with heaps of water. This gives the colour a beautiful translucent watercolour feel to the work......... The stitching over the top defines the colour & shape of the finished work more than the painting. The colour wash simply adds a richness & depth that, unless you are prepared to spend hours satin stitching & thread painting, is the only other way of achieving the full potential of the design
You may have noticed that the number of images have increased with each block. This is because, even though the original intention was 3 per block, I couldn't decide which I preferred.
I simply couldn't leave out a spotty cup,............... or the daisy cup......... or the Clarice Cliff teapot .............or the beehive...or the sugarbowl & jug.
The first photo is the finished block with all the pieces embroidered, backed & stitched together.
The second set are of the spotty cup so you can see how I have worked the colour in sections allowing the parts to dry before continueing on to the next bit. This allows me to add some simple shading to help the images look more three dimensional.
The third set are all the images with their embroidery & backing.