Embroidery and shopping in Bangkok

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2014: Sadly the Pinn Shop is no longer exists. 
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Being an embroiderer and a quilter, I searched out needlework shops in the neighbourhood where I recently spent a few weeks just outside of Bangkok in Thailand. To my delight I found one just 5 minutes down the road in the local shopping centre... I mean Shopping Centre.

Central Plaza is a large new shopping mall on not 1 level, not 2 or even 3, but on 7 levels! Besides shopping at Tops the supermarket in the basement, going for tea at Au Bon Pain where they serve delicious pecan nut rolls a bit like a Chelsea bun, and seeking out the needlework shop, I managed to see but a fraction of this enormous but very pleasant shopping centre.

The little needlework shop aptly called Pinn Shop is a charming place. It stocks all sorts of needlework related materials and equipment, like sewing thread, fabric cutters and blades, cutting boards, vilene, lace, ribbons and so on. I was intrigued by the knitting looms, like big versions of the wooden cotton reel with 4 nails knocked into one end that I used for French knitting as a child. Some of the the looms were big enough for knitting a scarf and looked like they could be great fun for little girls. And big girls too. There were also numerous templates and aids for quilters to make variously shaped 3-dimensional 'pom-poms' as quilt units.

As you walk in the door of the Pinn Shop there are a couple of tables in the centre and there always seems to be a group of ladies chatting and knitting enthusiastically with a wide variety of attractive novelty yarns all available in the shop. For quilters there is a small selection of cotton quilting fabrics, mainly dusty pinks and toning fabrics when I visited. There are also sewing kits for making soft toys, cushions and interesting bags of all sizes. At the back is a workroom with tables and sewing machines set up, perhaps for sewing classes.

Finally in the corner I spotted the embroidery section. Besides the usual things like needles, scissors and frames they have embroidery kits, all cross stitch as far as I could see, and the complete range of DMC stranded embroidery floss and perle cottons and some fabrics too. It was kind of comforting to know that if I needed any embroidery thread it was only 5 minutes away by motorcycle taxi.

If you are looking for a kit to embroider of the much revered Thai king or his family then this is the place you'll find it and you'll have a wide range to choose from.

The staff are helpful but speak little English, so you will have to make do with a lot of signing if you want something special. I was looking for red machine thread and was able to make myself understood enough so that the assistant went looking through a big storage drawer under the display of cottons. In the end I made do with a DMC cotton quilting thread she found which did very nice machine satin stitch, perhaps because it was thick and soft and gave a nice coverage.

Leaving the Pinn Shop I did find a small haberdashery section in the Central department store which also stocked cross stitch kits and they had the full range of Anchor stranded embroidery floss. There was little else of interest for embroidery but again there was an interesting selection of hand knitting yarn.

It does puzzle me that knitting is apparently such a popular hobby in Bangkok, where the daytime temperature seems to hover constantly above 30 degrees Centigrade. Firstly, it seems to me too hot to want to knit and secondly, there can't be many suitable occasions for wearing anything knitted in that hot humid climate.

As I mentioned in my last post I did find a quilting shop not too far from where I was staying, called Pretty Quilt Shop which you can see here. And very pretty it and the quilts were too. There was a good selection of cotton quilting fabric and lots of bits and bobs for embellishing like lace and tulle. In the back of the shop an area was set up with sewing machines which I believe you can arrange to use if you buy fabric from the shop and don't have your own machine at home. There were 5 or 6 ladies working at the tables and sewing machines but it looked as though they were taking a class as they all seemed to be working on similar pieces.

I really loved the display of creative patchwork bags in the shop. If you are looking for a kit for making a patchwork bag that is different or you are looking for handles for a bag that you are sewing then you are sure to find something suitable here. If I'd had longer in Bangkok I would have investigated doing one of the handbag courses. It would definitely have been worthwhile and fun because they are not traditional patchwork at all. One of the assistants spoke excellent English, so I'm sure that my lack of understanding Thai would have been no problem. Maybe next time...

And then there were two - a cloth book project

My second grandson Liam was born a few weeks ago in Bangkok. He is the dearest little boy. I can't help marvelling at how he seemed to change and grow before my very eyes while I was there. Here he is just 3 weeks old.


On one of his first outings, Liam Cindy and I visited Pretty Quilt Shop a nearby quilt shop - a rare find in Bangkok - and we found some eye-catching black and white printed fabric. Tiny babies see contrasts most easily so the black and white fabric, seemed perfect for making a simple little cloth book - one for Liam and one for his cousin Jake who was born just 6 weeks earlier.

Cotton quilting fabrics.

We set out to make a book about 15 cm x 15cm with the inspiring fabric, but only a vague idea of what we would do. Cindy was still feeding the baby every 2 hours. That left me with quite a lot of the actual sewing to do to complete our joint project before my return to Cape Town a few days later. We had to work on the dining room table because the work room has changed into the baby's room. We also all ate at the dining room table. You can imagine there was lots of clearing up and setting out to be done between meals.

The starry fabric is a bit like an op-art design. It makes your eyes feel a bit peculiar and you have to concentrate to focus on it when you see a big piece. That was a nice quick easy page to do. One Cindy could squeeze in between feeds. The problem came when it backed onto a white page. The 'show through' of the stars was a bit distracting and we had to put in an extra layer of the white cotton fabric.

The starry fabric showed through from the back

I rather liked the strong lines of the black and white striped fabric, but as a page in the book it needed a little extra 'something' - like a red line. In her blog, Mary Corbet had just suggested using two rows of buttonhole stitch as a line stitch which I liked, but I had no time to experiment with it first. In the end I stuck to good old chain stitch and a single red line added a focus and a bit of pizzaz. I still like the idea of the blanket stitch as a line stitch and want to try it sometime. Don't you think the unexpected wavy lines of this fabric are rather fun?

 

The front and back cover pages

Originally we wanted to applique some shapes onto a white background using a machine satin stitch. Its quick to do. That didn't work out too well though. The sewing machine we used didn't have a foot for satin stitching. Simple straight satin stitch lines were manageable, but definitely not the curves. Instead, blanket stitch did the trick for the circles. The red circles were fused onto the fabric before the hand embroidery was done and it made working with the rather coarse red cotton fabric a whole lot easier too. You can see the circles in the picture below where we are working at the dining room table - just before supper.

Embroidering the faces - our last page!

Apparently babies recognise faces very early on. Its got something to do with the spacing of the eyes, the nose and the mouth. Liam's dad Paul is very talented and he dashed out a number of faces for us to choose from. It was hard to choose just one, but we did and we embroidered the outlines with stem stitch.

And here are the two books, stitched together just hours before I flew back to Cape Town.

I'd love to receive your comments and also hear about any cloth books or quiet books you have made.

Whitework swaddling band at the V&A

Wandering on through the British Galleries at the V&A recently, and after seeing the poignant embroideries of Mary Queen of Scots that I mentioned in my last post, I came across a beautiful whitework and cutwork edged swaddling band. With my little grandson Jake just a few days old, it made me a little regretful that we no longer have the time nor the need to make such special items.

The long rectangular swaddling band I saw at the V&A was made around 1600-1625 in Italy. I would guess that it could have been a couple of metres in length. Although not the whole of the length was embroidered, it must have been a major undertaking to embroider. It is edged with a 4 cm wide linen band of embroidery in satin stitch, eyelets and cutwork, with a picot edge.  The embroidered edge would show as a spiral as it wrapped around the baby.  When you follow the link to see the photos of the work, do click on the 'More Information' tab for details about the embroidery too.

In contrast to this finely embroidered swaddling cloth, one of the receiving blankets that I had taken over to London for my daughter was brushed cotton; and one that I had used over 30 years ago to swaddle her! Not quite an heirloom, but it did have special meaning for all of us.

I hope you are having a good week wherever you may be.

 

More Embroideries at the V&A - Mary Queen of Scots



Mary, Queen of Scots in captivity. Source Wikipedia

 I visited the Victoria and Albert Museum in London in December and came across canvas work embroideries in the English Galleries done by Mary Queen of Scots. She embroidered them during her 19 years of house arrest before finally being beheaded by order of Queen   Elizabeth I on charges of treason.

I couldn't help wondering what thoughts were going through her mind while she sat working at her embroidery. I had just read Phillipa Gregory's historical novel The White Queen which vividly brought home to me how ruthless those early kings and queens were when it came to ensuring there positions on the throne.

Below are two links to panels embroidered by Mary Queen of Scots and her ladies in waiting between 1570 and 1585. The pieces form part of the Oxburgh Hangings, a group of panels worked mainly in tent stitch and then stitched together to form large hangings. They are worked on linen canvas in gold, silver and coloured silk threads. The first panel is of a Quail and it is on display as part of the large hangings in the British galleries at the V&A. I rather like the unusual stripey background.

The second panel we can be sure was worked by the Queen herself because it contains her cipher.  I can see the 'M' above the dog, but the rest -  an A with the Greek letter phi superimposed - is unclear to me. The dog in the panel is thought to be her pet dog Jupiter. Although the picture is available to us on the V&A website, this precious piece of embroidery is in storage. I guess there are not too many embroideries around that are known to have been embroidered by royalty, and then too an incarcerated queen awaiting an uncertain fate.

Next at the museum I came across a beautiful cutwork piece used for swaddling a baby. More on that in my next post.

Embroideries at the V&A

Our little grandson Jake

I visited London in December 2010. The occasion was the birth of my first little grandson, Jake. He arrived in a great rush on a cold and very snowy day, almost before his dad could get his mom to the hospital for his birth. Jake and his mom are now doing very well and regularly brave that wet wintry weather to go out for walks.


Whilst in London I managed a visit to the Victoria and Albert Museum to see some of the embroideries - always food for the soul! I particularly wanted to look at articles embroidered with Dresden Lace, but the costumes and textiles are in the process of being moved to another location and sadly it will be 2013 before they are all on view again.


The Textile rooms 95-99 were closed the day I visited due to staffing constraints, but I was fortunate to find the Textile Study Room 100 open. Room 100 will be open at limited times only until the end of February 2011. If you plan to try and see the embroideries there before they are moved, it may be an idea to phone the V&A beforehand.  Tricia Nguyen has written a very informative post about the scheduled move and the new premises on her Thistle Threads blog.

 Enquiring at the help desk, I was directed to look through the English galleries before making my way up to Textile Study Room 100 and I'm glad that I did because I saw some thought provoking work. The V&A has a number of embroideries by Martha Edlin. Not much is known about her but she possessed the needlework skills typical of a young educated girl in the mid 17th century. By the age of 11, Martha was an accomplished embroiderer and there is a fine casket of hers on display that she embroidered in 1671 with silk and metal threads on satin. You can see some details of the casket panels on the V&A website.  By the time Martha embroidered the casket, she had already completed a  sampler worked in silks at age 8 and also a complex piece of whitework and cutwork by age 9 although this is not on display in the British galleries. I just can't imagine a child of that age today having the skill or attention to complete such a major piece of fine embroidery. There are just too many other distractions vying for attention.


Although perfectly understandable, it is a pity that embroidered pieces must be stored behind glass. I would have liked to take a closer look at an oblong pincushion embroidered with silk on satin to study the stitch that Martha used for the two large red roses. They appear to be Queen or Rococo stitch, but I couldn't be sure? If so, then I can't help wondering just how Martha's embroidered a stitch that today is more usually used on canvaswork or some form of counted thread embroidery. I was also intrigued by the collection of articles that were kept in Martha's casket, especially the little ear spoon that formed part of a manicure set. Imagine using a tool like that as part of a daily routine to scoop earwax out of your ears!


Next I saw embroidery done by Mary Queen of Scots but more about that next time.