Loose Threads

a ramble through canvas work

We recently had a day out in the Essex market town of Saffron Walden (I wrote a little about the town a few weeks ago in a recent post about The Fry Gallery). It was Stewart’s birthday and he had only ever driven through but not spent any time there so we decided it would be a nice place to visit. As it was a Monday, many things were shut but it was a chance to explore the splendid parish church of St Mary’s, the largest parish church in Essex standing majestically on a hill overlooking the town.

It is a stunning church with a large tower that boasts 12 bells, it has a magnificent church organ and a wonderful set of stained glass windows. But the thing that caught my eye were the row upon row of embroidered kneelers positioned in each pew.

The word ‘kneeler’ is a fairly recent addition to the English language, not making an appearance until 1848. In the early church people would stand to pray. Kneeling for prayer was a practice which gradually spread during the 12^th century and certainly up until the end of the 19^th century worshippers would provide their own kneelers, also known as hassocks or tussocks, because they were frequently stuffed with dried grass. The uniform size and shape of kneeler that we know today was first introduced in the 1930s in Winchester Cathedral, which started a scheme for embroidered canvas kneelers for general use. Salisbury followed with a similar scheme in 1937 and today we can find these ornately embroidered cushions in churches throughout the country.

Worked by Eric Brown using cross stitch throughout. 1995

Before the reformation churches were much more colourful than they are today and in St Mary’s in Saffron Walden there has been a deliberate effort to add more colour with the introduction of banners and embroidered kneelers which have been designed and made by members of the congregation. Although the kneelers are all worked in a unifying colour scheme of blue, gold, yellow, red and white they display a variety of designs, borders and backgrounds as well a variety of stitches too, such as petit point, cross stitch, long armed cross stitch and tent stitch. I enjoyed looking at the different designs to see who had stitched them and in whose memory they were made.

Worked by Pam Rowbotham in memory of her brother William, 1997. Worked in cross stitch and reversed tent stitch.

I’m always excited to learn something new and then link it to a book I have enjoyed. When I discovered that kneelers as we know them today had been started in Winchester Cathedral in the 1930s I remembered ‘A Single Thread’ by Tracey Chevalier. Written in her usual enjoyable style, with a knack for story telling that is always impeccably researched, A Single Thread tells the story of Violet, whose brother and fiancé have both been killed in the first world war. Violet find herself one of an entire generation of women subjected to a single life after so many young men were killed in the war, left caring for her grieving and bitter mother. Eventually Violet saves enough to move away from her mother’s home in Southampton and she goes to Winchester, a cathedral city. Living there she joins the Society of Broderers, a group of women who embroider kneelers for the cathedral, where she starts to find some fulfilment as well as friendship. It is a beautiful story of friendship and love in the life of a woman who learns to craft her own life through embroidery.

Name has been worn away but it has been worked in memory of an 11 year old friend

I don’t have any experience of making church kneelers, but I have dabbled with a little bit of canvas embroidery in the past. My first foray into embroidery was through counted thread work, firstly with cross stitch kits which was followed with canvas work kits. I made a couple of cushion covers, one of which my Mum still has, although I have no idea what happened to the other one, a traditional lattice work pattern in blue, black and cream wool chosen to match the decor in our living room… over forty years ago. I also made a foot stool cover in a bargello design, again from a kit, which we still have even if it does reside unused under the bed.

My Bargello footstool

By now I was getting more ambitious and for my next canvas work project I chose a kit produced by Ehrman with multiple colours and an intricate design. It is called the Pansy Cushion by Elian McCready. But sadly I lost interest, and it was cast aside. Fairly recently when visiting a friend’s house I discovered she also had this kit but had finished hers and made it up into the most beautiful cushion. It spurred me into digging mine out again and every so often I finish off another couple of square inches, each time with a determination to get the thing finished but I find it hard to distinguish the different colours on the printed design in artificial light, plus I soon get bored as unlike knitting I can’t easily do it while watching TV. One day I might finish it but it’s not going to be any time soon.

The unfinished Pansy Cushion

And while writing this I remembered yet another unfinished piece of canvas work embroidery this time of my own design. Now you would think that having designed it myself it might have spurred me into finishing but alas not. I remember teaching the design process as part of a textile masterclass on various techniques for extracting designs for textiles from drawings and I had started the embroidery as an example of how we could move from the design on a sketchbook page onto a making a finished piece of work. I obviously did enough to illustrate the process and never felt the need to continue. Maybe I should attempt to finish this one day too, but I’m not sure I love it enough.

My own design… barely begun!

The actual design process is a fun exercise though and a great way of filling up sketchbook pages with lots of fabulous colour. It’s a process developed from a workshop by the artist Sue Dove, so I cannot claim credit even though I adapted it to suit my own outcomes, but if you would like to give it a go this is what you do:

·      The idea is to create a sheet of brightly coloured collage paper but you start with a white sheet of A4 paper. You can use other size paper, but this size works quite nicely.

·      Now cut or preferably tear a selection of smallish, coloured shapes from old magazine pages. Choose mostly bold solid colours. It’s okay to include some pattern or text but not too much.

·      Stick these shapes down randomly onto the sheet of white paper, leaving plenty of space around them.

·      With your choice of colouring media such as felt tips, oil pastels, paints etc fill in all the gaps of white paper around your coloured stuck down shapes. Think about the colours that are already there, working with them and extending them into larger blocks of colour. There are no rules, just work instinctively and have fun.

·      Now, turn the page over and draw the outline of something you have drawn onto the back. Keep it simple like a shell, a leaf or as in my case poppy seed heads etc and then cut it out. When you turn it back over to the right side you will have a colourful version of your image.

·      Stick it back down into your sketchbook, outlining it with a bold line and filling in any bold details. You can leave the background plain or add more colour.

For my design, after I had cut out the poppy seed heads to stick in my sketchbook, I then stuck down what remained of the background collage onto another page, creating a negative image where the background was brightly coloured, but the design was left white. I then enhanced the seed head shapes with some simple black and white drawing and this is what I chose for my canvas work design.

I still quite like the design so maybe I should attempt to finish the embroidery… but don’t hold your breath!

And if you try out this design technique please do let me know as I would love to see what you do!