Thank you for the wonderful explanations. Ill look forward to seeing what
you post further on these intriguing projects.
Di

--
Heart and soul can make up for technical lacking in any form of art, but let
the heart be lacking and all the perfection means nothing.

"georg" wrote in message
news
Diana Curtis wrote:

What is a loop start? And a 1390 quilt?
Diana, striving to become always less ignorant

The 1390 quilt is done in the style of an extant quilt currently in
storage in the Victoria & Albert museum in London. Pictures of it can be
seen in the Medieval Craftsman Series "The Embroiderers" among other
places. It's called the Tristram and Isolde Quilt or the Guarduicci
tapestry. There are no images of it online that I know of.

It is trapunto-like, stuff as you go, back stitched to make pictures on
a whole cloth of linen, stuffed with wool, using linen floss. This is
much more like elaborate needlework. The piece is nearly 3 foot square,
and is the image of 2 knights fighting sword and shield style with
words. When I have the outlining done and all the stuffing worked in, I
get to quilt it. With linen thread in running stitch.

If I'm lucky, I'll be done in March, where I will enter it into a
competition. Then gift the whole thing to a very nice person. For those
in the SCA, it's going to be someone's Ducal Scroll. Loose translation,
it's to commemorate someone's hard work for 2 years of their life.

A loop start is when you take a long thread, double it, and thread the
ends on the needle for about an inch or two. This leaves a loop dangling
off the needle. Put needle through fabric and back without pulling
tight. Put needle through the loop, then pull tight. You have just
secured your thread without any knots. When you finish with the other
end, just back stitch one, then bury it between the layers. This is a
needlework trick to hide all knots.

Ideally, the casualy observer on a galloping horse won't be able to tell
back from front. And yes, I'll be putting up pictures and documentation
on the web when I'm done with it. And instructions on how to get the
look without the effort.

-georg