By Madison Butkus
Hometown Weekly Reporter
Those with the New Year’s resolution to learn how to sew are in luck this year for the Medfield Public Library (MPL) is hosting a four-class series on embroidery. The first class happened this past Wednesday, January 3rd on Zoom with over thirty people in attendance.
Streamlining this event was Adult Service/Programming Librarian Bri Ozanne who had set up two different camera angles for the Zoom class including her face and her working on the embroidery stitches. This series of classes will cover different hand appliqué techniques inspired by contemporary and traditional sewing artists. Each class will also learn a few embroidery stitches that will help add some great textures to their work.
For those who registered before December 15th, free supply kits were provided for pickup at the MPL before the start of this class. Within this first session kit included sewing needles, an array of different clothes, an embroidery wooden hoop, and yarn. While these classes are an amazing opportunity to help those who are beginners, all sewing levels are welcome throughout each session.
The inspiration for this first class was “Handstories” by Hazel C. Monte in which there were three distinct embroidery stitches for Bri to teach everyone. Before going on to teach each of the three stitches, Bri gave some helpful tips on how to thread their sewing needles. She stated that when they are using embroidery yarn, a.k.a. embroidery floss, there are six pieces of thread intertwined together. For certain design elements, this can be too thick but there is an easy solution: simply part the number of threads you would like to use by gently untwisting.
Bri then taught everyone the three distinct embroidery stitches of the running stitch, the backstitch, and the stem stitch. The running stitch creates a dotted line effect while the backstitch creates a seamless line throughout. The stem stitch is particularly interesting in that it creates a type of vine (or stem) look to it; a type of twisting texture if you will.
At the end of teaching these stitches, Bri additionally taught everyone had to embellish each stitch if they wanted to. These embellishing techniques included whipping and weaving which were both extremely easy to do once Bri had demonstrated them. One of the perks of these two embellishing styles is that they don’t have you sew through the fabric again but instead the stitch itself.
As this class ended, everyone in attendance was extremely grateful to Bri for her amazing teaching skills. It can be said with ease that everyone learned a great deal about embroidery and sewing during this class and are extremely excited for the next three sessions ahead. These next three classes will be held on February 7th, March 6th, and April 3rd. For information and/or to register for these events, please email Bri at bozanne@minlib.net.
