A Little Splash of Color

Yesterday, I showed you the finished section of flat silk in the Ecclesiastical Embroidery Design  for the Easter Set Pulpit Fall.  It is always a thrill to finish one section on a hand embroidery project and to start embroidering a new area.  Often, it is tempting to move on to the new areas to test out ideas.  The mind tends to move so much faster than the fingers when it comes to hand embroidery.  But, moving on to new areas within a design without finishing a current area has its dangers.  There is always the concern that after half finishing an area and leaving is for a long time, the stitching rhythm will change, and create a noticeable difference where stitching stopped and restarted.  Therefore, I really must finish the goldwork Italian stitching on the Easter Set Pulpit Fall before getting in too deep with the colored silk embroidery floss.

It is hard to resist testing out colors to see which might work. The right selection of color will bring this embroidery design to life. When it comes to color selection for this Embroidery Design, there were a few ideas that stick in my mind which come from Ecclesiastical vestment pieces I have seen.  A favorite vestment set that comes to mind when thinking of Church embroidery for Easter that feature a stylized lily motif.  Stitched in bright golden yellows ,the lilies fairly “sing” of spring and the Resurrection Joy of Easter Morning.  That makes yellow lilies a must, at least for now.  Next, the Chi-Rho  and Alpha and Omega need to be read from a distance. Red is always a great choice for bold lettering.

Red and yellow also have significance as far as their use as Liturgical colors for the church.   White is the “liturgical color” choice for the festival times of the Church Year, and is the most widely used color for the seasons of Easter and Christmas.  White can range from pure white to cream or ivory, to gold or even yellow. All of these variations of white signify the importance of the season.  Thus, the desire to have the lilies be a beautiful gold/yellow color on a cream ground with gold stitching.   The use of red is also very festive.  The use of red on the Chi-Rho shows the Paschal Lamb fulfilling His Sacrifice. Now, this Ecclesiastical Embroidery Design is not meant to have every single color have liturgical significance, but knowing a little about use of colors within the church can help convey meaning and significance with a special Church Embroidery Design on a Vestment Set.

Once a few colors are selected as a starting point, how does one go about figuring out the rest of the colors?  This is something that has been rumbling around and causing worry for weeks.  There are a few obvious colors that will need to be incorporated, such as various shades of greens for foliage.  But what next?  After pulling out the entire set of Au Ver A Soie  Soie D’Alger that is on hand, the Soie Paris, Soie Perlee, and Trebizond silk embroidery floss, trying to select colors was becoming lost amidst the forest of skeins and tumbling thread spools. Now it was time for  little help.

Out came the book from Trish Burr entitled Colour Confidence in Embroidery and the color wheels to rescue and tame the jumbled color mass of embroidery floss.

Knowing a starting point of Red and Yellow as desired colors helped get things moving in the right direction.  A little review on the color wheel and it appeared that colors selected along the lines of a Tetrad (four color combination) might be a starting point.

Working through various threads, the colors have been narrowed down to reds and violets, greens and yellows, with a few blues mixed in to finish things off.  There may also be a few neutral colors used for various backgrounds if needed.

At this point, nothing is finalized, but the color families and various types of embroidery floss are out and set aside for the project. Among the threads being considered are a few things like Gilt Silk Twist, and Silk Gimp, but I am still not certain how or if they will work, or which stitch options to use.  This is as far as things are at the moment.

This has been a rather fun part of the process.  The options available in silk embroidery floss  make it a joy to select colors. Color is a beautiful thing!  May your stitching day be filled with your favorite colors.

Solo Dei Gloria

Be sure to visit our online store front Ecclesiastical Sewing where you may shop for Liturgical Fabrics, altar linen fabrics, church vestment making patterns, liturgical machine embroidery designs,  church vestment trims and notions and so much more. You may also find us on  Ecclesiastical Sewing  on Facebook , Twitter, and Pinterest. Sing up for our mailing list  at the bottom of the page on our online store front and receive a free copy of our Small Linens Booklet as our way of saying thank you for following along.