Loving Yellow and Some New Embroideries

I can't get enough yellow. I love it in its many shades - sunflower yellow, canary yellow, turmeric yellow, yellow squash, lemon yellow, daffodil yellow, egg yolk yellow. It is so bright and sunny and makes me happy. I've been seeing it being featured more and more in current interior design magazines. 

One of the most famous uses of yellow in interiors is at Giverny.

Love how the yellow room contrasts with Monet's blue kitchen. Heaven. 

And then there is of course Nancy Lancaster's Yellow Room. 

I know most people are rather colorphobic and don't have the nerve to paint an entire room yellow. Using yellow as an accent color is a great way to add some pops of fun color to any space. Like pillows or a bright chair.

I've been working on two new yellow embroidered pieces. They both began as plain yellow linen fabric. I printed the circle and oval designs on the linen with fabric paint and heat set them. These simple shapes are perfect for embellishing with embroidery. 

Here is the first one - Printed with ovals and circles in green, hot pink, and red. My original idea was to fill the circles and ovals with lots of different stitches. When I finished outlining the shapes, I decided that the piece would stand on its own without any more stitching. Now to sew it into something. 

For the second piece, I printed several different sizes of circles in brown. Each circle was decorated with a variety of embroidery stitches in bright colors. This was a really fun project to work on and I'm kind of sorry it is done. 

Here are some close-ups of some of the circles. I used a variety of stitches. 

I may work up another pieces similar to this one. Crewel embroidery is so easy to pick up and put down when I am at the Farmers Market. I much prefer handstitching in the summer than knitting or crochet because of the heat factor. 

These two pieces are samples for my upcoming Fabric Printing and Crewel Embroidery Creative Retreat happening July 29th. There are still a few spaces available for that retreat. More info here.