July Kit - tada gan iarracht
tada gan iarracht >>nothing without effort<<
After the last kit, I thought we’d do something a little less time consuming. Don’t get me wrong, there’s still plenty of detail to get your teeth into! But this 8 inch hoop will fill up noticeably quicker than the 4 inch Or Nué Ireland.
I’ve been wanting to do this kind of woodcut-style illustration in stitch for a while now. I just couldn’t put my finger on the right subject. I considered native animals, Irish flowers, even an claidheamh soluis (which I may revisit!). In researching this style I noticed a lot of images of hands at work which really got my cogs turning. But how to make it Irish? That is what links all of my designs after all! So I starting going through my mental filofax of Irish phrases - when it hit me! TADA GAN IARRACHT
Tada gan iarracht means ‘nothing without effort’. Could there be a more appropriate phrase for embroidery!? Not just the craft in general though. Specifically the task of threading the needle. We’ve all been through it! You just want to get to the stitching but you can’t seem to get the thread to behave long enough to coax it through the eye of the needle.
Every class I’ve taught has been the exact same. I spend more time helping students to thread the needle than anything else! So please know you’re not alone if you’re struggling too. I promise it does get easier with practice - but you can also check out my tips for threading the needle here.
And so the iconic image revealed itself to me! I went with an old english font which suits that woodcut style of illustration. And of course that’s also why it’s mostly in black thread. But I had to add some details to make it pop too! So not only do we have a contrasting red thread, there’s also a real gold-plated needle mounted within the piece too!
I’ve kept the stitches somewhat straightforward as well. Straight stitches for the shading - using just 1 strand to get all that fine detail. Stem stitch to outline the hands and give them some weight. Back stitch for the lettering (I was originally going to use stem stitch here too, but I thought it might be a bit fiddly for those intricate letters). Then couching the red thread to finish it off. I’ve left the thread trailing out of the hoop to add to that 3D effect, but of course you can also finish it off inside the hoop if you prefer.
