Lower Left Building

A major section is now stitched!  There was so much detail in the lower left corner and the structures were hard to separate visually, but it is now stitched.

Lots of details, but some straightforward design choices.  The first area was the blue and green stripe done in a satin stitch with 6-ply threads.  The green is done in Splendor S1139, while the blue is in Threadworx 010241.  The latter thread has some variegation in the dye design.  To avoid a striped appearance, 3 plies were reversed and then combined with the remaining three threads when threading the needle.

The green center section was stitched next.  The window detail was the start point.  For the shiny thread, Frosty Rays #Y360 in the elongated cross-stitch, and a 1-ply Splendor #S1145 was used as the rice stitch topping.  The dark green columns presented a problem: the columns should appear straight, but they were painted on a slant, so the stitch choice would be critical to create a straight object.  To repeat the dark green thread from earlier section, the Silk Serica 4036 was used for a Reverse Angled Gobelin.  Instead of doing an upright gobelin, the slant was from upper left to lower right over 1 thread and dropping lower by one thread for each stripe.  To allow the room for the fill thread (Kreinik #8 fine braid in color 085), a blank row was left before stitching the next Silk Serica row.  The fill stitch is a reverse basketweave.  The light green background was done in Splendor S1139 in a split gobelin with random lengths to create an illusion of stucco.  To have a smoother stitch, the needle comes up at the top and goes down at the bottom and also leaves a smaller puncture hole.

The door allowed for some creativity.  The white stripe was essential to help separate the two doors and was done in Elegance E800 as a basketweave.  The starting point was placed equidistant between the two door edges to make sure that each side was the same size.  Soft Sheen Fyre Works FT26 was used in gobelin over two threads.  The stitching was started at the bottom to allow for any needed compensation to be done at the top.  If the compensation was done at the bottom, the pattern rhythm could potentially be disrupted if there was not enough room for a complete row to be done.  The door handles were done in a straight stitch in Kreink #4 very fine braid 005 with tacks used where the curves occur.

The dark green walls in the lower right were stitched in Silk Serica #4036.  Because of the weight and texture of this thread, the simplicity of the basketweave stitch was all that was needed to allow the thread to shine.  Since the yellow windows were very narrow, Flair #F572 in a horizontal gobelin was used.  The window frames were also stitched in basketweave using a 4-ply Splendor S1145.

The blue and purple wall has some detail areas at the top and bottom.  Since architecture frequently has some raised decorative elements, to mimic that idea, the blue scallop area at the bottom was stitched using a buttonhole stitch done in an upright manner.  All of the threads were vertical with the edging following the scallop's curve.  The thread chosen was the Silk Lame Braid in 18 count SL15 has a fine weight with some sheen without creating a lot of bulk in this accent area.

I wanted to repeat the scallop feel of the bottom band in the upper blue band. I used this stitch diagram for this area. The heavy blue lines were done in a 6-ply Threadworx 010241 and the Silk Lame Braid SL15 was repeated as the fill. These thread choices connected back to the other blue wall areas.

The blue and purple wall was stitched in the same format as the blue and green wall using Threadworx 010241 and Splendor S827, both in 6-ply.

Now that all of the detail areas are stitched, the purple circle's purpose within the building appears to be a dome for the green column.  To create an illusion of a round 3-dimensional object, a Double Diagonal mosaic variation using a 4-ply Splendor S881 and a 3-ply accent of Accentuate 140.






The stitch guide for the Lower Left Building

The current progress....