Stitch Dissolve Distort: With Machine Embroidery

Stitch Dissolve Distort: With Machine Embroidery
Valerie Campbell-Harding & Maggie Grey
Published by Batsford
ISBN: 0 713 48996 0
Price: £18.99
Reviewed by Jenny Lewis

New techniques are essential to every textile artist’s repertoire, and Stitch, Dissolve, Distort provides challenging resource material. It is packed with hundreds of practical ideas from the creative minds of two widely respected authors.

The book is divided into three sections, the first being ‘Stitch’. The importance of stitch is examined, while new ideas of approaching stitch are suggested. The authors return to the roots of stitching and take a fresh look at the amazing variety of imaginative work that can be produced using the sewing machine.

Part Two – ‘Dissolve’, discusses water-soluble materials including film, fabrics, papers and sticky soluble stabilizers – in fact anything that can be washed away in water, leaving the original work behind.

Part Three – ‘Distort’, describes ways of attacking fabrics by cutting, punching, distressing and melting them. It finishes by explaining how to preserve their shape afterwards by using hardening agents, meshes, fabric and stitch.

This inspiring hands-on source book is superbly illustrated in colour and is invaluable for every textile artist.