A very talented and good friend of mine, Betz White, sometimes asks me to do a little pattern testing for her when she’s preparing something new and wonderful to publish. I had volunteered to participate in some testing for her recently and when she sent me the pattern my initial reaction was to be kind of freaked out. The pattern in question required some piecing involving sewing hexagons. Oh boy, I am not a quilter and I would consider myself only a moderately skilled seamstress. I took a step back and thought/read through the pattern and decided to give it a shot. I love hexagons and since they are part of my logo and my brand identity I though it might be cool to be able to sew some hexagons and incorporate them into my art and designs in the future.
I decided to use some scraps of silk dupioni I had done some rust dying on. The aesthetic of these are very different from what Betz uses but I was working with a limited selection from my stash that I have here in my temporary home. I choose 2 contrasting colors, the silver and a dark red brown that both had rust spots. The repetition of the process is quite fun and can be done in batches, first cutting out all the pieces, laying them out, pinning, stitching, pressing, stitching etc…
The only part I got a little unsure of was the back side of the Y shaped union where 3 hexes come together. It’s a little figity to get them to press flatly. There can also be a very small hole here which I was worried about but in the end realized it was fine (I’m a bit of a perfectionist!). There is a certain amount of patience and care needed to do this and I found it stress relieving because it forced me to slow down and focus on the process. If you have the desire to try piecing hexagons, take some advise from Betz and go check out Lady Harvatine’s video. I can’t show you the finished piece but go check out Betz’s patterns and keep an eye out for the new pattern she has previewed here that will use hexagons!
I love the way these turned out! I will be doing more of this, I guarantee it. Like I said it was a very soothing, repetitive, tactile process for me. I did this project in the midst of my in law’s kitchen table over a 2 day period with limited space, materials etc…never the less I feel I learned a beautiful new skill and got a beautiful piece from this process. Maybe you would like to give sewing Hexagons a try? I’m not saying I’ll be turning to quilting but I will be incorporating this new skill into my work in the future. Do you enjoying doing repetitive projects to reduce your stress?
Another fun aspect of the class was that our instructor, 
This class was primarily a surface design class and we began with limited materials and an 8″ x 8″ format using black backgrounds. The way we see color on black is different and this encouraged each of us to shake free of the “normal” color combinations we might use. We started with only gesso and color and eventually were encouraged to add stitching, collage or whatever else we wanted to. I find it tremendously helpful when I’m creatively stuck to really limit my options, within more restricted boundaries I find my self stretching to explore those limitations. 
After a few days experimenting and playing in this smaller format most of us began to explore other mediums and formats for our work. A group of us in the class began raiding the iron departments scrap pile and we began experimenting with rust dying. There is a good description of this process over 
Completed pieces of rust dye fabrics.
As you can tell we covered a lot of ground in this class. It was so freeing and inspiring, I came home with several new materials, techniques and ideas to work through more thoroughly. Both Jason and our studio assistant 
Jason working on one of his stitched pieces for the auction.
Debra’s scarf and a collaborative piece by Jason and Debra, donations for the Penland fundraiser auction.
Debra modeling a purse made by one of the students for the fundraiser auction.
One of the final projects I worked on was a collaboration with 3 other students which we donated to the Penland Session 4 fundraiser auction. I love to collaborate and this piece turned out well. I wish I knew who bought it…
Next week I will be back to share some of the work I began personally in class. Some of what I started is still incomplete but hopefully won’t be by the time I post again.
