The intricate work behind Kate Middleton’s wedding dress designed by Sarah Burton at Alexander McQueen (essentially an updated copy of Grace Kelly's wedding dress - View this photo - but don't tell it to the British fashion media, royalist fashionistas and McQueen's fans...) revived an interest in lace appliqué techniques and hand-embroideries.
Even the most impenitent fashionistas are now talking in their blogs about the Royal School of Needlework (RSN) at Hampton Court Palace (that assisted Burton and her team) as if they were trendy celebrity designers (before the RSN was mentioned in conjunction with Burton/McQueen the above-mentioned fashionistas always managed to avoid visits to Hampton Court preferring "educational trips" to Dover Street Market with shopping sprees included; Hampton Court is after all a boring place full of history where you can not buy any cool clothes...).
Anyway, if you have developed a genuine interest in embroidering and would like to discover further about it, join the talk "A History of Embroidery with Hand & Lock" on next week (Saturday 14th May, 2pm) at the V&A (tickets are selling fast, so book yours as soon as possible).
Created after two historical embroidery businesses - S. Lock and M. Hand - joined together, Hand & Lock is a renowned embroidery firm famous for decorating both haute couture creations by Dior and Vera Wang as well as gowns for the Queen and Lady Diana. The talk will be carried out by the director of the firm, Alastair Macleod who will go through a history of embroidery from the Bayeux Tapestry to more contemporary examples.
Hand & Lock samples will be showcased and the lecture will also look at the technique involved in creating lace, cords and costume embellishments.
Both the Royal School of Needlework and Hand & Lock offer a variety of courses to learn different techniques. Among the most interesting ones there is the Silk Shading course. This technique is also called "painting with a needle" (also mentioned in the first video embedded in this post) since it allows to create realistic embroideries in tonal shades using a variety of coloured cotton and silk threads.
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