February Meeting 2012 Stumpwork Heads

This month the meeting was led by Gillian Darrington, one of our own members, who brought with her some examples of stumpwork heads. You can see examples of Gillian's Stumpwork heads below. They are highly decorated with frills, flowers and feathers resulting in very pretty ladies from a bygone era. All of our members were keen to have a go.

We cut out an oval shape in calico, gathered the edge, pulled it tight and stuffed it to make the face. We then stitched the nose and eyes to lots of giggling fearing that our ladies were not going to be as pretty as Gillian's!!! However, we were assured the hair would cover a multitude of sins!

Next we used silk fibres in interesting colours for the hair covering any lumps and bumps.

We then used leather or felt for the hat folding and pleating it until we had an interesting shape. The hat was completed by adding a colourful feather. To complete the lady we made flowers or ruffles to cover the neck and a small amount of embroidery.

We were all pleased with our finished heads and you can see how colourful they are in the pictures below.

Thank you Gillian for a fun day.