Today at Seata we have had an in-house talk and workshop on Wessex Stitchery from Ruth Neller, including loads of samples for ideas. I’ve only shown two of the samples.

Ruth had broken down some of the samples, so that we could see how the different stitches build up to form the patterns.

The square motifs need more counting and accuracy to make sure they join up properly at the corners .

Many of us had not heard of Wessex Stichery before, but a few ladies had found the book by Gay Eaton on their bookshelves. Unfortunately, it is out of print now and tends to command a high price on the second-hand market when it turns up. Not much had been published on Wessex Stitchery previously.

Ruth gave us an interesting and informative talk before we started stitching. One Mrs M Foster of Bath, born in 1843, was the originator of the technique which uses simple stitches, often text, and done in rich colours. The stitches are combined to make patterns which vary in size and complexity. She was still stitching at 90, and had a well-received exhibition of 30 years of her work. She died at 92 .

Ruth had provided us all with a kit, containing some Aida, quite a high count, (certainly smaller than I tend to work on) and a selection of stranded cotton. I picked this one with the antique colour Aida, with the intention of it maybe ending up on my embellished jacket once it is finished!

I’m not using the stranded cotton as I prefer working in perlé, and so far have only used the browns from my stumpwork acorns from last week.

As any long term readers of this blog will know, I’m not good at counted work. I started with blanket stitch in a zigzag pattern, not counting but just repeating my pattern…….

…….. and it was not long before I made my first mistake and went up instead of down; rather than unpicking I decided to go with it……

…. and ended up with this for my first row.

It made me think of mountains and a landscape, so I stuck with it. The second row in the darker brown (above the rusty perlé), I went off piste sooner, more mountainous. Then I went back and filled in at the bottom with straight stitches, still not counting, just making the pattern by eye.

More of the rusty colour to fill in at the bottom right.

I worked this top row from right to left until I ran out of thread, then started on the left and stitched until it joined up.

I think I’m ready to introduce some different colours and stitches when I carry on….. maybe I’ll even do some counting!

Around the room the work was very varied, both in colour, stitches and patterns used, and once again we were still stitching late in the afternoon. Thank you, Ruth, for all your hard work (fun stitching), research, preparation and kits. It was obvious that we all had a good day!