London Embroidery School

an embroidery school for all abilities and budgets.

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Camellia Online Class is Out Now!

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The much anticipated Camellia Online Class has come to the London Embroidery School. Heavily requested by our community, this online class will teach you to make the timelessly styling camellia design from easy to access items. If you have seen these fabric flowers before, they are usually made with heated shaping tools which are very niche, hard to get hold of and a little pricey so we have developed a pattern for you to create a similar effect without the hassle.

You can use your own materials and purchase the class only or grab one of our kits too and make it in the materials shown in the recording. Initially we will be launching this class in two colour ways of the sumptuous Boucles tweed with a leather version to follow in the near future.


During the class we will walk you through all the potential adaptations you could make to your design to create the best outcome for your fabric choice so that you can style the Camellia your way.

Items needed:
Fabric 25x25cm
Sewing Thread to match fabric colour (buttonhole thread if using leather)
Embroidery Needle No10 or Leather needle
Thimble (optional/ for leather )
(woven fabrics only)
Paper Petal Guide (sent to you with class email purchase)
Small Scissors–
PVA Glue (approx 40ml)
Modelling glue applicator (Leather only)
Small shallow container for PVA wash (woven fabrics only)
Gel Pen/ Fabric Marker / pencil
Iron on Backing (vilene) 25x25cm (open weave fabrics only eg boucles tweed)
Center embellishments (optional)
Access to an iron (open weave fabrics only)
A place to hang dry your PVA washed fabric (woven fabrics only)

The Endlessly Versatile Chiffon Rose

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Available in 4 colours, mix and match or stick with your favourite as you make these soft, luxurious, 3-D flowers.  This class is great value as £15 gets you unlimited access to the class to watch, re-watch, rewind and replay as many times as you like and a mini kit containing enough supplied to make 3 roses.


Be sure to check out the stitch along we did on our YouTube channel, working on the chiffon rose below for more ideas about how to adapt the artwork to give the roses different characteristics and best suit your outcome.

New Organdie Rose Colours

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Seeing as you all seemed to enjoy our organdie roses class and kits so much, we have been very much looking forward to sharing with you the news that are expanding our colour range. In addition to the lovely sunshine yellow we started with, we will now be stocking mini kits in 4 other colours, Rosewood Pink, Terracotta orange, Seafoam Green and Lavender Lilac.

As you can see these colours are great to mix together or match to you own colour scheme. The sculptural nature of the organdie roses means that you can manipulate them to be as big and open, or newly blooming a flower as you wish. Where do you plan on using your organdie roses, I’ve got mine earmarked for millinery, table settings, bouquets, hair accessories, corsages….

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_CyZrCBNATo&feature=youtu.be

Find these in the kits heading of online classes on the london embroidery school website to have your mini kits sent to you at home.

New: Chiffon Roses Online Class

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Following the success of the Valentino Roses Online Class (still available) , we have a new class to bring you today, Chiffon Roses Online Class!

These 3-D flowers are very soft and sit high from the base so they have real impact when applied. In this video we will talk you through manipulating the fabric, adapting the draft and stitching your rose in real time with us.

As you may not have the right bits at home already for this one, there are two kits available to go along side the class, the Deluxe kit (£20) for those who need all the equipment and materials, and the Mini kit (£5) if you just need the materials. Kits will be delivered by post both UK and worldwide.

Image from Deluxe Kit

 

Check out the taster video to see what it is all about…

All these roses need now to bloom, is you!

 

 

Valentino Roses Online Class Guide

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Today we wanted to share with you a little sunshine in the form of something fun for you to make with what you have to hand at home. Valentino Roses are one of our longest running classes, where we make these gorgeous little silk flowers. We have been beavering away making the first London Embroidery School online class video which is now available on youtube so we can make the roses alongside each other and talk you through our process. Follow the link to the class when you are ready, you will find the list of materials and instructions below in case you get stuck at any point. Remember to pause the video as you go along if you need some more time to keep pace with the steps. We hope you enjoy making valentino roses with us.

 

Things you will need:

Fabric for your rose (lightweight) – ideally Organza (50x15cm); other options- tuelle, chiffon, muslin anything lightweight and flexible (likely to be sheer)

Base Fabric (medium/heavy weight) – ideally a non stretch woven like cotton (fit to our hoop size) or felt (10x10cm)

Thread- Match colour to your lightweight fabric

Needle- Sharps or similar- size you feel comfortable threading up

Scissors- Fabric and Paper

Paper

Pencil

Ruler

Pins

Embroidery Hoop (optional)- regular hoop, table clamp frame, seat frame

Laying tool (optional)- mellor, stiletto, awl

Step 1: Drafting you Valentino Rose Petal Guide

  • Draw 2 parallel lines measuring 6cm long each, 4.5cm apart
  • Add a smooth curve to join the ends of the parallel lines together
  • Cut around your template

Step 2: Prepping your Fabric

  • Frame up your base fabric into your embroidery hoop and pop to one side for later (see Pro Tips: Framing up a Round Frame blog for further help) or
  • If your using felt/fabric not on a hoop, just keep your base fabric to one side for later
  • Take your lightweight fabric and fold the fabric along the length, each fold a little wider than your petal guide
  • Fold to the end, min of 8 folds
  • Pin your guide in the middle of your folded fabric
  • Cut around the guide
  • Remove the pins and guide

Step 3: Making the Petals

  • Thread up your needle- comfortable length, single thread, knot the end
  • Fold fabric cut out in half along the length of the petal
  • Running stitch along the whole of the raw edge of the folded petal, starting in the corner of one side- along the curve, long straight edge, along the other curve and finishing at the otherside corner
  • Knot off the thread, cut off any excess thread ends

Step 4: Sewing your center

  • Thread up your needle, single thread, comfortable lenght, knot in the end
  • Anchor your thread in the center of your fabric with a couple of small stitches
  • Take one of your prepared petals and roll it tightly along the stitched edge (stitched edge will be the bottom)
  • Hold firmly with one hand and stitch onto the frame where you anchored your thread
  • Stitch the whole way around the bud till it stands up right

Step 5: Sewing on the petals

  • Starting close to where the downward slope of the bud finished, stitch your first petal down from the corner so that the petal sits close to the bud.
  • Allow the body of the petal to face outwards from the bud so the raw edge is in towards the bud
  • Stitch just above the running stitch line on the petals using pin tuck stitches (coming up and down through pretty much the same point
  • Tuck any raw edges that escape in towards the center of the flower so they become hidden
  • Continue to the other corner
  • Repeat for the rest of the petals, paying attention to the start and finish points of the petals so they look like they are in a nice place (so all your downward slopes arent on the same side of your flower
  • This will change everytime as the line your stitch around the bud becomes larger and larger as the flower builds
  • On your final petal tuck the corner right into the previous petal so any raw edges are hidden
  • You can grab a tiny bit of the previous petal and pull that down over the finish for an extra tidy look

Step 6:Finishing off

  • If your center looks a bit too proud, bring the needle up through the center of the bud and go back down through the center
  • Gently pull the thread which will have caught a little of the body of the bud, pulling it down and making it less proud
  • Adjust until your happy with the finished effect, then knot off your thread
  • Remove from the frame and using a pencil on the back, mark a light circle outside the flower approx 3mm clear of your flower and stitches
  • Cut around the edge carefully with your scissors, keeping clear of your petals on the right side
  • Tuck under the excess fabric (follow link for Pro Tips just on ths finish), on the bottom side of the rose using small stitched to secure it to the underside of your rose, you will create some tucks as you go to gather the excess of the circle
  • Stitch your now freestanding rose onto your chosen item, brooch pin, hair clip etc

Don’t be afraid to make some chances once you have mastered the techniques used for these roses, change the colour, size and fabric for different variations on the valentino rose.

We’d love to see how your roses went, so please share your makes with us, you can find us on instagram @londonembschool, Facebook : London Embroidery School or email us: classes@embroidery.london

 

 

 

 

Show us what you got!

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Here at London Embroidery School we LOVE to see our students work! From our classes and especially what you go on to create after!

Share you work with us for a chance to be selected as student of the month and a chance to win 10% off on the shop. Which can be used on all equipment, materials and classes.

Send us your work via facebook, instagram, or email! Feel free to tell us a little about yourself and show off your skills! Remember to tag London embroidery school, and use the hashtag #londonembroideryschool or #lesstudent

Your work will be featured across all of our networks.