Ellen Anne Eddy's Thread Magic Studio: No More Color Police:Creating Flower Colors

Saturday, December 17, 2011

No More Color Police:Creating Flower Colors

10:08 AM |

Posted by Ellen Anne Eddy |

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"Roses are red. violets are blue. Angels in heaven know I love you." Down in the valley

What color is a flower, actually?

In spite of everything your kindergarten teacher told you, it's not a simple answer. If she made you color all your roses red, give me her name and I'll go have a little chat with her. Or better still, you might want to tell her that she can't live in your head anymore without paying rent.

That's not a white tulip. Nor is it really red or yellow. It's a wonderful swirl of a number of great colors. Leaving any of that out is a loss. But how do you do it in fiber?

We have two great tools. Well, we probably have hundreds but these help with this.Hand dyed fabric has all those great streaks. It's a great way to start a flower.

Machine embroidery also speeds us on our way.The wonderful thing about stitching flowers is that thread really is minutia. We can slip in that dash of green, that edge of orange or purple that flowers either do have or should.
When Mark Lipinski asked me how important color was on his show this week and why I put so much emphasis on it, I almost fell of my chair. Color IS the media. We see everything through the color and the texture. You can here that conversation on Mark's Creative Mojo show, December 14th.