Christen Brown teaches embroidery, crazy quilting, ribbonwork, mixed media, and beadwork in her best-selling books. She is a fearless and bright artist who constantly creates, experiments, and experiences all that she can. Her goal and wish through this incredible journey is to continually grow, be surprised and inspired, and create new and relevant pieces.
Keynote: Making Magic with Needle and Thread, One Stitch at a Time
In a heartwarming reflection to begin Embroidery Extravaganza, Christen describes her early memories of stitching and how not a day goes by without taking a stitch. She offers tips, tricks, and sage advice gleaned from these many, many, many years of taking a needle and thread to cloth. This lecture will explore Christen's four forms of embroidery stitches: traditional, silk ribbon, raised and textured, and beaded. Bursting with color, a colorful gallery of crazy-pieced and whole cloth designs — from old school to contemporary, feminine to fanciful, classic to avant-garde — showcase her techniques and intricate stitchwork, best described as "Embellishment to the Point of Explosion."
Christen Brown will be presenting a Breakout Room Session in addition to her keynote....
Silk Ribbon Embroidery
This beginner-friendly technique class is your official welcome into the joyous craft of embroidering with silk ribbon! Walk away with the basics of silk ribbon embroidery and the tools you need to be successful. You will learn five basic stitches: woven rose stitch, lazy daisy stitch, padded straight stitch, ribbon stitch, and the French knot stitch. Prepare to bust into your treasured stash with Christen's inspiring examples of embroidered purses, brooches, wallhangings, and more darling projects from her book Creative Embroidery, Mixing the Old with the New.
Amy Barickman is a vintage fabric and embroidery addict and aficionado! You can find some of her favorite treasures on the pages of her best seller, Vintage Notions: An Inspirational Guide to Needlework, Cooking, Sewing, Fashion & Fun! Her deep knowledge and passion for heirloom needle arts will take you on a journey through history, inspiring you to stitch vintage-made modern designs and upcycle vintage textile treasures.
Redwork Made Modern
Discover the fascinating history of Redwork and its role in early American culture. In an interactive show and tell, see rare treasures from Amy's extensive collection of vintage Redwork quilts and textiles and learn how they inspire her modern pattern designs. Entertaining and educational for all needle artists, this class is a guide to Amy's favorite threads, transfer methods, and tools to enhance your stitching experience.
Claudia Martinez is the owner of Snuggly Monkey. After her first visit to Japan on a high school exchange program, she quickly fell in love with the country and culture. While living in rural Japan, she learned about traditional Japanese crafts, deepening her appreciation for Japan's rich cultural heritage. Now, Claudia shares this beautiful, meditative art form with stitchers around the world.
Hitomezashi: Exploring the Possibilities with Grid-Based Sashiko Stitching
Explore the world of possibilities with Hitomezashi. This grid-based style of Sashiko stitching is ideal for boro-inspired projects, visible mending, decorative stitching, and more. In this introduction to Hitomezashi, learn how to approach this style of stitching and how to use it in your own projects. Claudia will show you techniques, tips & tricks for Hitomezashi and several examples of how to use Hitomezashi in various projects.
Jo Avery is a prize-winning quilt and embroidery designer and teacher. She regularly contributes to many quilt and embroidery publications and is the author of New Patchwork and Quilting Basics and Modern Crewel Embroidery, both published by C&T Publishing. As part of The Thread House, she organizes sewing retreats and an online teaching academy. Inspired by nature and our craft heritage, her eclectic style perfectly blends modern aesthetics with traditional techniques.
Modern Crewel Embroidery
Jo will demonstrate a range of crewel embroidery stitches as we create this modern sampler design stitched on wool felt. Using techniques from her book Modern Crewel Embroidery, she will teach you practical stitches for filling shapes, including chain, satin, seed, colonial knots, and laid work. Jo will show you how to draw Interlocking Squircles and mark felt, and provide a pattern for those needing it. Using wool felt as a background for wool embroidery makes this a beginner-friendly workshop. Jo will finish by showing you how to turn your completed mini sampler into an adorable needle book and share other uses for the pattern.
Laura Wasilowski’s method of free-form embroidery combines the warm, familiar art of hand embroidery with the heady thrill of improvisation. Her passion is transforming fabric from a flat, plain surface into a world packed with color, texture, and pattern. Having the skill and patience to stab something over a million times, she continues to invent new ways to mark fabric with the stitch and hopes to inspire others to do the same.
Stitch Combinations to Create Textures, Patterns, and Shapes
Explore the fun of free-form hand embroidery and learn how combining basic hand embroidery stitches creates exciting designs. There are stitch combinations that build bumpy, lively texture on the surface of your fabric. Other stitches combine to make motifs or patterns helpful in filling in large background areas. And then, there are stitch combinations that create recognizable shapes like flowers, leaves, climbing vines, or even a bird’s tail feathers. You’ll see multiple examples and demos of combining embroidery stitches to enhance your next piece of artwork.
Lisa Archer is the Designer at Pickle Pie Designs and loves sharing happiness in-the-hoop of your embroidery machine. She is the author of Modern Machine Embroidery and a Spokesperson for Bernina of America. Lisa (and her machine embroidery designs!) have been featured in several publications, including Creative Machine Embroidery Magazine. Lisa lives in North Carolina with her kids (two humans and two felines!)
Make your Machine Embroidery Project Pop
Choosing the right fabric and thread can make or break your machine embroidery project. Lisa will show you the best practices for choosing fabrics and thread colors for a beautiful visual impact. Sharing examples of her in-the-hoop machine embroidery designs, she will demonstrate how and why fabric and thread selection can make a huge difference in a project.
Michelle Staub is a self-taught embroidery artist, author of Pet Portrait Embroidery, and the creator of Stitching Sabbatical, specializing in creating stunning pet embroideries. Since 2014, she has been using her needle and thread to create beautiful keepsakes that celebrate the love and joy pets bring into our lives. Whether you're a pet owner looking to immortalize your furry friend or simply a lover of beautiful embroidery, Michelle's work will surely leave a lasting impression.
Pet Portrait Embroidery Basics: From Photo to Pattern
The key to creating a detailed pet portrait lies with the pattern! Watch Michelle demonstrate the pattern-making process and discover techniques for capturing your pet's unique features, such as their eyes, nose, fur, and whiskers. Whether you're an experienced embroiderer or a beginner, you'll come away from this presentation with the confidence to create a beautiful and accurate pet portrait that truly captures the essence of your furry friend. This demonstration will be done digitally on an iPad, but the same techniques can be applied to traditional mediums.
As a National Educator representing Sulky of America, Michelle Umlauf has mastered working with all kinds of decorative threads and knows a lot of stabilizers. She has been embroidering for a long time and enjoys sharing her passion with others. If you are a collector of gadgets, she can enable you like a bag of M&Ms at a quilt retreat because she is a connoisseur of tools that make crafting easier, and she is more than happy to show you all the tips and tricks!
Machine Embroidery Made Easy
If you appreciate hand embroidery but are short on time, it may be time to consider machine embroidery. It is a lot easier than you think! You just need to understand how the embroidery aspect of your machine operates. Armed with the right thread, stabilizer, embroidery foot and hoop for your project, you’ll be able to create labels and embellishments that are embroidered in a fraction of the time! Join Michelle as she presents this information easily, leaving you inspired and ready to use your embroidery machine with confidence.
Shannon Leigh Roudhán and Jason Bowlsby are the dynamic DIY duo from Seattle, Washington. Shannon and Jason have published 11 books, including the best-selling Boro & Sashiko and the newly released Contemporary Kogin-zashi from C&T Publishing. Their mastery of the subjects they teach (including history and evolution), enthusiasm, quirky sense of humor, and relatable teaching style have made them sought-after teachers in local and national venues. The “edu-tainment” experience of a class with Shannon & Jason will leave you informed, empowered, and in stitches (see what we did there?).
Modoko Madness: Mix & Match Motifs
Learn the art of counting, placing, and arranging modoko (kogin motifs) to create beautifully simple repeating patterns, interlocking and continuous patterns, and astonishing, increasingly ornate patterns. Once you understand the basics of modoko, you will more easily duplicate traditional patterns and use them to build unique arrangements. This workshop is your invitation to discover kogin-zashi style embroidery, how modoko is used, how to count and swap out modoko for other patterns, and how to build unique patterns from these iconic shapes.
Sharon Boggon has taken her weird interest in stitching as a creative expression and turned it into a superpower. As an international educator trained in fine arts, she is on a quest to share her extensive knowledge of contemporary embroidery and crazy quilting with the world!
Find Your Stitching Style
Discover your personal stitching style with an in-depth look at embroidery play points. Sharon shows you a unique way of thinking about your stitches so you can easily adapt, change and be innovative with your embroidery. Using basic stitches, she demonstrates her process to create new variations on classic favorites.
