Dragonfly Summer

I haven't seen many dragonflies this summer...maybe it hasn't been hot enough around here. I usually see a couple of bright orange dragonflies hovering over my hot asphalt driveway in the late summer afternoons. So I thought I'd bring out some stitched dragonflies instead...

The first one is DRAGONFLY DANCE, shown above. It's 12" by 7", done on 18 ct mono canvas (white with silver sparkles woven thru it). The three dragonflies have metallics woven into their wings - purple, teal, blue. I surrounded them with an Art Nouveau border of swirling lines; and then filled it in with Basketweave Stitch, using a variegated thread just for fun.


The other dragonfly design is DRAGONFLY SUMMER (shown below), which is 8" by 8", stitched on pale green 24 ct. Congress Cloth. I've listed two different colorways: one is the blue and green version I stitched for the model; the other version could be purple and pink.


This dragonfly version uses a variegated silk thread (Waterlilies 068 - "Mediterranean") with other floss colors and fine metallics.

What was fun to stitch on this one, was the delicate border patterns. My favorite border was the outer "ribbon" which has tiny little dragonflies dancing along the edges, in-between the flowers; and they're stitched with the variegated silk, so they change colors along the border. Here's a closeup shot so you can see them better:


I chose to stitch this design on the pale green Congress Cloth, because I wanted a cool, leafy feel to it. But maybe the design would have shown up better on a brighter canvas - eggshell, perhaps...to give it a sunnier feel. Although I also think it could be worked on a 25 ct. Lugana fabric - and maybe a variegated, hand-painted fabric would REALLY give this design some extra dimension, too!