Last months knitting homework for City and Guilds class was on surface embellishment, mostly things added to a plain piece of knitting, but some were knitted in. I had had a go at some of the techniques before, but some were new, so a nice mixture of old friends and new excitement!

The first old friend was the method of knitting with beads that I used on my bracelets. Here the beads are placed between knit stitches, and the piece is totally reversible.

Next, a different method of adding beads into the knitting. This time the knitting is stocking stitch, and the bead lies on the working thread in front of a slip stitch. The pattern is only on one side of the fabric, and this method seems to work best if the bead is a similar kind of size to the knitted stitch. I actually have a dress that I am knitting using this method. I have been knitting it for the last 8 years (ok it has spent a lot of that time in a bag). One of these days I will discover which bag it is in and dig it out and continue.

The last sample using beads involved sewing the beads onto an already finished piece of knitting. I was less keen on this sample. I think it looks a bit messy, partly due to the beads I used being rather inconsistent, and partly due to my not sewing them on very neatly. Not sure I will be doing a lot of bead embroidery in my future.

The next bit of embellishment was fringe. I’m afraid my example isn’t wildly exciting.

And then onto appliqué. I got a bit carried away with this one 🙂 So many little leaves, so much fun, so many colours. I particularly liked the sock yarn ones.

Then a bit of Swiss darning (also known as duplicate stitch). My example is a little abstract, though I do think it looks a bit like an angle-poise lamp (totally unintentionally).

Finally, an example of embroidery. Despite my rather strained relationship with sewing I enjoyed doing this one, and I particularly liked the effect created by space-dyed yarn.

Now I had better get cracking on this months homework. Only just over a week til the next class.