Jessica Marquez is a professional photographer and the creator of Miniature Rhino, a full-time embroidery and teaching business based out of Brooklyn, New York. She is a self-taught embroideress who travels for inspiration and views instruction as one of her callings. She grew up surrounded by woman makers, who taught her to love all-things craft; one of the results of this love was her first book, Stitched Gifts: 25 Simple and Sweet Embroidery Projects for Every Occasion – which she wrote and also photographed.

We came to know Jessica through one of our sewing workshop a few years ago, where she gifted Natalie with some of her embroidery kits. She often lists The School of Making in her classes as a resource for tools and techniques. Our relationship has continued and we were one of the first to receive a copy of her newest book, Make and Mend: Sashiko-Inspired Embroidery Projects to Customize and Repair Textiles and Decorate Your Home.

Make and Mend shares Jessica’s passion for hand embroidery and exposes the reader to the Japanese technique of sashiko—a stitching technique that uses simple stitches and patterns to mend and embellish fabric. Sashiko is a traditional technique to mend and repair, but is an easy way to add detail to any garment; it is a wonderful way to repair worn-out clothing or embellish your favorite pair of jeans. The book is easy for even the less-experienced stitcher and offers careful step-by-step instructions. It provides 15 projects and requires no equipment but needle and thread. The book is full of patterns and color and also delves into ways to be more environmentally friendly through crafting. We love that she is encouraging mending, rather than discarding less-than-perfect garments.

Through Jessica’s work, be inspired to mend and embellish your own garments in new ways.

This week we share insight and inspiration from The Art of Embroidery: Inspirational Stitches, Textures and Surfaces in a Journal series from our contributing writer, Elaine Lipson.

As I was reading Françoise Tellier-Loumagne’s The Art of Embroidery: Inspirational Stitches, Textures and Surfaces, her deep visual dive into embroidery as an art and design form, I began to imagine the first embroiderer. Sometime in the 5th century B.C., maybe somewhere in China, our original stitcher broke through the functional-stitching wall and went decorative. Accidentally or deliberately, a stitch was formed that was not purely functional. Maybe grasses or stones or flowers came into the sewer’s view and became the first stitched motifs — or maybe he or she put a bird on it — and infinite possibilities were born.

Whatever inspired that original stitcher, everything that embroiderers do today is essentially the same, except that the techniques have been refined over 2500 years, made into patterns and diagrams with smooth manufactured needles and flosses, styled with regional variations, expanded into different forms, even industrialized and made by machine — and we love mastering the medium with all of this helpful structure. But this book definitely isn’t for tracing patterns and coloring inside the lines; like that first embroiderer, you’ll be challenged to figure out processes on your own.

Instead, this book is for experimenting, improvising, and pushing your limits as a stitcher and an artist. “To embroider is to draw, paint and write,” Tellier-Loumagne says. To embroider is to “look, analyze, choose, explore and translate… to express yourself… to create, innovate… to develop and elaborate.” And finally, it is to “express yourself and communicate.” Through hundreds of color plates of stitched and embellished cloth, often paired with an inspiration photograph of anything from leaves to fences to an orange covered in a rainbow of mold, Tellier-Loumagne creates a dizzying array of textures, dimensional effects, repeat and irregular patterns, layered stitches, blended colors, and shapes. This main section of the book is organized into twelve sections, from lines and stripes to friezes and frames to allover designs, and almost any page can be a starting point for experimenting.

The Art of Embroidery will happily put you to work with threads and floss but also with plastic paillettes, synthetic threads, and machine stitching — anything goes. It has a minimalist stitch guide (for a more detailed exploration, look to The Geometry of Hand-Sewing) and a brief survey of specialties such as whitework, blackwork, and goldwork; but here too, other resources do a better job of breaking down formal embroidery techniques, if that’s what you’re after. But when you feel the need to experiment, like that original stitcher in 5th century China, let this book set you loose to freely express and interpret what you see with stitches, and be inspired by everything around you.

Here are links to some of Elaine’s favorite nature-inspired embroidery artists to explore:

Françoise Tellier-Loumagne

Bettina Matzkuhn

Meredith Woolnough

Our Craftsy virtual learning courses dive into hand embellishment and construction in The School of Making techniques. In The Swing Skirt: Techniques & Construction, Natalie walks you through each step of creating a hand-sewn garment. Creative Embellishments gives an in-depth look at our most popular hand embellishing techniques including quilting, reverse appliqué, whipstitch appliqué, and more. Natalie’s newest course—The New Embroidery: Simple Geometry, Beautiful Stitches—rounds out the series by sharing embroidery tips and tricks perfected over the years.

In this course, you’ll learn more about the grid system used throughout The Geometry of Hand-Sewing that provides you with a fool-proof method for achieving even, consistent stitches on any project. Natalie demonstrates how to use the grid system to embroider a wide range of stitches from the most basic to the more complex.

The course is broken into six lessons. The first covers the physics of sewing, how to use the grid system, and the tools and supplies you’ll need to get started. Lessons two, three, and four cover the different types of grids and stitches that can be made using each. Lesson five shows how to add beads and sequins to any stitch as well as lacing your stitches with a contrasting thread to add texture and color. In the final lesson, Natalie shares projects to practice your stitches including a stitch-sampler scarf and a reference binder of stitch samples you can refer back to as needed.

See all available virtual learning courses available through Craftsy here. Share your projects on Instagram using #theschoolofmaking and #thegeometryofhandsewing, and join our global maker community in The School of Making Stitchalong group on Facebook.

P.S.: If you purchase your class from the links on our website, we will earn a small commission from the product purchased through that link. This commission supports our business and helps us stock our 100% organic fabrics, pay our employees a living wage, and allows our teams to continue to design and create the products that you love. What might seem like a small gesture can go a long way for our business, so thank you.