I am going to France to be an Artist-in-Residence end of July, and have received The bDenis Diderot [A-i-R] Grant, which is so thrilling I can barely contain my excitement. I’ve been holding off on blogging about this, because things are so crazy right now and I needed reassurance that if I was restricted from travelling I would be allowed to go at another time. Having now received that assurance, I can tell all of you.
Chateau D’Oquevaux is a spectacularly beautiful place. To view a video of it, click here or just look at these photographs!
Just three hours from Paris, I am hoping to see some old friends before going to my residency. I will certainly be shooting lots of YouTube videos while I’m there! Which, if you haven’t headed over to my YouTube Channel – Ariane Zurcher – On The Other Hand – and watched any of my videos, please do! I’m posting a few a week. My latest one was How To: Open Buttonhole Filler Stitch, and the one before that is, How To Make Hexies! (Bonus: using non-traditional fabrics)
My How To Make Hexies Tutorial with bonus instructions on how to use non-traditional fabrics for hexies.
With all my free time (insert eyeroll and a sigh here), I designed another zippered pouch! This time an abstract design – Playing with Shapes and it’s a little bigger than my Rhino Pouch. This one is 14″ x 12″. It is also fully lined, has a zipper and the wool front is perfect for applique and stitching. The PDF pattern, templates and detailed instructions with tons of photos are up on my Etsy shop. Everything you need to make this, is on Sue Spargo’s website.
Other than that, I haven’t been able to design much as I’ve been spending every spare minute researching YouTube, taping, editing, re-taping, editing some more, learning how to make a decent thumbnail (I still need to work on that) adding music and then watching other people’s YouTube videos to learn even more.
I’ll admit, so much of this was new to me as of two weeks ago, but now? Talk to me about SEOs, keywords, banner art, thumbnails, end cards, playlists, analytics, reach, monetization, and did I mention that I had never edited anything on iMovie ten days ago? I now know my way around not only iMovie, but Canva, and YouTube studio, versus the older Creator Studio Classic. I’m by no means a pro, but I’m getting the hang of it. And here’s the thing, I still have SO much to learn.
My latest thumbnail and video
Some of the most successful YouTubers out there are doing tutorials on… wait for it… how to be a successful YouTuber! Now that’s irony and soooo meta! But perhaps the most surprising thing of all, is how much I enjoy making videos. I am constantly learning, but am loving the process.
I thought I would be posting one tutorial a week, but, in the last two weeks , have posted five, with one more taped, but not edited and another, in the works. Evidently you’re supposed to have a regular schedule and post at the same time and day, but right now, as I’m just getting my feet wet, I figure I’ve got time to work all of that out. My next video will be demonstrating the Bullion Knot and after that how to applique a circle.
A month ago I taught a 2-hour stitching workshop exploring shapes and stitches at my quilt guild. It was a huge success, and lots of fun! I prepared squares of wool and precut circles in different sizes. More than 20 people attended and each person got to pick a wool square and some circles, which they then whipstitched on to their wool base. As most of the participants already knew how to do some of the more basic stitches such as the Running Stitch and Backstitch, I taught how to do the Bullion Knot and a Cast On Bullion stitch. (We only had two hours) It was a lot of fun! I really, really love teaching.
Through one of the participants (who also happens to be a friend) of that workshop I was introduced to one of the owners of the last remaining quilt shop in New York City, Gotham Quilts – New York City’s Quilt Shop. It was a terrific meeting and as a result of that meeting, I will be teaching a 6-hour Creative Stitching workshop playing with shapes using many of Sue Spargo‘s techniques in April. If you’d like to sign up for it, you can, by clicking ‘here‘. The workshop is on April 25th from 11:30 – 6. Everyone will get a “kit” which will include precut circles, a wool square base, wool thread to whipstitch the shapes onto the background, needles, lots of different kinds of threads to play with, tons of Perle Cotton threads, a piece of silk velvet, some stabilizer for the silk velvet, a sampling of beads, buttons and silk ribbon. I am SO excited and hope some of you will join me!
For those of you unfamiliar with Gotham Quilts, it opened in 2014 and is located at 40 West 37th Street between 5th and 6th Avenues in the heart of Manhattan and just a block from the Garment District. Two friends, Andrea and Ivete, own and run it. Over the years they have expanded what began as a tiny shop on the second floor, to a multi level space, carrying a wonderfully curated selection of fabrics and notions as well as Bernina Sewing Machines. They are now open six days a week, everyday but Sunday, from 11 – 6, and on Thursdays until 7pm.
Gotham Quilts
I hope to see some of you there!
Have you checked out my latest YouTube video? My channel is: Ariane Zurcher – On the Other Hand where I give tutorials on all things involving stitching, sewing, design and creating. I will be doing videos that are for Left Handers, but others that are not hand specific. So join me, and stitch along!
Tutorial: How stitch the Pekinese Stitch
How to stitch The Coral Stitch with 2 (okay 3) variations!
Things have been busy around here. I had the idea to start a YouTube channel over a year ago. My thought was to go through Sue Spargo’s Creative Stitching book and demonstrate every stitch (but for left-handed stitchers) featured in her book, one stitch a week. I discussed my idea with Anna Bates, my friend over at Quilt Roadies, who encouraged me to go for it. But I knew I couldn’t do anything until I’d gotten Sue’s okay. Not only was she okay with my idea, but we then discussed launching YouTube channels together, each doing the same stitch on the same day, linking our channels to each other’s, and we even filmed a couple of episodes at her store in Ohio.
In Tucson where my YouTube idea first took root!
But life has a funny way of inserting itself into the best laid plans. Things happened, we had to delay the launch and then finally, last week, Sue told me to go ahead with my channel without her. For those of you who do not know Sue Spargo, she is one of the most hardworking, dedicated and talented artists I know. She has an extremely successful business, both brick and mortar, as well as online site over at Sue Spargo.com. She teaches all over the world, has a wildly popular Block of the Month club – this year she is doing TWO, one for those who desire something a little simpler and not quite as time consuming, and another, which features more advanced stitching. All of this is to say – everything she does, she does incredibly well.
Whew! Okay. So…
Last week I took a deep breath and took the plunge. I launched my YouTube channel. I knew it was going to be a fairly steep learning curve, but I hadn’t taken into account just how steep! I had to teach myself how to edit video on iMovie. Then I learned all about banner art and thumbnails, which required downloading a couple different apps (that I also then had to learn how to use.) I read all about how best to monetize your channel once you’ve reached 1,000 subscribers and a ton of watched hours. I then had to read about monetizing your blog, because if one is already monetized, it makes monetizing the other a lot easier. I watched hours and hours of YouTuber’s videos and finally my husband, Richard, who for years owned and ran a very successful ad agency, and I sat down and brainstormed. He came up with “On the Other Hand” for my channel, which is just so brilliant. Love that, and him. He also helped me design my YouTube banner. It looks pretty good, right?
My YouTube Banner
Finally, I began taping and, I’ll admit, feeling kind of old, because, while I would be far more comfortable keeping the camera zoomed in on the stitching, I also get that people want to see the person behind the hands. Looking at yourself during the editing process is a lesson in humility. Most of the up and coming YouTubers out there are young and beautiful and most definitely not almost sixty years old. Did I just say that? Yup. I did. I’ll be sixty in another six months. Pretty much clinging to these final months while still in my fifties. As in seriously white knuckling it… But it’s all relative. I know, twenty years from now, I’ll look back and think – Wow! I was so young.
Photo of hands stitching a Pekinese Stitch is far more preferable than a photo of myself
So yes, it’s ALL relative.
So that’s what I’ve been doing for the past week or so.
And the last one, uploaded Tuesday evening, is how to stitch the Pekinese Stitch.
The Pekinese Stitch (I had to delete the first one and redo the music as it had copyright issues! Learning… lots of learning…
All the videos are directed at left handed stitchers, because we left handers have to bush whack our way through most tutorials, figuring it out on our own. I have, in the past, come up with some very creative looking hand stitching that in no way resemble stitches in any embroidery book known to mankind. Yelp!
I also give tips on how to thread a needle, thimbles, which needles to use for which stitches, how to make a quilter’s knot and, as time goes on, I’ll discuss all kinds of other things as well. In my Pekinese Stitch Tutorial Merlin, our mischievous kitty, even makes an appearance, wreaking havoc with my attempts to stitch and teach! So watch and stitch along with me. Don’t forget to give a thumbs up, and subscribe because I’ll be posting at least once a week, and not just content for left handers, but for anyone who loves art, design, stitching and life! Hopefully there will be some laughter in there too. Laughter is good.
A couple years ago I was featured in Quilting Arts Magazine – the Year of the Rooster!
The piece I submitted, entitled Regal Rooster, was made of wool, cotton and silk velvet (that I dyed myself) using a variety of threads, but predominantly Eleganza Perle Cotton from Sue Spargo. She has the most luscious perle cotton threads in sizes 8, 5 and 3 as well as just about anything else one could want.
I designed the rooster with one of my sister’s roosters in mind. Though I must admit her roosters are mean, nasty, brutish fellows and can only be appreciated from afar. As in – where are my binoculars? (Sorry Sis.) However my rooster is kind and regal and very colorful. Here’s his head, since that’s the first to go… Oh stop it. Seriously, in my experience roosters in real life tend to be vicious creatures, but my fictitious guy is lovely. I swear.
To all the rooster lovers in the world, I apologize in advance for my biased characterization of them. I’m sure there are some really nice roosters out there, I’ve just never met them…
And here he is in all his colorful glory. I used Sue Spargo’s techniques of layering beginning with a wool base and then adding fabrics: cotton, velvet and silk ribbon before applying the wool Rooster body. Hand stitching using various threads and stitches came next and then I machine quilted the whole thing!
See the random seed stitches in the lower right corner? That’s where I inadvertently burned the silk ribbon with too hot an iron. I can tell you this now because no one noticed and why not admit to these tiny mishaps that inevitably occur in life?! They say we learn from our mistakes, and I’m hoping that’s actually true as a singed silk ribbon makes for a very unhappy stitcher, however stitching and gorgeous threads can cover up just about anything.
“Crafts” have occupied a large part of my life. I was fifteen years old when I knitted my first sweater. My mother taught me to knit when I was so young my fingers had trouble wrapping the yarn around them. I didn’t realize it then, but being left-handed certainly must have made it more difficult for me to learn, yet learn I did, and to this day I knit as a right handed person does. It was the beginning of a love affair. When I was in my twenties I had a brief moment when I was the editor of the “How To Knit” page in Elle Magazine.
Ariane Zurcher DesignsAriane Zurcher Designs Capelet and Sleeves
My mother also taught me to do embroidery and sewing, this was in the days when knitting and fabric shops were as abundant as Starbucks. It was a special occasion when my mother would drive me to San Francisco so we could visit Britex, which carried the most luxurious silks and fabrics from all over the world. When I moved to New York City there was a little knitting shop on Sixth Avenue in the village that had hand dyed and spun specialty yarns. They were out of my price range as I was a student on a budget, but I would wander into that shop and just smell the wool and gaze at the beautiful colors, coveting the skeins that hung like candy along the walls.
Emroidered Creche my mother & I made when I was a teenager.
My father, born and raised in Paris, used to do Petit Point, at least this is what he called it, though in fact I believe he was doing what in America we call needlepoint. It was my father who taught me how to do basket weave needle point so the back of the tapestry resembled a basket weave, and was not as prone to warping the fabric and lay flatter or so he insisted. He looked down upon those who did their needlepoint by going back and forth horizontally. I have a pillow he made for me with the letter A prominently displayed in the center, it’s tattered back and edges giving clues to how old it now is.
The Pillow my father made for me
When I came to New York City it was because I’d been accepted to Parsons School of Design. My love of fabrics, sewing, knitting and all things crafts-related propelled me into the world of fashion design. It was an uneasy alliance and ultimately one I could not reconcile. I learned early on that anything “Crafts” related was the sullied, unkept cousin to “high fashion.” Crafts were what housewives did, it wasn’t the sort of thing an “artist” indulged in. So the thing I loved most, creating things by hand, became the thing I felt ashamed of. The world of fashion and the designers whose work hung on exquisitely tall and impossibly thin models, exemplified all that I wasn’t. My love of crafts became something I began to hide and even reject. It was “woman’s work” and if I was ever to make a career for myself, it was best to put those “childish pursuits” behind me.
“Craft” has begun to get its well deserved recognition and I couldn’t be happier. It is no coincidence that female artists in general are generating more interest in museums and galleries. Women’s work finally elevated to more prominence in a male dominated world is as it should be. “Craft” and all that it encompasses is yet another way we have been taught to undermine, under value and even ridicule work done by, mostly, women. We have a lot further to go, but it is wonderful to see that beginning to change!
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