How I Created my Sunflower Applique Wall Hanging
‘A sunflower field is like a sky with a thousand suns’
Corina Abdulahm-Negura
A wonderful quote and very true. I am very lucky to live not far away from fields which will be adorned with sunflowers later in the year, after their crops of strawberries are over!
How I created the sunflowers
My inspiration for the Sunflower Wall Hanging was the range of ‘Sunflowers’ fabrics from Lewis and Irene I had in my shop from a previous subscription box. I then started to google pictures of sunflowers and came across a copyright free image which I downloaded into my quilt design programme, EQ8. After some manipulation of the design and drawing each separate piece, this is what I ended up with.
I knew I wanted to stitch the wall hanging using applique techniques, so I set out how to transfer each leaf, petal and centres into pattern pieces which could be used for the applique.
Selecting fabrics
I have four designs from the Sunflowers range in my shop, but only used two in this design. The reason for that was one of the designs was a one way print and the other, the sunflower print was too large. I also used Bumbleberries in Custard for one the petal designs, Dashwood Twist in Indigo for the background as I wanted the design of the sunflowers to really stand out, and AGF Solid in Teak for the centres of the sunflowers. I also used the Bumbleberries for the binding. I was able to fussy cut the sunflower fabric so as the flower was the main focus of the petals, I love how they came out!
All those french knots!
During the process of stitching the applique pieces onto the background I realised that I needed to add some embellishment to some of the pieces, so I decided to add veins to the leaves using green embroidery thread (as seen above), and french knots to the centre of the sunflowers using brown embroidery thread to represent the seeds. It seemed like a good idea at the time, but it was a labour of love! I am really happy I did it as I love the dimension the knots have given to the finished project.
I love Bees!
Bees quite often feature in my work, whether it is on fabric designs or simple embroidered bees I add to some of my makes! This wall hanging is no exception. My embroidered bees are very simple, I used three colours of embroidery thread, a satin stitch for the body and a chain stitch for the wings.
In the picture below you can also see some of the outline I stitched around the applique pieces for the quilting of the wall hanging, I used Aurifil thread, weight no. 12 in yellow and green.
I'm really pleased how this design came to life and I loved all the hand stitching involved. If you feel this is a project you would like to try then I have a few kits in my shop which includes everything you need for the applique, find the kit here, including a link to a YouTube tutorial. If you would like the pattern only then you can download it as a PDF here.
Would you be interested in learning different patchwork techniques and receive a wonderful box of sewing goodies through the post every two months? Then have a look at my Fabulous Quilters Club subscription box for inspiration such as the Sunflower Applique Wall Hanging. The next subscription is for May which will be sent out at the beginning of June. Find all the details here.
Happy sewing!