Inspirations

Referred to by readers as 'the World's most beautiful embroidery magazine', Inspirations is where you find the best classic hand embroidery by leading embroiderers throughout the world. Complemented with superbly styled photography and captivating stories, each issue brings a diverse collection of timeless projects from home wares and bags to gifts and accessories. A wide variety of embroidery techniques is presented with detailed and easy to follow instructions, step-by-step tutorials and full size patterns, making each issue a valuable resource for people new to embroidery and seasoned needleworkers alike.

FROM THE EDITOR

ERRATA

Taking Flight • It is easy to imagine Lesley's embroidered birds coming to life. Hopping from branch to branch, pecking around on the ground or in the trees, looking for titbits, tasty morsels, and shiny objects. They are curious, intelligent, inquisitive, and colourful. And they love being free and in their natural surroundings. Just like Lesley.

INSIDE STORY • Mention hand embroidery and images of flowers, birds, ornamental motifs, and landscapes come to mind, not images of intestines, muscles, skeletal joints, and other internal body parts. But that is only because you have not seen the work of CATH JANES yet.

MAPULA EMBROIDERY TRUST

BETWEEN THE COVERS

MYOSOTIS • The enchanting, clear blue petals of dainty forget-me-not flowers are captured within an ornate frame of golden stitches and glittering beads in this charming panel.

FIORI • A delicate tracery of stylised flowers surrounds a central square on this delightful Deruto Sfilato mat, worked with pristine white threads onto ivory, open weave linen.

HYDRANGEA • Softly shaded petals in subtle blues, dusky mauves and gentle pinks are worked with surface embroidery and stumpwork and are cleverly arranged to form the flowerhead on a spectacular stem of hydrangea.

THE BLUE BEAD • Inspired by the children's novel, The Blue Bead by Polish writer Maria Krüger, this beautiful Jacobean design utilises numerous shades of blue thread and a wide variety of interesting stitches.

NATURE'S DELIGHT • Celebrate the endless beauty of the natural world by stitching this glorious collection of flowers and insects with a rainbow of stranded cotton threads, enhanced with touches of metallic thread and gleaming beads.

TERRAZZO • Step back in time to 15th century Italy and an extraordinary age in art and architecture, where every detail was carefully considered and beautifully executed.

LITTLELEAF SENSITIVE BRIAR • The delicate beauty of MIMOSA MICROPHYLLA is perfectly captured here with a combination of hand-dyed cotton and metal embroidery threads.

SUMMERBERRY • PLUMP BERRIES, DAINTY BLOSSOMS, GOLDEN LEAVES AND PRETTY SEED PODS DECORATE THIS GRACEFUL GARLAND, CAPTURING ALL THE DELIGHTS OF A SUMMER DAY.

Inspirations

story cloths