Flowers in Honor of St. Valentine

What a surprise!  Seeing flowers as the first site to greet the day certainly brings a smile!  How can one help smiling when beholding the beauty of flowers?  They are like candy for the eye, a visual assortment of confetti in every shape and color imaginable.

Flowers are so pleasing to look at.  The color and variety of flowers in nature are limitless, and they often serve to spark the imagination when it comes to Ecclesiastical Embroidery Designs.

Flowers can add that vivid splash of color to accent goldwork embroidery.  Sometimes a little touch is all that is needed.

Simple petal shapes can add interest and help to balance and fill space. When placed on a vine, they can suggest movement and lead the eye to various parts of a design as above.

When using techniques such as needle painting with silk floss, flowers can take on a very realistic appearance, as if they were recently picked from the garden.

Want to accent or frame a design?  Flowers may be the key. Using symmetry and balance, the roses and carnations help the eye focus on the gold cross.

Tiny rosebuds are used to frame this little design. These simplistic elements are perfectly balanced.

Looking for a design that is a little more bold?  How about lilies?

Used in both large and small sizes, lilies are often seen in Ecclesiastical Embroidery designs.

Sometimes they are realistic; while at other times the lilies are stylized.

Famous Designers have used lilies as an element for their work, such as this design by a well known Architect and Author from the late 1800’s, John D. Sedding of the United Kingdom.

Whether stitched in vivid colors or

intended for whitework, flowers are an important design element in Ecclesiastical Sewing and Ecclesiastical Embroidery.

While I love lilies, nothing says beauty like a rose, and so, in honor of St. Valentine’s Day,  here is a gift of roses. This beautiful piece of Ecclesiastical Embroidery has to be one of my favorites.  It is part of the Rose set of vestments from the Haehn Museum.

Worked in the late 1800’s on silk satin, the needle painting on this piece is nothing short of exquisite.  The color shading on the roses is worked to perfection. The colors seem to blend effortlessly from one into the next, creating the perfect balance of light and shadow, and vivid color.

Thank you for joining me on this special Holiday, as we take a walk through the gardens of sacristies and Ecclesiastical workrooms, and enjoy the variety of flowers therein. So how about you? Do you have a favorite floral motif or design for Ecclesiastical Embroidery?

Happy St. Valentine’s Day.

Soli Deo Gloria