I must admit, I’ve had this canvas in my stash waiting for the right project for awhile. This orange heart, from the upcoming sapphires ebook, was just perfect.
On the up side, the results are stunning. The opal metallic in the canvas is much more apparent on the black and really sets of the design. While the white/opal combination makes for a subtle background, this is dramatic.
On the down side, I thought this was harder to stitch than plain black canvas. The metallic threads made it more difficult to see the holes. I mostly had to work in bright light. I also found that the black showed through with lighter-colored threads, such as in the middle block of the second from bottom row, but not with thicker threads, such as the velours.
One other thing to remember, the metallic threads are only in the weft (horizontal) threads. While this is true of all metallic canvas, it’s especially apparent with the black. Careful planning of your project is needed to take advantage of this. In this case I wanted the metallic threads to be vertical, so the canvas was turned 90 degrees.
All in all, I think the look outweighs the difficulties and I will be using it again.
About Janet M Perry
Janet Perry is the Internet's leading authority on needlepoint. She designs, teaches and writes, getting raves from her fans for her innovative techniques, extensive knowledge and generous teaching style. A leading writer of stitch guides, she blogs here and lives on an island in the northeast corner of the SF Bay with her family
Lovely, just lovely. I know stitching on black is difficult.
Try having a white cloth over your knees when stitching on black canvas. Then you’ve got an easy background to check for holes against (if you follow me…!)
It looks great! I haven’t done any needlepoint as yet. I do mostly cross-stitch, and I’m getting into blackwork embroidery a bit, too. However, I can understand the problem with seeing the holes in the black. I’ve done cross-stitch on a navy blue Aida and remember having some trouble seeing the holes unless I had a bright light.