National Embroidery Month: Nostalgia is not a Strategy

At the beginning of this month, I mentioned that I had begun an embroidery based on inspiration from the speech given by our Prime Minister, Mark Carney, at the World Economic Forum in Davos in January. This was a speech that had immediate impact, but for me it also influenced an embroidery idea.

A phrase from this speech struck me as soon as I heard it: Nostalgia is not a strategy. Now, in context, the PM was referring to the state of the world and focusing on politics the way they are now, not as we want them to be. I agree with this! But it also immediately had shades of other meaning for me, applied to other contexts. As general life advice, this seems solid! And in light of tradwives trying to claim embroidery for themselves when stitching has always been, and very visibly so, a protest medium -- I thought this was a perfect candidate for a stitched piece. 

So I created a nostalgic looking floral spray, choosing a more nostalgic colour scheme as well. The irony appealed to me. It was a fairly quick project, though would have been quicker if I hadn't kept putting it down for days! 

I used Canva to design my original sketch, and then traced it onto my fabric. I like to use thrifted linen napkins to stitch on, as the quality is good and they are usually about the right size for small projects. That's what I'm using here. But because it was a lighter weight, I also put a layer of lightweight cotton behind it to add some structure and hide any carried threads. 

I used my favourite stem stitch (2 strand) for the word Nostalgia and the black lines around the text. I used 2 strand whipped back stitch for the rest of the printed words. The darker leaves were fishbone stitch, the bright ones satin stitch, stems were stem stitch, all 2 strand. The outlines of the brighter leaves were one strand stem stitch. As for the flowers, they were long and short stitch, with satin stitch yellow centres on the small purple flowers and french knots for the larger flowers. I just chose colours I liked, and didn't really keep track. 

I will likely mount this in a hoop as wall art, as I feel like that meets the nostalgia factor of this piece. But I will have to find one and paint it black first. I usually use my plastic hoops for stitching so don't have a wooden one lying around! 

In any case, I really enjoyed stitching this quick project and am so pleased that I actually started something timely while I was thinking of it! And that I pushed myself a little to finish it before National Embroidery Month ended! I hope you enjoy it too. If you want to stitch this one yourself, here is the pattern I made with the help of Canva -- I shifted the small sentence over a bit to the left when I traced it, fyi.