Veronka by Kasia Jacquot

I bought this Kasia Jacquot kit from the Art Gallery of South Australia on one of my visits to the Radical Textiles exhibition. It is part of a series stocked by the shop, along with lots of other goods relevant to the extensive, long-running exhibition. I certainly didn’t need another kit, but loved the look of the series, the particular relevance of this one to my family, and wanted to support the Gallery.

Inside the box was the design printed in full colour on linen, a full-size colour diagram, two sheets of instructions, the threads, needle and, generously, a very clear black and white copy of the design in case I want to work it again on another piece of fabric.

Most of it fitted in a 10" hoop so I went with that in my seated frame, and took the linen out to finish the edges - the best solution for my hands.                               

I began in the centre and followed the suggestions for both stitches and thread. The designer's preference is for 6 strands of cotton, which worked.

It was a long time after stitching this central heart that I realised the outer border was meant to be dark blue, not green. It looks fine, and I’m not undoing it. Fortunately, I had a hank of the same green in my thread stash. The error meant I needed a whole extra hank!

While stitching I was thinking about how I might use the finished piece. I remembered some cotton craft bags I had bought a couple of years ago when I saw them in Spotlight. At the time I thought they'd be handy for painting. I dug them out. Veronka sat very nicely on one of the red bags. That spurred me on. I could now see a use!

It is a nicely varied design for stitching. Some motifs are paired but others are single. Although the stitch range is limited, the colours and placement vary, so there isn't a lot of simple repetition.

I stitched as far into the corners as I could

then removed it from the hoop and worked the corners in hand, followed by the borders. 

Before working the latter I folded in the raw edges and worked the borders through the double thickness as far as possible. As can be seen here, the horizontals are entirely through two layers, the verticals have two of the three through two layers.

At the last minute I decided to block it rather than iron it. It was 32C when I decided, so it dried in a few hours.

I stitched it to the bag by machine. I thought about another row of red herringbone over the edge but don’t think it’s needed. 

The bag came with a loop that can be used to hold it together folded. I’ve attached it to the bag in case someone wants to fold it to carry in a handbag. It’s tight, but works. It does crumple the bag - but shopping will soon fix that!

The cotton bag is not as strong as the embroidered linen square but it’s sturdy. If and when it wears out the linen can easily be removed and repurposed. This has been a really enjoyable project - and I've ordered more in the series.