Classes/Workshops

The following are classes/workshops that are currently being offered.  All classes can be custom designed to fit your specific needs.  Please contact me for contract and pricing information.

• Baby Lock – for the Love of Sewing

As a new Baby Lock Educator, I’ll be offering custom classes designed for your stores specific needs and requests.  My specialty is embroidery and sewing, so anything related to that using Baby Lock sewing machines is right up my alley!  Please contact me and we can begin some fun adventures together.

• Sumptuous Surfaces – Beyond Boundaries

Do you love encrusted surfaces that can’t be duplicated by others?  It’s time to to explore the incredible array of techniques and materials that are available for incorporating into custom designed artwork.  This hands-on workshop will incorporate materials and techniques to build up textural surfaces inspired by nature.  Paint, heat, stitch, and illuminate to create surfaces with translucent depth and vibrant colors. Get inspired, think outside the box, and let your creative juices take you beyond the norm.

• Delicious Delicacies in Vintage Ribbonwork

In his hands-on  class, we’ll be exploring options for working with vintage ribbonwork.  We’ll be learning how to manipulate and form various tropical inspired cabochons, fuchsias and flower buds with French wired ribbon.  Learn how to develop your own vivid designs and create special effects that bring your flowers to life with sculptured ribbonwork. You’ll develop an addiction for this art form that’ll whet your appetite for more!

• Creating Cockades and Flatwork Vintage Ribbonry 

In this hands-on techniques class, we create cockades and flatwork ribbon trims that can be applied to wedding essentials, distinctive millinery, elegant jewelry, custom clothing, or any other ideas your imagination can conjure up. Whether you’re a fan of Victorian women fashion or not, we’ll learn the twists and turns that make vintage ribbonwork so unique and fun to do by using simple folded techniques to create complex and dimensional designs. Create simple dramatic effects that flatwork trim brings you, or more focal accent pieces with cockades that have endless variations.  These ribbon forms date back centuries, and we’ll revive their form by creating folds that can be manipulated in various ways to create one-of-kind embellishments to enhance your creative pieces. Time-tested techniques will be taught that have been gleaned from the golden era of vintage ribbonwork.

• Beadwork Bootcamp

Bead embroidery is a multifaceted means of embellishing and enhancing our wardrobes, and making a personal statement on what we create.  It has a history as rich as beads themselves.  In this hands-on class, we’ll explore many of the hand stitching techniques associated with beading and embroidery.  Some of the stitches you’ll learn include some of the  traditional stitches including the backstitch, couching, and running stitch.  And there are newer beading techniques including whipped chain and feather vine stitch that we’ll learn that can be used on clothing and structures alike.  We’ll begin with bead embroidery, and then venture into some freeform beading in the afternoon portion of this class. You’ll be amazed (and probably addicted) at how easy beadwork and bead embroidery really is.  If you enjoy hand stitching and beads, and you’re looking for new ways to make beautiful embellishments, this class is for you.