Susan Bates - Designing the “Berry Sweet” Patterns for StitchableCards
For me, the strawberry is quintessentially all about summer – it’s the fruit that I love to eat during the hot summer weather. My mum and dad used to grow strawberries in our back garden and we’d wait for them to turn ripe so that we could pick them and eat them – usually with cream or in a homemade trifle. The bright red color of the strawberry is beautiful and the smell and flavor of them is so appealing – I just love them!
This set of designs came together quite quickly, as I knew that I was going to make strawberries the main focus. This of course meant that red had to be the main color, but I really like the contrast of the green leaves against the red flesh of the berries and the little white flowers of the strawberry are very pretty, so I had to include these colors too.
Picture credits: Strawberries in colander
For inspiration I referred to photographs of strawberry plants and began sketching up some clusters of large berries and leaves. I included some white flowers in my sketches, to add more interest and details to them.
Once I’d got an outline drawing that I was happy with for the rectangular-shaped Stitchables template I began to think of the color palette I’d like to use for it. I wanted the strawberries to have vibrant reds fruits and colorful lime green leaves. The pale blue ‘Stitchable’ thread colors work well as a background for the strawberries to sit on and create a sweet picture.
I continued the strawberry theme by depicting some arranged in a bowl. I love the combination of red against blue and white porcelain, so I chose to decorate the bowl using these lovely blue shades. The design seemed to naturally work well inside the circular template, so I decided to use that ‘Stitchables’ shape for my bowl of fruits.
For the other two designs I decided to move away from the strawberry theme. I wanted to continue including imagery associated with summer, and to me bees are symbols of summer. They’re also very welcome visitors in our gardens, as they help to pollinate the plants, so I decided to include a bumble bee in this design set.
The symmetrical nature of the bee’s body and wings works really well in the heart-shaped template. I’ve set my bee upon a light sky blue background, which really helps to make the striped black and yellow body of the bee stand out against it.
For the fourth design I decided I’d like there to be a floral element to the set, so I sketched up a red flower. I went for a stylized look, with the main focus being the lovely red petals. The green leaves also help the flower to be quite vibrant in color.
I wanted to add another element, so I decided to add a ‘frame’ effect to it. The golden yellow frame helps draw your eye to the central flower motif. You can see I’ve included a light blue border around the frame, which is very pretty. The blue color also helps to tie this design in with the other designs in this set.
I’ve included my sketches for these designs, so that you can see how my designs evolve from sketches to finished stitched pieces.
I enjoyed creating these little summer-themed designs, so I hope that you really love them and have fun stitching them!
