About Dionne
Dionne paints with stitches to create dynamic, vibrantly coloured textiles. Her needle becomes her pen and thread her ink. The scale, emotion, and energy of her landscapes are inspirational.
Dionne is a graduate of Goldsmith’s College, London University. She has a Masters in Textiles from UCE. And she has been recognised by the industry for her incredible work, e.g. Shortlisted Finalist in the Fine Art Textiles Award at The Festival of Quilts 2020.
Now based between Yorkshire [UK] and Abruzzo [Italy], she exhibits and tutors internationally.
You can watch Dionne demonstrate how to use free motion embroidery to create a range of patterns, textures, tones, and shades in an episode of The Makers Studio series, brought to you by Janome and justhands-on.tv.
Signature Technique
Painting with stitches
Top Tips
- Use a vibrant mix of thread weights, colours, and styles to build up a more dynamic texture.
- A machine with an extra wide throat makes it easier to manipulate your piece.
- Cover your hoop with fabric to give it more grip. You need the fabric to stay drum like as you manoeuvre it.
- Drawing your subject first, with pencil on paper, can help improve your observation and knowledge of your subject – try not to work from a photograph.
- Practice by stitching your signature to get started. Your muscle memory will help you.
- Think of painting with stitches as an orchestra with the sewing machine, threads, fabric, hoop, and you (!) coming together to work as one.
- Don’t be afraid of the machine. After a few hours of speed sewing it becomes second nature.
- Try not to have a set image of the outcome. You are not stitching an exact replica. The result is where you get to. There is no wrong in there. Enjoy the journey.
Videos
Patterns
Posts
Folded Potholder
I love the folded potholder you demonstrated. I will eventually get around to making one for myself but for now i really would like to make one as a 16" pillow topper. Can it be done that large and in a square shape as opposed to the round? Answer: The answer is yes you can make this bigger - you will need more squares to fold into the pointy shape on each round - from 8 you will then need 16 and you might even have to go up to 32 per round!);
and then to turn it into a square I suggest you use bigger squares (gives you more fudge factor!) select a point for the first one and add to the opposite side and the opposing quadrants (say north, south east and west) (but you could have marked this out on your foundation piece first)
There is quite a bit of fabric and will feel quite heavy - just so you know If you would like to enjoy the workshop: click here:
Fun at Cae Hir Gardens, West Wales
Despite the wet, Matt managed to have fun
Traffic Pattern quilt
Pat was the lucky winner of the Boys quilt pattern a few months back, donated by Kids & Co.. I have now finished the "traffic" quilt that I won in one of your competitions and have sent you a picture from my iphone - hope it arrives ok. It really came out well and looked stunning. Thank you. It was well received by mother father and child!! I felt very proud of it - thanks to all of your teaching over the years. and she plans to make two more for the other grandchildren! Happy Sewing
(we have Bugsy and Alphabet Jungle from this range available in the shop)