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| New casual dining dishes and linens. |
A move into a new house is an opportunity to refurbish and renew. I decided it was time to retire our 20+ year-old Fiesta dishes and inject some new color and pattern onto our tabletop. While unpacking my textile supplies, I also excavated some pre-printed sashiko fabric purchased in Japan in 2012. As well as kits, the Olympus company produces pre-printed panels as well as yardage in a number of patterns. The fabric available by mail through https://www.athreadedneedle.com/collections/kits-patterns and other suppliers.
I knew I wanted to go in a blue and white direction with the new dishes, as that's a timeless combination and so many accessories are available in that colorway. Found new plates in Villeroy and Boch's Artesano pattern but didn't like the bowl shape, so back to Fiestaware for the bowls - the new color Mulberry went very well with the Villeroy salad plate design, seen above in the first image. Fiesta's classic color cobalt goes very well too.
Motivated, the next step was making color-coordinated sashiko placemats.
Materials used:
Two meters Olympus sashiko fabric, 46" wide, used for front and back of placemat
Olympus sashiko thread, color 103, indigo, and color 19, purple
Sashiko needle
Wash-out marker (Used Clover water erasable marker, fine point)
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| "Bobbins" made from toilet paper rolls. |
Do not pre-shrink the fabric - this will remove the stitching guidelines. I did iron the material before cutting, but did not use steam. Some feel that ironing will "set" the print lines, but I did not find that to be so.
Cut size of placemat = 13" by 19", determined by the motif - I wanted to work with the pattern. From the two meters purchased in Japan I was able to cut six placemats.
I marked 1" from the cut line for my hand-stitched border and 1/2" inch from the cut line for my machine stitching line, then sewed both front and back pieces together, right sides facing. I left about 3" open, to turn the placemat right side out.
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| Right sides together, machine-stitch on blue marker line. |
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| Top-stitched at edge; orange thread marks border. |
After trimming the seam close to the stitching, I turned the placemat right side out, then topstitched in matching thread (topstitching also closed the turning opening). The orange thread (used for blog example) is my guideline for the hand-stitched border.
Generally, it's best to sew the border first in sashiko, so the field stitching can "meet" the border stitches nicely. I picked out the orange machine stitching as I sewed the purple sashiko thread; the holes left by the machine stitching helped me achieve evenly-spaced hand stitching. Once the border was finished I began stitching the wave pattern.
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| Orange machine stitching guided purple sashiko stitching. |
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| In progress. |
In the image above I show the wave stitching before the border is completed; this is just to show the pattern and colors used in this blog. Thread is carried between the layers of fabrics to minimize starting and stopping. It's a little tricky stitching through two layers of fabric - check occasionallly to ensure stitches secure both layers.
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| Stitching finished - ready to be washed in cold water and line dried. |
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| Back of placemat - left is before laundering, right is after. |
Of course the pattern won't align on the back. I could have used a plain fabric for the back, but I preferred to have both sides match exactly in color.
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| Chilewich napkin in blue finishes the setting. |
