Goblinf's Blog: Chicken Scratch Embroidery

Nothing to do with the ScanNCut at all today. I am however feeling an enormous sense of achievement. I have today finished making an embroidered 3" square lavender bag. Not too exciting true, however it is the FIRST embroidery 'thing' I have actually made and finished since I got unwell in 2013. And back in 2013 -2015 I used to look at the 'things' I used to make and couldn't believe it was made by me nor that I would ever be able to do such things again. So an enormous milestone!

And here it is in all it's slightly dishevelled glory! it's two sided with slightly different stitching on each side, mostly because I didn't plan it very well. oops.

Side One

Side Two

A small thing but mine own!
I'd never heard of Chicken Scratch embroidery before. But our lovely embroidery group lady had some samples and I was fascinated by the different effects that can be obtained by working over the three different tones you get in gingham fabric. So I requested that this month (June) the technique would be chicken scratch. And she obliged, which was lovely of her as I generally only have energy to turn up once every two months so as I was there in May, it was touch and go whether I'd even be there to do it myself!

It appears to originate in 1930s Depression Era USA at least it became popular in mid-twentieth century, and is also known as Gingham Embroidery, Amish Embroidery, and Depression Lace amongst other names. Traditionally it has comprised of running, cross stitch and double cross stitch and to my mind has some similarities with hardanger and other European embroidery traditions which no doubt fed into it and certainly people have added needleweaving and other stitch techniques which has pushed such embroidery into new territory.

The theory goes that gingham or check was very cheap fabric, and is a technique that can be very economical with thread and time, which gives an expensive 'lacelike' appearance in decoration.

Here's a couple of articles that give a deeper explanation, some lovely examples of how the stitch placement makes a difference to the overall effect and also instructions on how to do it.
Craftsy's Amish Embroidery article HERE
and Nordic Needle's Chicken Scratch Embroidery article HERE

There's also some pretty wide ranging examples on Pinterest, some more successful than others in my view, as for me, what really works is when the stitches are placed so that they trick your eye into thinking the stitching is a totally different piece of (appliqued) fabric that's been inserted.

In case you are wondering Gingham is fabric that has specific colour threads in warp and weft. It's easier to start thinking of Check fabric, this is quite simple, it has two colours. The warp is set up to alternate between the two colours, and so is the weft so that you end up with a two colour repeating square pattern say warp is 20 green, 20 white and so is the weft - where green warp meets green weft the result is a green square and where white warp meets white weft the result is a white square.

With Gingham, the warp and weft are set up again with two colours, but instead of just alternating the warp and weft in the same pattern to make only green and white, instead there's more alternatives, green warp and green weft make green square, white warp and white weft make white square, however when white warp and green weft or green warp and white weft meet, they make a tonal muted green - giving you the three tones - green, white and a mid tone. And it's the three tones that are either highlighted by not being stitched, or hidden by stitch that alter the way the eye reads the colours and fools it into thinking the fabric has changed.

So to explore that, I repeated the same pattern as a sample with each one highlighting 1. green, 2. white and 3. midtone


Stitched so the Green shows where there's no stitching

Stitched so the White shows where there's no stitching

It's difficult to see on a small sample, but if this sample was say a border on a tablecloth or apron (popular uses for this technique in the past) then your eye does blend the colours and see the fabric as totally different where stitched. But, once you look at those two together, you can see how the one with white highlighted mostly covers up the dark green and brings the white forwards.

Stitched so the MidTone shows where there's no stitching

I also, just to be awkward, picked a different pattern that I suspect would work better on check (2 tones) than Gingham (3 tones) and did the same thing, which is why they are slightly strangely offset, and why two of the points are on a completely different tone than the other two points. I think it might be interesting to develop that on a larger sample to see how the colours behave in due course.

Same pattern, 3 repeats, each one starting in centre as green (middle) white (bottom) and midtone (top)

Then, because of the deep influence that the City & Guilds Creative Embroidery course that I never finished has had on me, I wondered, what would it be like if these stitches were done on a distorted grid? And worked out that it would be hideous to mark and colour a grid just for this.

However as luck would have it, I have some offcuts of a heavy jersey in black and white distorted check in the 'scraps' box. Which I could get to myself without help from anyone else. And whilst I don't think I picked the right patterns and I'll have another think and do another one with the remaining piece, I am pleased with the rather crazy effect. The larger area initially looked very spherical, then I did the more complicated lower pattern and well, it is what it is - a flat piece of fabric that messes with your brain!

One way up

The other way up

I like the way that the stitching accentuates the feeling there being a bulge in the fabric, as though it's not lying flat (which it was mostly).

Anyway that's as far as I've got with chicken scratch, it's apparently possible to do it on polkadot fabric, and I've got a few yards of chocolate colour cotton (slightly heavier than quilting cotton) with turquoise dots, that's what I'll be having a go at next. Eventually. In the meantime I'm still doing my chain stitch paisley phone case, but it's using wool and the weather is warm, so nope, waiting til it rains and cools down a bit to carry on.

I also like the idea of experimenting with using different colours - the following photos are of the samples the embroidery group leader has made for a class of 30 she's teaching the technique to some time this summer.