It must have been over 25 years ago that my mom and I stopped into a wearable art store and saw some amazing coats made from a faux-chenille fabric. The softness. The drape. The color. And I couldn’t wait to try my hand at the technique …
And sure enough, a mere 25 years later, here I am playing in faux chenille-land.
I usually need a push to actually get working on something new. So I saw that Nancy Zieman had a Christmas stocking challenge on her blog and set to work.
Making the fabric is a process of layering 4-5 fabrics, stitching channels, and slashing the channels open (while leaving the bottom fabric intact!). When the fabric construction is done, you throw it in the washing machine and the raw edges ravel and fluff out. My favorite part is taking it out of the dryer and seeing what the finished fabric looks like. Always very different from the pre-washing appearance.
For these stockings, I worked with a series of green fabrics for the base. For the toe, heel and top cuff I laid in a multicolor dot print; under the top layer for the toe and heel and on top for the cuff. I also added some larger dots in the body layers for fun. To further define the toe, heel and cuff I varied the stitching pattern when making the channels. If I hadn’t been so anxious to see how the fabric turned out, I would have taken some pictures of the process!
I really like how these turned out … but I think I will keep my old knit stocking, kinda like that stretch factor …
It will be a while (hopefully not another 25 years!) before I gather enough experience to try making a coat, but I’m more interested than ever.