Q&A with Suzann Moss

Profi le

Q&A WITH Suzann Moss

www.etsy.com/au/shop/Tiramisue2 tiramisue@bigpond.com

Can you tell us about where you live and your family? I live in the outer eastern Melbourne suburb of Mt Evelyn, Victoria. Mt Evelyn borders wine country, cherry orchards and bulb farms — it still has a village feel even though the area is growing.

My husband is a very patient soul who encourages me by not constantly asking “what’s for dinner?”, knowing it is quite likely nothing. I have one son who fl ew the coop recently. We have a grumpy black and white cat called Norman and a very large Irish Wolfhound named Wilson after ‘the volleyball’ — I fi gured Wilson was a perfect name as I feel I am frequently talking to myself anyway!

What crafts did you do as a young person? My mother is a knitter and dressmaker, so fabric and yarn have always been in my world. I really didn’t do much creatively until I left home and had a place of my own to make a mess. In the early stages, I managed to keep it all contained in one room — not so much these days!

How did your interests progress to machine embroidery?

I started off with a knitting machine — the push-button type — and worked my way up to computer-based machines and programs. I really took to the whole technology thing. I discovered machine embroidery via the knitting machine guy. He had Jenny Haskins coming to his shop for a trunk show so I signed up. I was hooked — stitch no 83 on the 7570 — I had to get myself one of those beauties. This, in turn, meant I discovered the internet. Free designs, more free designs, most of them badly made, but the ideas started to form. My local sewing shop had Tuesday night classes to show what the machines could do, aside from sewing straight lines and clothing. (Leanne Church taught many of these early classes.)

My first major quilt was Eileen Campbell’s U is for Unicorn. We did the blocks each month: everyone started with the same pattern but as the time progressed, everybody realised the pattern wasn’t cast in stone and began making alterations. It was a wonderful way to learn more and more.

What other hobbies do you enjoy? As I said, I love technology. I am very keen on photography in particular, anything underwater and macro. I am trying to learn digital painting — I see it as a fantastic way to add colour to fabric and the possibilities are endless. I dabble in digitising — I have an Etsy shop where the more successful ideas go although

Profi le

I won’t be making a killing at that one — oh, and fabric dyeing, how much fun is that?

What are your favourite items to make? I really enjoy making bags. You can run with an idea, try techniques and move on to the next one. I tend to just ‘make’. The occasional sale is a bonus, but tragically I am not great at self-promotion, so I have a mighty fi ne collection of work stuffed in cupboards and drawers.

From where do you get your inspiration? Inspiration varies for me. Our local show always has a theme, so each year I try to complete something with that in mind. Last year it was ‘Bees’ so Liquid Gold was my piece for that. This year it is ‘Lady Birds’. I have a bit of an obsession with fi sh — I entered two bags into a challenge earlier in the year with a botanical theme, so the goldfi sh pond was the inspiration for that and I spend hours snorkelling and chasing fi sh with my GoPro and TG5. I can be inspired by a photo, a piece of clip art or a piece of fabric. When my mind is full to capacity with ideas, a camera can help store those ideas. Pinterest also has a lot to answer for.

What has been your best fi nish? I decided I needed to put myself out there and enter a few competitions. I don’t care what the outcome is, I just want people to see what can be

The Tiger Jacket

As the children in our family get older, it gets a little harder to fi nd just the right present. My niece made it easy for me this year. She had a jacket and asked if I could put a tiger on it. She chose Wild Beauty Tiger by Embroidery Library Tiger.

I have a fear of embroidering on someone else’s clothing and having a massive ‘oops’ moment, so I have developed a few work arounds — especially when the stitch tally is nearly 400,000 stitches.

Method A works well for designs that do not have lots of gaps or are sparsely stitched. Apart from the bamboo design — stitched directly onto the jacket — the fern pieces, fl owers and tiger were all stitched using two layers of organza and two layers of medium-weight tear-away stabiliser. After hooping the fabric and stabiliser I added a basting before I started stitching, because the organza can have a mind of its own.

Sometimes it is better to match the organza to the colour of the garment and sometimes I match it to the item being stitched. I used green for the fern leaves, white for the tiger and black for the fl owers.

After it was stitched, I removed the tear away as close as possible to the edges of the embroidery. Some designs will give you a good clean line; in the case of the tiger, there was a more feathery edge so I had to use a needle to try to get as clean an edge as possible. I used small sharp, curved scissors to trim the organza close to the edge of the embroidery.

After trimming, it was time to melt the organza away from the design. I like to use a candle over the kitchen sink for this process. I fi ll the sink with water in case anything catches alight. Holding the fl ame close to the design edge, but not touching, enabled me to get rid of any furry bits. As the organza melts it also creates a locking system for the stitches.

Once all the embroidery pieces were prepared, I put the design together. First I stitched bamboo directly onto the jacket. Then I positioned the other elements and pinned them in place. To reduce bulk behind the tiger, I cut away the pieces of fern that wouldn’t be seen.

I started stitching down the pieces from the back to the front of the design. On the lighter areas of the tiger, I ran the stitching in the same direction as the embroidery stitching to feather the appliqué. I didn’t want a big bold satin stitch for this type of work. My aim was to stitch down the pieces in the most invisible manner possible.

done with an embroidery machine besides designs in boxes. I think winning the Embellishment award at this year’s Quilt Convention is my best fi nish to date. The quilt Sea Change is actually called At the Drop Off but in my usual queen-of-thelast-minute state, I fi lled out the forms on the run and couldn’t for the life of me remember what I had named it!

Do you share your skills with others, teaching etc? I am part of a local quilt group here in Mt Evelyn. Not many people in my circle actually own an embroidery machine, but I do like to throw ideas around and help others with their quilting. I have run a couple of classes — one was an art quilt featuring a ton of ideas — painting fabric, stamps, stencils, bead making — it was a fairly intense two-anda-half days and this year a call went out for some bagmaking tips, in particular using zippers, so I put together a class for that. I like to share things I have learned to help others get their piece of art over the fi nish line. I want everyone to enjoy fabric art as much as I do.

What is the best thing about machine embroidery for

you? Once you learn the basics — and there are always things to learn — you can create anything. You don’t need to be able to draw and shade — good designs have got that covered. Machine embroidery and free-motion work bring me happiness. Everything else going on around you is forgotten as the magic with needle and thread starts to unfold.

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