The satisfaction that comes from taking a piece of cloth and crumpling it up and then holding it (a handkerchief ) or hugging it (a shawl) or snuggling under it (a blanket) or looking at it (an afghan) led me to wonder if I could translate this feeling into clothing. I'd need to stabalize the scrunch.
A length of linen…..
… crumple and stitch on the machine with a long running stitch …. random direction …… back and forth, round and back and round ….. letting the fabric dictate …….
Here it is at the start…..
And now a scarf. I wasn't sure it was finished – it was fun and rhythmical to "crumple and stitch….crumple and stitch" – I could have continued, but I stopped sewing and wore it on the daily jaunt. I liked the feel and the drape, the ruff on back of neck that gave protection from the sun, the 'scrunchied' aspect. It is finished. The edges are left free to fray and travel as they will.
Next I took another piece of linen, this one the colour of the crocus in the garden…..
…. wet it, scrunched it width-wise and then length-wise, secured it with elastic bands and let it sit for a number of hours to set the creases. Then I took off the elastics and let it dry in its crumpled state.
Here is how it looked dried and unfolded.
Then – time at the sewing machine with more scrunch and stitch, scrunch and stitch, scrunch and stitch – letting the set creases have their say.
Again, as in the above one, becoming more intense at both ends with some notion of an anchor to the drape and flow.
I am 'scrunchied'!
A sprig of forsythia would look nice peeping out from one of those folds.