Historical Sampler - Heavy Chain Stitch, Not Laid Work: The Rose Stem

I haven't actually seen a long straight line of laid work being done in a scrolling vine design, as I did for the long stem of my rose. (I'm going to do a separate post on the possible stitches to use in a scrolling vine design)

So I decided to change it.

Jane Zimmerman's "The Art of Elizabethan Embroidery" suggests a number of stitches as being suitable for a thin line.

This is the "before" photo of the stem as it existed :

 

I decided to go for Heavy Chain Stitch, since it is a relatively simple stitch for long lines and this was my first (well, second) attempt. Jane Zimmerman also describes a variation of Heavy Chain stitch which gives a heavier braid.

I learnt the actual stitch from Country Bumpkin's "Embroiderer's Handbook". (I need step by step embroidery instructions)

Now, the "after" photo makes the stitching look absolutely terrible. It's reflecting off the gold and makes it look very wobbly indeed.

Not that I didn't occasionally put the needle through the wrong hole when going up towards the rose, but it does look a whole lot better in real life than it does here :

I widened the stem as I got closer to the rose, finishing at 4 threads across. Each stitch was one thread up from the last stitch.

The pointy part at the beginning 'just sort of happened' as I started to build my chain of double (heavy) chain stitches.

I used my trusty Lurex thread.

It was hard to do in terms of getting the needle to catch those two small ends  of each metal thread chain stitch. I needed a bandaid to protect my finger. I'd really hate to try it with passing thread.

I used a tapestry needle to avoid picking up any ground threads.

Here's the sampler as it now looks :

I think this version of the stem is far more in the flavour of the piece than the laid work version was, and I'm glad that I made the change.