Among my souvenirs {The Italian Job}

Continuing the stories behind some of my favourite quilts before I pack them up for the move.

In the lead up to our trip to Italy in 2007 I had a light bulb moment.

I decided to bring back what would be, to me, the ultimate souvenir: a quilt. I’d make it myself, and it would hold all our precious memories and reminders of our adventures.

This is how I went about it.

First of all I designed the layout on graph paper. It would consist of 12 inch blocks arranged in a seemingly random pattern on a 4 x 4 grid. I raided my stash for fabrics in variations of red, green and gold choosing patterns that reminded me of Baroque music or rich, Italianate architectural styles.  Gold stamping was perfect for creating that Renaissance feel too.

I was particularly excited to find this green acanthus leaf fabric in the photo below, looking just like flowery decorative moldings.  Here and there I designed pairs of ‘tiles’, squares on point, to suggest, in a simplified way, the mosaic floor tiles I knew I’d find in Italian churches.

Each block included one piece of plain cream homespun among the fancy fabrics, and my plan was to embroider these with small sketches of sights that took my fancy as we travelled around.

Once I had the layout arranged to my satisfaction (see below) I took a photo for future reference.

Finally I gathered together the pieces for each block and popped them into 16 plastic ziplock bags which I labelled by row and column (1A, 1B, 1C etc).

Sixteen small plastic bags of fabric pieces weighed very little, and with a bunch of DMC embroidery threads in a varied palette of greens and khaki shades and my sketchbook tucked into my bag I was ready to capture the essence of Italy and turn it into a quilt!

First stop Rome where we first saw these bees at the Palazzo Barberini. This is the shield of Pope Urban VIII, the member of the Barberini family who had Bernini build the Palazzo, and I was fascinated to see more bees on monuments to this powerful family all over Rome. We were told they symbolised industriousness, but I’ve read other theories one of which says they were a visual play on words associated with the first part of the name (barb = bee sting). Bees also apparently have significance as religious symbols.

This pretty little finial was in the grounds of the Vatican.

I just love this little guy carrying an Egyptian obelisk on his back! Created by the sculptor Bernini in 1667, this baby elephant’s a little gem hidden away in the peaceful Piazza Minerva just minutes from the tourist crowds milling at the Pantheon. The day I went looking for him I found myself quite alone in the piazza, delighted to be able to take my time sketching and appreciating the beautifully balanced lines of one of the sweetest little monuments I’ve seen.

By contrast, right beside the Spanish Steps where, it seems, the youth of the world joyously meet, I was taken by this shell shape, carved above the front door of the Keats Shelley Memorial House where John Keats breathed his last.

On to Sicily where we visited the town of Monreale and its magnificent Cathedral where marble columns in the cloisters are decorated with foliage, animals and Biblical scenes.

In Palermo the charming combination of Norman and Arabic architecture caught my eye.

Just a short bus ride from Palermo, in the seaside resort of Mondello, this mermaid fountain dominates the town square. I knew she needed to go in my souvenir quilt, as a reminder of my day at the seaside.

The cathedral in Cefalu boasts this magnificent golden mosaic.

If it’s colour you want you can always count on glorious Tuscany! I’d been trying to get to San Gimignano for twenty years and once there you might say I ate it up . Italian ceramics are so exuberant and vibrant, but the only way this huge pitcher was coming home with me was on my quilt.

Assisi was another of those places I’d had on my “bucket list” for ages. Here’s the Church of St Francis.

This is our friend Angela’s Tuscan villa, perched high on a hillside near Manciano surrounded by groves of olive trees. It was our base for a week where we relaxed in the sunshine, read, drank Italian wine, and I caught up with my little embroideries for the quilt. Ah, the serenity……

We also enjoyed some mighty fine meals. One of our favourite gastronimic experiences was wild boar (cinghiale) which we ate casseroled, roasted, skewered, cured, and minced on crostini. This fellow above was stuffed and mounted on a board.

By the time I walked in the front door back home I had most of my embroideries completed and just needed to sew the squares together.

I loved the creative process for this quilt which was, quite literally, a fantastic journey. I’ve had it hanging in our sitting room for the past six years where I see it every day, but writing this post and looking back on all my blog entries for that holiday has brought me even more pleasure than I imagined.

I’m blessed to have such happy memories in my quilt.

 Di

At last - the Italian Job (top) is finished!

Here he is, the final stitchery in The Italian Job - a wild boar! These fellows are hunted in Tuscany and feature on the menu in many a trattoria. Delicious!

Now for the quilting... but don't hold your breath 'cos I've just started another quilt!

The Italian Job: 'Bout wrapped up, guv!

The Italian Job is about done! I've snapped, sketched and stitched my holiday memories into a colourful, scrappy quilt, and at last the end is in sight.

We saw this huge ceramic jar, featuring vibrant sunflowers and lemons, outside a shop in Assisi (or was it San Gimignano?...)

Only one block to go - what do you think my choice of stitchery will be?

A clue - it's a very popular ingredient in Tuscan cooking.

The Italian Job: A Tweetie from Monreale

This little birdie was carved into a column in the cloisters of Monreale Cathedral in Sicily.

The Italian Job: "Jim" from San Gim

This magnificent fellow, a ceramic wall-fountain, caught my eye in San Gimignano. With foliage and fruit covering his head I think he is probably some sort of harvest fertility symbol akin to the Green Man mythology in England.




Though he looks quite fearsome, of course he had to go into the quilt.

The Italian Job - another block finished

After a 10 month spell 'resting' in a box while I worked on other quilts, The Italian Job is once again seeing the light of day. With only 4 more blocks to complete I hope to have it stitched together pronto!

If you don't already know about this project of mine take a look at my previous entries describing this quilt under tag "The Italian Job".

Basically, I'm stitching together memories of a fabulous trip to Italy at this time last year, with embroideries created from photos I took. I've selected design elements from buildings, as well as objects that were quintessentially summer in Italy, and as I work on it again the memories of Rome, Palermo, Taormina, San Gimignano and Assisi come flooding back.

This latest block shows an arched window from a building in Palermo, demonstrating the very strong Moorish influence in that city's historic architecture.

Another stitchery - Tuscany to a "T"

"The Italian Job" just wouldn't have been complete without a sunflower...

Stitching while travelling overseas - an update

You might recall the memory quilt I planned to make while we were travelling around Italy - The Italian Job.

[To see my previous references to this project, please click on the "Italian Job" label in the right hand column]

I had laid out my fabrics (reds, golds, greens and creams from my stash, the colours of an Italian summer) in blocks until I was happy with their placement. Then I photographed the unstitched "quilt" and each unstitched "block". Some blocks comprised as many as 6 pieces of fabric, but always included a square or rectangle of cream quilters muslin and a corresponding piece of Pellon. Then I popped each block's fabric into a zip lock bag, taped its photo on the front, and labelled it (A1, A2, A3...etc) so I knew exactly where each block fitted in the scheme of things.

The plan was to photograph design elements, or simple buildings or landmarks, that we saw on our travels around Italy - and what a wealth of material there is!!!! Then I would make simple sketches (at night, in our hotel) and trace these onto the quilters muslin pieces, then back them with Pellon ready to embroider.

16 zip lock bags were quite light, compact and flat, easy to carry in my computer bag on the plane. I just needed to remember, before each flight, to swap my lethally sharp embroidery scissors for my Clover pendant cutter. I had no trouble anywhere (Singapore Airlines and Alitalia) with carrying needles and a small supply of pins.

The airline movies were so much more enjoyable with my stitching in my hands, and it was wonderful to enjoy so much guilt-free sewing time! When we were wandering around Rome, Palermo etc I would just pop one of my little plastic bags, with needle, thread and scissors, into my handbag, and each time we stopped for a coffee at an outdoor cafe I would take out my embroidery, while Boak would read a chapter of his book.

He did comment one day that he considered putting out an upturned hat, since so many people seemed to gather or slow down to look at this strange activity! If people would pay to watch buskers juggle, dress up as the Statue of Liberty, or play at being Pinocchio, then who knows what they might have paid to see a foreign lady stitching their landmarks into a quilt?!?!

Well, I've arrived home with 10 blocks (out of the 16) completed, so I'm very happy with my progress. However, since this quilt is just for me, and since I have several quilts and other projects for other people, the Italian Job is unlikely to be completed very soon. I have done the sketches, though, and traced several more designs onto their quilters muslin and backed them with Pellon ready for stitching.

Here are some of my finished stitcheries......

This was part of a huge golden mosaic in the apse of Monreale Cathedral in Sicily. My humble stitchery just doesn't do it justice, but I was so impressed with the real thing that it had to be included in my quilt of memories from our trip.

This is my interpretation of Angela's beautiful little villa where we stayed, on a hilltop surrounded by groves of olive trees, a few kilometres from the Tuscan villiage of Manciano - and a thousand kilometres from care!

I think this has to be my favourite stitchery so far, a little elephant carved in red granite by a pupil of the great sculptor Bernini, supporting an obelisk on his back. He stands in the Piazza Minerva, a stone's throw from the Pantheon, and is just the cutest thing!

The splendid Basilica of San Francesco dominates the town of Assisi, and so it was a natural choice to represent our visit there. The symbol looking like a letter "T" is actually a "tao", a peace symbol, and Assisi has adopted it as one of its emblems.

Tootling around Tuscany

Perhaps so much “tootling” as “tearing” around Tuscany where 'Fangio' (you may know him as 'Boak') is concerned! He’s been at it again, fearlessly chewing up the miles as we zipped up to Assisi today. It’s a three hour drive each way, about half of it on a wide straight autostrada and the rest winding through the beautiful Tuscan and Umbrian countryside.

Assisi was a photographer’s paradise and I went quite snap-happy as I collected plenty of photographic material for the stitcheries on The Italian Job.

The Church of St Francis - and its magnificent rose window below.

We wandered around licking gelati and checking out the shops selling exquisite embroidery (Assisi work) and ceramics to die for, but waaaaaaaaay beyond our budget. A huge plate (not this one here, though) I spotted in a window had a price tag of 900 Euros!!!


However, ten minutes after Fangio drove out of the car park at Assisi it slowly dawned on us that we were travelling in the wrong direction. Not one to stop immediately, ask directions or turn back, Fangio drove on (hoping the road might miraculously take a U turn and begin to go in the opposite direction?). Not until we were 50 km from Assisi, and well on the way towards the other coast of Italy’s boot, did he execute Plan B, but by then we were thoroughly enjoying our proverbial “scenic route”.

If it hadn’t been for our unscheduled detour we might never have been pulled over by the Polizia.

Our hearts raced. Had Fangio been exceeding the speed limit? Never! (ahem…) Did they have RBT here in Italy? He’d at least be squeaky clean if this were the case.

The officer stepped out from the roadside and waved a paddle at us.

With infinite cool Fangio slowed the car and nudged the indicator. The windscreen wipers went into a frantic slip slapping!

Even before Fangio produced his International Driver’s Licence it was crystal clear to the officer that what he had here were a couple of nervous foreigners – and he played it up.

For what seemed like 5 minutes he flipped back and forwards through the licence, checking and rechecking Fangio’s photo before finally telling us we didn’t have our headlights fully on, as required here even in daylight, and letting us proceed.

We drove off ever-so sedately. Then we collapsed with laughter!