Phase 2: Round and Round Couching, Part 1

I've been working on my cords, and I only have one left to finish, but today I'm going to talk about my JE lesson this weekend, where I learned to do round and round couching on the main fan rib. I used a #5 imitation silver thread and a dark blue silk couching thread.

The first step in this process is to wind the metal thread around koma. Metal threads come in a twisted loop like this:

I took off the ties, untwisted it, and put the giant loop around two large tomato cans:

I found one end and then began twisting it around one of my koma:

Because metal thread has a slight twist in it, it's important to wind it properly, or you could get kinks in the thread or accidentally remove the twist. With the tomato cans to hold the loops of thread up, I held the koma in my left hand and used my right hand to keep the thread length I was winding taut. I then rested my right wrist on the table so that hand wouldn't move at all, and I swirled the left hand to wind the thread around the koma. Every loop or two off the tomato cans, I carefully checked to make sure there were no kinks in the thread.

When I had about 25 loops left around the tomato cans, I found the other end of the thread and wound it around the other koma, till there was an even amount on both koma. Then I snipped the thread between them. Here are my koma, wound and ready to go:

With that done, it was time to start the round and round couching on the main fan rib. I started near the bottom and first couched down a single thread:

Then I lay the second thread next to it and couched over both of them in the same spot:

To make sure those stitches would hold tight while I continued my couching, I placed a pinhead stitch between the two strands:

Then I continued placing couching stitches at 2.5mm intervals:

I kept the pattern line between the two metal strands and held the koma taut with my left hand:

With metal threads like this one, keeping the threads taut apparently makes them look much shinier when you're done. So I did my best; the koma helped a lot.

Here's the circle done:

I think it looks pretty good, but this is where things got tricky. The spot where the thread turns the corner to go up the fan blade is supposed to have a sharp corner, but I found this very hard. You have to place one stitch over both threads in the direction of the long fan blade line. Then you place a single stitch over the outer metal thread to help it form a sharp corner. Then you place a third stitch over both threads along the direction of the circle line, going in the same hole as the first stitch: 

The grey lines are my silver threads, and the blue lines are the couching threads. The black is the pattern. Hopefully you can see it well enough from this.

But it was surprisingly difficult to do. Here's my first effort:

It's not so much a sharp corner as it is a gradual curve. 😂 I did it three more times before I decided it would have to be good enough. Here's the final try:

It is a more obvious corner at least. So I pressed on. I had a little better luck with the next two corners, as they were 90-degree angles:

I think it looks pretty good. I poked my tekobari in the corner of the outer thread to help define a sharper corner.  But no joke, it took me forever to get this far — like three hours. It was really hard to hold the koma to keep the thread tight and also hold the 2.5mm measuring template and also place the couching stitches. I needed three hands. 

Then I remembered my handy dandy needle minders, of which I have a nice collection. I used one of those to hold the measuring template in place, which left me with one hand to hold the koma and one hand to stitch:

I wish I'd thought of this sooner because this method was so much easier and my pace doubled. Things went smoothly till I reached my starting point. I had sunk my beginning ends, one at time, once I finished the first round of the circle, so that part was done. I had a little trouble going around the corner, but I think it turned out okay:

Once I got to this point, I didn't really need my measuring template because I was bricking my couching — that is, placing each stitch between the stitches on the previous row. Here's my first row of bricked stitches:

I think it looks pretty nice. Alas, this is all the progress I made in eight hours of lessons this weekend. It really was time consuming. And it's trickier than you'd think to place each couching stitch perpendicular to the metal threads. I had to remove countless stitches and redo them because they were at an angle. But I think I'm getting the hang of it. And heaven knows, I'll have enough opportunity to practice as I have much more round and round couching to do. 

Anyway, this was the last technique I needed to learn in order to finish this fan. So I will do my best to make good progress on it. I'm also in the process of choosing my phase 3 design and colors. I'm excited about that. It will take a while to make my final decisions, order all the materials, and then wait for them to ship. But that's just as well because I still have many hours' worth of work to do on this piece. But it really is exciting to be so close to finishing.