Wednesday, March 26, 2008

Vespa. Period.

I mentioned Floresita's Vintage Embroidery week over at Meet Me at Mikes, and realized that I'd planned on playing along but hadn't posted anything yet. Have I mentioned how scatter-brained I am? It's bad.

I was determined to get my stack of transfers scanned and start cleaning them up tonight, and I'm happy to report that I actually succeeded in the first part of that. I'm still cleaning some of them up, but I do have a little goody to post tonight.

I'll preface this series of vintage embroidery transfer posts with the story of how I came to have them. I haven't really stepped in to the world of collecting vintage transfers yet. I've peeked at the ones on ebay a few times, and knew myself well enough to get the heck out of there before I spent time and money I didn't have. I kind of live vicariously through Floresita, and get my vintage fix from her.

That was until I saw someone post to the Flickr Emrboidery Group that they had some vintage transfers they were off-loading. I jumped at the opportunity, and man am I glad I did. She generously sent a stack of vintage beauties all the way from England! I almost fell out of my chair when I started going through them. Most of them are Needlewoman and Needlecraft from England. I haven't been able to research them much yet, but these little gems just make me giddy.

This first transfer comes from a large sheet of vintage cars. They are amazing, and I'd give anything to drive in any one of them. There are also some great trees and shrubs that show up in the "background" of some of the car images. I know trees and shrubs don't sound like a big deal, but they have some really interesting design elements and would be fun to stitch and include in other projects. They'll make an appearance in a later post. For tonight, I'm posting one of my favorites on this sheet - the Vespa. Simple and fun and cute. And there's something about how it says, "Vespa." - with a period - that I love.

Vespa. Period.

I'll be back with one or two more tomorrow as I play catch-up on the week of vintage embroidery transfers. Enjoy!

9 comments :

  1. ooo love the vespa. Thanks for sharing. It is funny how sometimes we just fall into something. I never collected many embroidery patterns but I did collect crochet patterns and along with them came some vintage embroidery patterns and then I was hooked.

    ~Bekah

    ReplyDelete
  2. Oh, I likey! Thanks for playing along! This is a real goody!

    ReplyDelete
  3. Sweet! I can't wait to see what else you post. ;)

    ReplyDelete
  4. Ooh, I want to see them! I'm currently working on some Vogart Bees that Floresita was kind enough to send me transfers for.

    ReplyDelete
  5. love the vespa!!! i guess since i can't own one...i'll just have to embroider my obsession...

    ReplyDelete
  6. Thanks for sharing. I have suddenly developed an obsession with them, probably since I can't drive a car...or motorbike...or much else worth a damn.

    ReplyDelete
  7. Thanks for helping me realize that embroderiy can be hip.

    Now I just need to learn how to do it!

    ReplyDelete
  8. Holy Jesus, that's an amazing image! I'll have to tell you about my Vespa fixation someday (no, I don't OWN a scooter, I've just been obsessed with them for a loooong time...) Thanks for posting this!

    I want to see more vintage British embroidery designs!

    ReplyDelete
  9. I know this is way past the sell-by date for this post, but I just stumbled across this in a search for a profile image of a Vespa in order to make a V-themed mobile ... And the "'Vespa.' - with a period ...". You rock!

    ReplyDelete

Thank you so much for your comments! I read every single one of them. I do my best to respond when I can.

Have fun and be nice! :)
XOX
Rach