Fort Hunter Needle Art Exhibit and Half Moon Handwerks

June 8, 2018, 8:02 am
Filed under: Fort Hunter Exhibit, General comments

A beautiful piece of stumpwork greeted Linda and I as we entered Fort Hunter Mansion in Harrisburg, PA. Then, we enjoyed meeting and joined Judy and Joanne from Reading, members of ANG Apple Needlepointers, for a tour of the mansion by a lovely docent. We missed you Carol T! Feel better soon.

There were so many more pieces than I expected. Because some had multiple components, there had to be close to 150 items on display. They were distributed in all the rooms. We were able to get close to them. And, there were antique pieces of needlepoint throughout the mansion too!
Participating guilds include Apple Needlepoint Chapter of the American Needlepoint Guild, Molly Pitcher Stitchers, Susquehanna, Nittany Valley, York White Rose and Lancaster Red Rose chapters of the Embroiderers Guild of America. The pieces represented about 2 dozen forms of needle arts including beadwork, blackwork, canvas work/needlepoint, counted cross stitch, counted thread, crewel embroidery, goldwork, hardanger, hock swedish weaving, Japanese embroidery, lacework, petit point, pulled thread, Rozashi, surface embroidery, stumpwork, thread painting with machine, and wool felt applique.

We were allowed to take photos without flash. But, there were so many and I’m only going to post a couple of the exhibited items and a couple of vintage ones.

Stumpwork

Pulled work. Notice that the right in all white is the same pattern as the one on the left stitched with colored threads. Thanks to the docent for pointing that out to us.

These are excellent stitchers and the participating guilds should be commended for putting on a stellar exhibit.

Antique firescreens

Vintage sewing box and tools. Having the spools draped across the front makes such an efficient use of space and is pretty.

And, we can’t go that far without stopping by Half Moon Handwerks. While Debbie helped Linda find fabulous fabrics for her quilt projects, I drooled over the Chameleon threads which I have only found here. Chameleon Threads are hand dyed in Africa and are wonderful. I especially love the Shades of Africa Two Oceans. But, they also have amazing colors in Perle 8, 12, 16 (not in this store but according to what I found online), Soie d’ Alger, Soie de Paris, Au Ver a Soie, and stranded cotton.