Sometimes it is difficult to remember precisely when an idea is born. In this case it was definitely while we were driving around Iceland in 2014 that this project first came into focus.
We discussed it, thought it would be a nice project but would take many years and if I’m honest, I suspected it might just be an interesting pipe dream.
My partner Debbie enjoys many different arts and crafts but embroidery is a particular skill.
She has worked on museum quality projects such as the one you can see her working on here for Lofotr Viking Museum in Northern Norway and she has made some fabulous work for me over the years, much of it being featured in my regular school workshops.
It was not long after our Iceland trip that this first concept image was created outlining a Valknut formed from the branches of the great tree ”Laerad” embracing the nine worlds described in the Norse pantheon.
Having discussed how long something like this would take to complete and with figures of around ten years being discussed, I still did not really expect it progress far beyond the concept.
Imagine my surprise then when Debbie handed me a watercolour pad in 2016 on my birthday, containing 83 pages of beautiful hand drawn and painted concept art. I was speechless, which is very rare for me.
I knew she had been doing some research but the scope of it and the quality of the artwork was a revelation.
One of the things that impressed me most was that I could recognise many of the images from archaeological or art sources from the period or very close to it. Although we were creating something new and unique, the design itself had it’s foundations firmly rooted in the real art of the Nordic world.
What followed was the creation of some simplified line drawings on rolled paper to match the scale of the intended garment and my skills finally came into play with photographing the line work and compositing it so that we could get some sense of the entire thing.
The base material for the cloak was chosen to be a good match for natural black sheep wool and the thread for the embroidery ( crewel work strictly speaking ) is pure wool as well. Some colours would be chosen for symbolic purposes while others would help to identify key characters.
Work on the embroidery itself started in the summer of 2017 and the image you see here was taken at the end of 2018.
In this second image I have superimposed the proposed digital artwork onto the embroidery to give a better idea of how the finished article should look, although the design is still evolving as time goes on.
February 2019 and the tree is almost completed other than the middle section which needs to intersect with elements of the design near the centre.
Here you can see a closer view of some of the occupants of Laerad to give you an idea of the quality of the embroidery.
I should make it clear at this point that we are not setting out to make a reproduction of any real artefact here. Although the Vikings and Saxons did use embroidery, it would have rarely been used in this sort of concentration.
The intention is to create a visual aid for story telling and as such the design contains elements from many of the important stories that create an arc from the Norse creation myth to the prophesy of Ragnarok at it’s end. It serves as a mind map of sorts to a fantastic world, populated by gods and giants, elves and dwarves, dragons and other spiritual creatures.
This is a long term investment and will be used as an important part of our education work when it is finished.
New Year 2022. Debs is at the stage that she thinks this may be finished in a year or two. If so it will have taken about ten years from concept to completion. A stunning amount of work.
Most of the characters are in place now and some of the buildings have been repositioned to fit better. Almost all of what you see here is on the cloth with very few bits of the original artwork overlaid this time.
I have labelled some of the characters and if you click on the image you may be able to see a larger version depending on your browser.