Crewel embroidery

Crewel embroidery, or Crewelwork, is a type of surface embroidery using wool. A wide variety of different embroidery stitches are used to follow a design outline applied to the fabric. The technique is at least a thousand years old.

The origin of the word crewel is unknown but is thought to come from an ancient word describing the curl in the staple, the single hair of the wool. Crewel wool has a long staple; it is fine and can be strongly twisted. Modern crewel wool is a fine, 2-ply or 1-ply yarn available in many different colours.

Description of the technique

The crewel technique is not a counted-thread embroidery (like canvas work), but a style of free embroidery. Crewelwork had its heyday in Britain in the 17th century, but has come in and out of fashion several times since then. Traditionally, crewel embroidery is done on tightly woven linen twill, though more recently, other fabrics like Matka silk, cotton velvet, rayon velvet, silk organza, net fabric and also jute have been used. A firm fabric is required to support the weight of the stitching. It is best to use a crewel needle to execute the stitches as a needle with a wide body, large eye and a sharp point is required.

Crewel (novel)

Crewel is a 2012 young adult dystopian fantasy novel by Gennifer Albin. The book is Albin's debut novel and is the first entry in her Crewel World trilogy.Crewel was released on October 16, 2012 by Farrar, Straus and Giroux and follows a young girl in a dystopian society that is pulled from her family due to her ability as a Spinster to manipulate the world via weaving. Albin stated that she came up with the idea of using the term "Spinsters" while comparing the term for old maids with that of the usage of the term to describe someone who spins wool. The following book in the series, Altered, was released on October 29, 2013.

Synopsis

Crewel form of magical weaving. This marks her as someone that would be of interest to the people who run Arras, as the world is completely dependent on the Guild to manipulate the world and bring in food and good weather. Every year Arras’s Manipulation Services performs a test on girls of a specific age, looking to see if they have the ability to manipulate. The girls that show promise are taken away in the night and put to work weaving the world around them. Adelice's parents knew of Adelice's abilities and tried to hide her talents, only for Adelice to accidentally reveal them during the testing period. Her parents try to hide her, only for the Guild to attack the family, seemingly killing Adelice's parents and carting away her little sister. She's told that if she cooperates, her sister will be fine. However, in a world where your entire personality can be re-woven to turn you into someone else and anyone can be removed from the world entirely at the whims of Arras's government, Adelice soon finds that not everything is as it seems and discovers a secret capable of destroying everything she holds dear.