Crewelwork Dragonfly and Butterfly

With summer coming soon the insects are flying by again. Many of the bugs are very beautiful when looked at closely. They are a popular subject in embroidery. Many books have been written just about designs and techniques used to recreate the look of these fascinating creatures. Quite a few artists worked almost solely on this subject.


The Dragonfly is made with Appleton's Crewel wool light Olive Green and two shades of Marine Blue. The body and the antenna of the butterfly are a Dark Olive green. The wings are two shades of Mauve and a Dull rose pink for the spots. I used these pieces as the motifs for the sampler in the third lesson of the Crewel Embroidery Course.

The body of the butterfly is worked first in herringbone stitch then surrounded in outline stitch. Then the antenna were added in split stitch with a french knot on each end.

For the wings on the butterfly I split stitched around each segment. Then satin stitched over top. The spots where worked first so that I could keep a more uniform shape when I stitched around them. The light Mauve is workup up and down and the darker wing tips are worked side to side.

The body of the Dragonfly is made the same as the wing segments in the butterfly.
By split stitching around and doing the satin stitch over top.

The tail is a row of French Knots made with two strands of wool to make the knots larger. The antenna and the outline of the wings are made in split stitch. The veins of the wings are worked in Feather Stitch. Starting from just inside the outer edge of the wing towards the body.