Church Banner Triptych Set

Hi Friends!

Now that you've seen the 3 banners for church develop individually, I'd like to explain a little more about the inspirations, and also tell you some of the hidden secrets!

A stained glass window at church, with some of the symbols of Rocco: Hat, dog, staff.

One of the inspirations was too look at some of the symbology already present in the church, and the histories of the saints themselves.

The St. James window, with the scallop and sword.

Another resource was looking at banners I could take inspiration from. I traveled to Valparaiso around the time I started the project, and initially, this banner caught my eye, for some techniques (not design).

This banner has lots of texture. Couched threads, textured fabrics, smooth fabrics, and metallic threads all play a role.

I particularly liked the couching (where you lay a thick thread on top of the fabric, then use thin threads to sew it down). There are a few pieces that are currently glued and will be couched on the St. James banner, but I abandoned the technique as not giving the effect I wanted, based on the types of fabrics I was using.

However, as I was shown the University Chapel at Valparaiso, there was one banner set that really started catching my eye. Not only were they neat on their own, they gave me clues about how to make several banners look like they belonged together.

By looking at this banner set, I learned that you could use several motifs (light, ribbons, and a scene) and by having them cross over multiple banners, and using a piecing technique to bring in multiple colors, you could still get a set.

I hope you can see that happening here too:

The following info is what I shared with the congregation about some of the hidden features and details of the set.


The Saint Banners: Did You Notice?


St. James

- The red cross actually contains some of his other symbols: the bottom is the pointed sword, and the top and sides represent his scallop(s)
- The red shield is in homage to the St. James Church coat of arms, which is a red shield with three scallops and a sword


St. Andrew

- Some of the blue fabrics have a nautical theme. Bonus if you notice what’s on the period on the word “St.”!
- The overall color is blue because that reinforces the nautical/fisherman theme
- The fish actually has scales, if you look closely. They are made of glitter on a see-through fabric, but the glitter is trapped because I used the fabric upside-down!
- The fish also has an eye
- The net has three ropes, representing the Trinity
- Can you see the St. Andrew’s cross? It isn’t actually made of fabric, but the negative image of the cross is formed by the blue squares, outlining the white saltire


St. Rocco

- This dog is copied directly from a medieval drawing, since St. Rocco lived in the middle ages, including the style of his eye and his collar
- There is a cross on the loaf of bread


All Three: Similarities

- The overall style is similar: the use of bold color and blocks/squares for much of the design
- All are abstract to some degree
- All have an animal
- None have humans
- Each has at least one human tool
- All use a silver fabric (sword for James, fish for Andrew, dog for Rocco)
- All are the same size and use the same background/base fabric
- All three have some form of cross


All Three: Differences

- None share any colored fabrics
- Each has a different featured color (Reds for James, Blue for Andrew, and Green for Rocco)
- Each has a different featured shape (triangle for James, diamond/X for Andrew, and upside-down V/square for Rocco)


Yours,

Sarah

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Church Banner - St. Andrew

Sketch for St. Andrew banner

Hi Friends,

This banner was fun but oh, so much harder to put onto fabric what I had in my head!!! As you can see in the sketch above, St. Andrew (a fisherman) is being represented in a nautical way, with a large fish in the center.

To begin with, I started with the fish. The squares, while a multitude, are geometrically simple, so those came second. The net... ah, the net. We'll get to that.

The fish.

To make the fish, I used the same technique as with the dog: iron-on the interfacing, draw the fish on the paper in reverse, then cut it out.

Fish compared to banner. Note that due to aspect ratios, I had to shift proportions when transferring the idea to fabric.

The squares in place, but not ironed down. Selecting the fish angle: nose down...

...or nose up? The lines are masking tape, helping me keep some angles lined up.

Still hadn't figured out the net, and can't place the fish till the net was done, so I set that aside, and worked on the squares and the name. The squares needed to not have too many of the same print near each other, and I wanted the slight fade-out effect from using different sizes.

Working on the name.

Squares are ironed down. Now placing, aligning, and ironing down the name.

At this point I hit a mental roadblock. Initially, I had thought of creating some sort of string net in dark grey, and couching it to the banner. But the amount of handwork was daunting (not in and of itself an issue), and I hadn't figured out how to not have the ropes show through the fish and give it a weird texture.

I looked at various types of netting, lace, and other hole-y fabrics, in hopes I could find something flatter that would give me the look I wanted. I found nothing that worked. The project came to a standstill. Luckily, I still had some time.

I kept browsing for options and frequently went to fabric stores to try to figure out a way past the incongruities between my vision and what I could put my hands on.

Finally. I realized that maybe I could find a fabric that just looked right. It had to be dark lines on a light background, though, and most prints with ropes are dark blue with white or tan ropes, so this would take some hunting. Eventually, though, I found what I wanted!!!

The diamond "weave" matches the lozenge blank space on the banner, so that is a lovely shape-echo

Here you can see the color a bit better. It's a pale blue with very dark navy lines.

So now I have a net! Still a bit of shaping to be done, but it means I can go back to the fish for a bit.
The fish originally was going to have individual scales, each of a different color. I swapped that plan in favor of a sheer teal tulle, which was much more synthetic than I'm used to working with. Had to turn my iron cooler! And... this part I paid for... it had a glitter pattern shaped like fish or mermaid scales. I reversed the fabric, so the glitter side faced the silver fish, but once it was ironed down, you could still see the scales (without the banner shedding glitter).

... I got a little over zealous cleaning up the glitter (which I am not a fan of!) and accidentally touched my hot iron... had blisters for a week... oops!

The scales and the fin stripes are from tulle fabric and tulle ribbon respectively, in both cases with the glitter encased.

After a bit of playing with it, I managed to shape a net, and started working on positioning:

And here we go! All put together!

Staying ironed on the rocking chair waiting to be delivered to church!

And hanging up!

The symbolism:

The Saltire
You may be familiar with the flag of Scotland, which is blue with a white X (also called a saltire). This is the Cross of St. Andrew, which originates from the shape of a sideways crucifix or similar cross, which is how St. Andrew was killed.

The Net
St. Andrew was a fisherman, and one of Jesus’ disciples.

The Fish
Again, St. Andrew was a fisherman, and he "fished for men" according to the story.

Other names for Saint Andrew include: None! He was only St. Andrew!


Yours,

Sarah

To subscribe, find the "subscribe by email" note in the left column and enter your email there. Posts will be emailed directly to you whenever I post them!

Resource list: Visit my spreadsheet at www.tinyurl.com/infantloss

Church Banner - St. Rocco

Banner plan sketch detail.

Hi Friends,

The second banner I worked on for church represents St. Rocco. Unlike the St. James, who I already posted about, and St. Andrew (yet to come), Rocco was alive in the 1300s, and this means that part of my research could be in medieval manuscripts! Fun!

In fact, this picture from a book cover is actually my direct inspiration for the dog on the banner. There is a dog because that's part of Rocco's story (see below for explanations of the symbols I used). The dog is a whippet style, because whippets and greyhounds were popular in the middle ages. Also, because they are super cute the way they were drawn back then!

A book cover with original medieval art, serving as inspiration for my St. Rocco Puppy!!! :)

Final sketch

Final sketch, framed to give to the Priest whose idea it was!

Doggo!

My first step was to use iron-on double-sided interfacing, as I'd used on the prior banner. I ironed it all over the back of the silver fabric, but left the paper on, sketched my dog in reverse, then cut it out; laying it on the banner gave me a sense if I was where I needed to be. I proceeded to do this with all the other shapes needed for this design.

Initial layout

In the initial layout, you can see that all the edges are still curling up. At this point they all have the double-sided iron-on interfacing, but still with the paper backing. This was my test for placement, then I pinned it all down roughly, just to keep things in their respective places, so I could move to the ironing board.

All ironed down!

As I ironed, I was able to fine tune placement, especially when I had to remove and replace upper layers so I could get the bottom layers right, or when I was interweaving layers, like with the roots and branches. You may have noticed that my sketch and my banner do not have the same aspect ratio. Yep, that actually caused some consternation, since it meant I had to readjust placements and proportions once I was working with fabric! I don't know why I didn't prepare my sketch pad to reflect the right dimensions...

Done and on display! Love that doggo

The Symbols of St. Rocco

As represented on our new banner, 2017

The Forest
St. Rocco lived in the middle ages, and cared for people with the plague. When he also caught it, he went and lived in the forest alone. He is often shown pointing to an open plague wound or bubo on his leg.

The Dog with Bread
While St. Rocco was living in the forest, a dog stole bread from its master and brought it to St. Rocco to keep him alive until he recovered. Some stories say that the master followed the dog, and took St. Rocco to his home to recover. Others say the master simply became a follower of St. Rocco once he recovered.

The Hat with Shell
At one point in his life, St. Rocco made a pilgrimage, likely to Rome. By this point, the shell was the symbol of Christian pilgrims of all types, regardless of where they went, though still most often associated with St. James at Santiago in Spain.

The Staff with Water Bottle
The staff is another symbol of pilgrimage, given that pilgrimages at that time were done on foot.

Other names for Saint Rocco include: St. Roch, St. Rock, St. Roche, St. Rochus, Sant Roque.

Yours,
Sarah

To subscribe, find the "subscribe by email" note in the left column and enter your email there. Posts will be emailed directly to you whenever I post them!

Resource list: Visit my spreadsheet at www.tinyurl.com/infantloss

Church Banner - St. James

Hi Friends,

Last year, our parish priest requested that I make a three-banner set for the church, representing 3 saints that are important to that church. Based on when he asked me and how soon he wanted them ready for display, I agreed to try to have them finished by the saint's day for each one as it came up.

**Note. Since this was done for a church, the descriptions and explanations below will make use of more "churchy" and Bible-related language. However, I'm presenting it here primarily for the artistic and fiber arts side of things.

The first saint's day that was going to approach was that of St. James. Based on research using various saint descriptions and databases, I came up with a list of symbols for each saint, and started working it into a design.

Additionally, it was important that all three banners be distinct and individual, but yet that they have some cohesion and are clearly of a set. I came up with the mosaic-esque element first, and decided to try to have a similar element in each, to keep them unified. I'll write more about my inspirations for the set as a whole when I post about the completed set of 3.

Here are some of my sketches:

The key was in my early sketches, but got exchanged for the St. James cross when I had trouble finding out what the key was supposed to stand for. Drat, because I liked my multi-piece key design.

I liked how the cross came out too, though!

Once I had the design ready, I got the fabrics. I got all of the base/background for the banners at once, since it would be the same for all of them. I measured the hall they would be going into, with the help of the priest, to figure out what kind of space coverage he wanted. They ended up about 3' x 5', though the wall could have handled more. The restrictions that kept them small were 1) it had to be able to fit on banner poles for procession, and 2) the person carrying it needed to be able to see under or around it if necessary.

I cut and hemmed all three bases at once, so I could then just focus on design.

Here you can see the process of layout. I used a combination of pins and eyeballing, and then ironed everything on using iron-on double sided interfacing. In fact, that's the state the banner is still in... one of these weeks I'll bring it home and just sew down all the edges!

Full layout, fully ironed down, awaiting some details.

The details are the shell ridges and the sword runnel. Both are a shiny metallic cord. They are glued on, to be couched properly by hand at a later date.

Draped over a rocking chair awaiting delivery. Didn't want to make creases in my ironed banner, so it took over the living room!

Banner and artist in the church hall!

Here's my write-up of the symbolism used, which was posted beside the banner in the church:

The Path
St. James, after being a disciple of Jesus, became a traveling preacher in his own right, and is said to have traveled as far as Spain. The path represents his travels and his teachings of Jesus as The Way.

The Shield
St. James Parish in [removed] uses a red shield with a sword and shell as their church crest.

The Sword
St. James is said to have been beheaded by a king who did not appreciate his teachings.

The Shell
One of the places in Spain that St. James may have traveled to, and where his relics did come to rest, was named after him: Santiago de Compostela. This is not far from a coastal area, and pilgrims who visited his relics in the middle ages would pick up a sea shell as a souvenir. Some attribute the shell to pilgrims’ souvenirs from the area of Palestine, instead.

The St. James Cross
The St. James Cross combines the iconography of the sword (the pointed bottom) and the scallop (the top).

Other names for Saint James include: St. James the Greater, Santiago (or Sant Iago), San Diego, Sankt Jakobus, St. Jacob.

Yours,

Sarah

To subscribe, find the "subscribe by email" note in the left column and enter your email there. Posts will be emailed directly to you whenever I post them!


Resource list: Visit my spreadsheet at www.tinyurl.com/infantloss