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GINNIE THOMPSON FLOWER THREAD There are two main reasons for using Flower Thread. One, the soft matte colors made to resemble natural dyes and two, the thickness of the thread which equals two strands of six-strand floss. The colors were originally dyed by the Danish master dyer, Einar Hansen. In the Museum of Applied Arts in Copenhagen there is a series of folios by Einar Hansen in which he has pressed and mounted those plants which made the natural dyes used in the 1800's by Danish peasants. Beside each pressed plant is a wool sample showing the color of the natural dye. These colors were the basis for the chemically dyed cotton thread we call Flower Thread. The name reflects the infuence of Gerda Bengtsson (1900-1996), A Danish designer who is best known for her beautiful flower designs. Miss Bengtsson was trained as a weaver as well as an artist, and was experienced as a dyer. Another artist and a contemporary of Gerda Bengtsson and Einar Hansen was Else Johnsen, who sought textural uniformity in counted cross stitch embroidery by using the same thickness of basic thread for the background fabric and the embroidery thread. As devotees of Flower Thread know, this similarity of thickness gives a very special look to pieces worked on linen of a thickness equal to a single strand of Flower Thread (26-30ct.) or linen of a thickness equal to two Flower Thread strands (18-20 ct.). Ginnie and Ken Thompson introduced Danish Flower Thread to the American market in the mid-1980's. When the demand for the thread exceeded the production capacity of the Danish Handcraft Guild, they introduced Ginnie Thompson Flower Thread®, with redesigned packaging, color numbering and a broader color range, as a substitute to meet market demands. The Flower Thread Company is presently operated by their daughter, Meg Shinall. In choosing colors the first
determination is HUE (red, green, grey, brown, etc.). The
second determination and the more important decision is
VALUE which only means the lightness or darkness of the hue.
Mistakes in hue are less serious than errors in value.
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