Shep heads for Arizona

I finished up the Shep's World rug in time to take it to AZ for the class I'm taking and the rug show that is part of our class.

The finished rug measures 36 1/2 by 28 inches.  It is hooked in Townsend cut, hand cut and hand torn strips that average 8.5 - 10 cuts.  Some small accent colors (especially black and the rust/orange) have been hooked in a narrow cut averaging from a 4-6 cut.

As a last minute addition I added some random and narrow cut black lines in the rectangular background area around Shep.  The more I looked at the finished rug on the floor I decided the narrow black lines would give the rug more balance to enhance other black tones in the rug.  Here are two pictures showing the rug with the lines and without the lines.  I think I prefer the lines added, but I may still end up removing them.  

Shep with black lines in rectangular background area.

Shep with no black lines in the rectangular background area. 

I had an interesting piece of selvage from one of the wool fabrics used in the rug so I gave Shep a collar.  It is hand stitched on.  I also tweaked his mouth a bit to give a small dark lip line.

Note the addition of a collar strip on Shep's neck.

It is hard to tell from these photos, but the wool selections used in this rug are much more harmonious together than they look in the photos.  This is one rug which doesn't photograph well.  It has a good primitive appearance in person, with far less contrast as it appears to have in the photos.  Here are some closeup shots of the other barnyard critters Shep watches over.

The brown hen below recedes into the background quite a bit on the rug and after hooking the hen I didn't use this color again because of the contrast challenges.  But I decided to keep her in the mix of animals as she is because I like the fact she doesn't stand out a lot which makes the mix of animals more quirky.  

The brown hen is a little hard to see and make out in the overall rug, but this adds to the antique style charm.

Several people have emailed me and commented about the wool used for the cats.  It is an old Pendleton plaid and unfortunately I seem to have used it all up so I cannot photograph it to show what it looks like as fabric.

This rug was a lot of fun to hook.  It is more muddy in primitive style than I usually hook and that was a good exercise for me.

I've received a few requests asking if this rug will be available as a pattern.  Yes it will be available but due to my impending move (fingers crossed all escrows close) I'm postponing pattern making until mid March.  I've taken my website and Etsy shops down for the time being.  If you are interested in the pattern please feel free to email me at briarwoodfolkart@surewest.net and I will keep you posted about its availability.

I am scheduled to be back from AZ on January 21st and I will post pictures of my AZ adventures then.

Thank you for watching my progress on this rug.