My Norwegian Hardanger embroidery doilies

Norway is a beautiful country in the north pole region with its breathtaking landscapes, crystal-clear waters and rich Viking traditions.  Anyone acquainted with this marvelous country and talented people cannot afford to ignore their exquisite Hardanger embroidery.
An Intro to Hardanger embroidery >>

Also popularly known as Norwegian drawnwork, Hardanger embroidery is worked on a two-thread Hardanger fabric or evenweave linen.  The technique uses thick and thin pearl cotton threads from DMC/Anchor and uses cutwork, needle weaving and bands or blocks of satin stitch (known as kloster blocks) arranged in a countless number of intricate, geometric patterns.

After having lived in Norway for several years, I could not resist trying out this lovely needlecraft and after a bit of training, tried out a couple of creations myself. Though the stitches and the finished creations can be really small, the end result could be attractive enough to merit all that effort.

Blue Hardanger doily 
Here is a small rectangular doily with jagged edges I created using DMC pearl cotton threads in shaded blue:

Hardanger embroidery doily in shaded blue

Yellow Hardanger doily for Easter

I stitched a small square doily with maize yellow-colored DMC pearl cotton, on white sultan fabric.

Hardanger doily in yellow

The threads used are No. 5 and 8 in color # 726.

The design is from a Norwegian Hardanger book, where this doily is for decorating an Easter table.

Here is a closeup of the corner of the doily showing the stitches used:  Buttonhole stitch for the corners (Tungesting), Gobelin stitch (Klostersøm), Openwork with woven bars stitch and tracery (Utklipp/Stoppestingstolper med slyng).

Closeup of yellow Hardanger doily

Here is a picture of the original doily from the book and the chart for this doily:

Wanna try out yourself? Click here for a  listing of free patterns on the web.
Here are plenty of fabulous magazines scanned and free to download:

• The super-duper collection of Hardanger magazines and books - my favouritest - 1!!
• The super-duper collection of Hardanger magazines and books - my favouritest - 2!!!
• Alberto Rossi's Picasa gallery