Crewelwork Pineapple finished!

I really did save the best for last on this piece. All throughout the embroidery of the leaves, what I was looking forward to was filling in the centre. It's the centre that I imagined first. Reproducing in stitch the bumps on the skin of a pineapple was what originally inspired me to create the piece.I used a combination of two stitches that are raised off the fabric: bullion knots and raised leaf stitch. I first learned raised leaf stitch when working the Leven's Hall kit by Phillipa Turnbull. It's been a favourite ever since then!To ensure that the group of three bullion knots were centred in each diamond shape, I first drew a straight line, right in the centre of each diamond. Using the middle colour of three gold wool threads in this piece, I put the centre bullion knots in all the diamond shapes first.When working a bullion knot, it's so helpful to use a milliners needle. The difference between a regular and a milliner's needle is that a milliner's needle is the same circumference all the way along the shaft. This makes pulling the needle through the wraps of the thread around the needle so much easier!After the centre bullion knots were in place, I then added the lightest colour knots to the right and the darkest colour knots to the left of the centre.To prepare for the raised leaf stitch shapes, I drew a tear drop shape in the centre of all the remaining diamond shapes. Each one is filled with a raised leaf shape with the colours getting lighter from the bottom rows to the top.I love the combination of these two highly textured and raised stitches and the gradation of colours in the gold and the rose.The pineapple needs a stem, of course, and that was next to embroider. I used chain stitch in double rows, moving from the lightest green to the darkest, left to right and finishing with a single row of stem stitch in the darkest blue. This helps give the effect of a shadow cast by a light source coming from the left side.To complete the pineapple, single rows of stem stitch were embroidered on the lines separating the diamond shapes. The lighter green running from the bottom left to the top right and the darker from the top left to the bottom right.The entire shape of the fruit was then outlined using two pieces of gold wool couched down with holding stitches and the thread being left slightly loose to create little puffs of gold along the edges of the pineapple. This is a technique I learned from Nicola Jarvis whilst working on her Loveday design.The piece is now finished and I am thrilled with the result! All that's left to do it mount and frame it or make it into a cushion. I'm thinking a cushion...What do you think?