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POLA LAAMANEN - EMBROIDERY ART

@polalab

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🪡Hand Embroidery and fiber art, sustainable fashion
📍Based in Helsinki, Finland
⬇️Embroidery tutorials, workshops, original art ⬇️

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🧶 Chapter 1: Karelia is not one place, but many voices stitched together.

From the northern Karelians, to the Ludiks of the lakes, and the southern Livviks, each community shaped its embroidery with local stories, colors, and techniques. 🌲✨

👉 Did you know? Neighboring Vepsians also shared patterns with Karelians, creating a beautiful cross-border textile dialogue.

❓Have you ever seen embroidery where you could tell where it came from just by looking at it?

This is the first chapter from series about Karelian embroidery. I will gather them all here: #polalab_karelia

The project is supported by @koneensaatio

#handembroidery #heritage #embroideryheritage #crimsonwork #kirjonta #kirjontatyö @texo_ry by @polalab

Dream feature - DONE✔️🥹🙌🏼

I’m so happy to share that an interview about my embroidery journey is now featured in beloved KOEL Magazine 💫 It was such a beautiful process to reflect on my work, my inspirations, and the stories behind my pieces.

KOEL @koelmagazine is a gorgeous online magazine filled with yarn art, creative stories, and endless inspiration. I warmly invite you to explore my feature—and while you’re there, take a moment to dive into the many other wonderful stories from artists around the world. 💛

You can find the magazine at @koelmagazine or visit their online KIOSK to read more.

Thank you KOEL for this opportunity! ✨

Ph: @polalab @poletelianna

#koelmagazine #artistinterview #embroideryart #contemporaryembroidery #textileart #slowmade #yarncraft #makersgonnamake #embroideryartistsoninstagram #texory by @polalab

I’m proud to be featured in @voguescandinavia - "The Embrodiery Artist" in Issue 9.
I’m still dreaming of that cashmere sweater which @silandersanna chose for me 🧡
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Artist: @polalab
Style: @silandersanna
MUAH: @makeupbymeghna
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Huge thanks to @shiffmane @amelielangenskiold for this opportunity #voguescandinavia #myvoguescandinavia #voguemagazine #embroidelicious #embroideryart #lovermbroiderymagazine #contemporaryembroidery by @polalab

Every stitch is a step forward 😌

Double sided embroidery on paper #holbeinstitch #etupistokirjonta #embroideryonpaper by @polalab

Admiring the double sided running stitch - did you spot where I made a mistake? 😅🫣

#holbeinsteg #holbeinstitch #handmadejewelry by @polalab

Microtaide🥹 Day 17 of September Textile Love — Texture 🪡

Tiny works, lots of texture.

A selection of five 5 × 5 cm micro artworks — little experiments with thread, layers, volume and surface.

Sometimes you only need a few centimetres to explore a whole textile world on canvas leftovers from the larger artworks.

Which one is your favourite?🥹

@seam_collective @texo_ry

#STL26Day17 #SeptTextileLove #SeptTextileLove26 by @polalab

Day 15 of September Textile Love — Celebration 🎉

Today I’m celebrating colour — one DMC @dmc_france thread at a time. 🧵

Sound on for some embroidery ASMR. 🎧

@seam_collective

@dmc_embroidery @dmc_crafts @dmc_france

#STL26Day15 #SeptTextileLove #SeptTextileLove26 by @polalab

🪡 Day 5 of September Textile Love — Caring

For me, caring is repairing.

Caring for the things we already own. Taking the time to notice a worn area, a stain or a hole — and choosing not to discard the whole garment because of it.

During the Reimagined Resources @threadsnpa project, I explored artistic repair as a way of bringing two things together: garments that already carry value and textiles that have lost theirs.

Discarded textiles become material for repair, embroidery redirects attention, and the damaged area becomes a starting point for something new.

Repair doesn’t have to make the past invisible. Sometimes caring means allowing its traces to remain — and giving something a reason to be valued and worn again.

Read. Source. Translate. Tend. Redirect. Revalue.

@seam_collective
#STL26Day5 #SeptTextileLove #SeptTextileLove26 by @polalab

🪡 Day 4 of September Textile Love — Story-telling

Let me tell you a story about three daughters of the air that descend to earth. From them flow three kinds of milk — white, red and black. Where the drops fall, iron was born in different forms.

Later iron becomes dangerous, and the wound it causes can only be healed by knowing where iron came from. Knowledge of its origin gives power over it.

I find something deeply beautiful in this idea: that a challenge can be overcome through knowledge — by tracing something back to its beginning and learning its story.

In Birth of Iron, I brought Karelian mythology into conversation with the visual language of Karelian embroidery — an old story retold through thread and form in my own interpretation.

The work was first presented to the public in Kuhmo at Juminkeko @juminkeko_kalevalakeskus , as part of the Runon rajatonta matkaa – Kalevala ja nykypäivä exhibition.

@seam_collective

#STL26Day4 #SeptTextileLove #SeptTextileLove26 by @polalab

🪡 Day 3 of September Textile Love — Colour

I love working with raw canvas and letting colour appear in accents — small details that pop, redirect the eye and bring attention to particular areas of the work.

My relationship with colour keeps changing, but lately I’ve been completely obsessed with pine green combined with orange-red. That contrast gives me goosebumps every time.

So for today’s prompt, I turned five of my artworks into their own little Pantone-inspired palettes. @pantone - I’m obsessed 😏

Which palette is your favourite? I wish I could do more of these - there are never enough of swatches 😅

@seam_collective
#STL26Day3 #SeptTextileLove #SeptTextileLove26 by @polalab

🪡 Day 2 of September Textile Love — Hand or Machine

For me, the answer has always been: hand.

Every stitch in my work is made by hand. I love the slowness of the process, the tactile connection with the material, and the small irregularities that make hand embroidery feel alive.

Over the years, my techniques and subjects have changed quite a lot — from tiny embroidered jewellery to larger textile artworks, heritage-inspired pieces and artistic repair — but the needle in my hand has remained a constant.

And after ten years, I’m still fascinated by how much can be created with something as simple as needle and thread.

Are you team hand, machine — or both?

@seam_collective

#STL26Day2 #SeptTextileLove #SeptTextileLove26 by @polalab