Broadway SAL - Release 1 Design Insights!

So as y'all have may have already seen our first release for the Broadway SAL is Les Misérables. I was very happy about people voting for as it was the first musical I memorized all the way through, and it has a special place in my heart. For the song lyrics on most of these we considered different iconic songs or phrases from each musical as well as what the spacing of the letter would allow. We actually had a couple lyrics we were considering for Les Mis. I believe One Day More was one of them, but it came out a little short to fit the space we wanted it to.

For the graphics we included 2-3 graphics on each one, depended on size. So, like the lyrics, there was a lot of debate about what to use for this one. The flag was a given, seeing as it one of the more iconic images from the show. Given that is is a larger graphic we decided to just have one more for this. We considered doing a silhouette of the barricade over or behind part of the letter, but given the small size it lost to much detail. We incorporated a similar idea in a later release. We considered doing Cosette's broom, but that was put aside for reasons to do with clashing with a later release. We tried putting in a rifle, but didn't like the way it interacted with the overall look when completed.

Finally we decided on the candle sticks Jean Valjean is given by Bishop Myriel after he is caught having stolen the silver. We actually did try include some silverware as well, but it was just too small next to the candle sticks. Though these aren't as iconic of an image overall I liked including them, because that is a big turning point for Jean Valjean.

You can see quite a few other graphics or parts of graphics in this one that we won't go into very much right now, so as not to spoil it for anyone. I will say the bubbles and the vine you will have to wait a bit on, but the smoke above the flag will connect to the next release. I was very pleased with how the vine interacted here, because the flag was meant to be more tattered and it was quite fun to make it come through it. As I said Les Mis has a special place for me so I very much loved doing this one and hope everyone enjoys stitching it just as much!

- Tina