Sonnet 18 - Unearthing a New 'Fair'
"For my Sonnet 18 book, I was drawn to Shakespeare’s repeated use of the word fair, which is a term he summoned three times to describe beauty as shifting, resilient, and ultimately eternal. I wanted the cover to explore fair not as a fixed ideal, but as something gradually revealed and illuminated over time. That idea guided my use of layered embroidery, gemstone hues, and textures that feel both ancient and newly unearthed.
"The cover design begins with a metallic floral foundation worked in iridescent threads and chatoyant tones. This symmetrical base establishes the piece’s quiet shimmer, echoing the poem's opening comparison to a summer’s day. Above it, I added a second layer: a constellation of tiny prismatic blue glass beads and micro-sequins glowing like scattered sapphires. Their soft flicker creates a visual cadence, inviting the eye to linger as the meaning of fair unfolds.
"The third layer intentionally breaks from symmetry. An asymmetrical trail of green glass inclusions, flecked with gold, red, and orange, twist across the surface like archaeological finds. These beads mimic the rough textures of natural stones and echo the sonnet’s awareness of time, change, and the unpredictable paths beauty can take: 'By chance, or nature’s changing course untrimmed.'
"As I stitched, I kept returning to the way emotional truths are unearthed like minerals. They surface slowly, first rough and unpolished, then gradually revealed to light. Most sapphires and emeralds found in nature never achieve gem-quality clarity; only a few hold the brilliance we associate with fine gemstones. That inner radiance, revealed when light passes through a stone, became my metaphor for Shakespeare’s 'fair': not external perfection but an internal luminosity.
"By returning to the natural properties of gemstones, I hoped to reclaim fair from its historical, man-made biases and return it to a meaning tied to clarity, brightness, and the light that radiates from within. My layered cover, with its interplay of polished and “unearthed” elements, mirror that process. Emotion is brought into clarity, beauty is revealed rather than imposed, and a fleeting summer is made, in Shakespeare’s words, 'eternal.'"
~Suzanne Coley
Shakespeare's Sonnet 18
Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate.
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer’s lease hath all too short a date.
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimmed;
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance or nature’s changing course untrimmed.
But thy eternal summer shall not fade
Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow’st,
Nor shall Death brag thou wand’rest in his shade,
When in eternal lines to time thou grow’st.
So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,
So long lives this, and this gives life to thee
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