Needlework designs and delights
An antique adaptation with heart. Sometimes a little piece of history comes your way and just captures your heart. From the moment I saw Harriett’s needlepoint sampler, I knew she was a kindred soul. While the beautiful, almost abstract flowers first caught my eye, it was the sentiment that really drew me to the piece.…
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A new stashbuster design. When I was working on ‘LT 1909’, it struck me how many red threads I keep returning to, as well as how many I had waiting for me to pick up. An idea sparked with me, and the result is this pin pillow: a homage to one of my favourite colours…
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An antique reproduction and a mini design. When I’m especially busy (or, let’s be honest, a bit frazzled), I find I reach for monochrome stitching. Working with a single colour is particularly restful, as you can just focus on the calming repetition of thread flowing through linen. And, more often than not, it’s a redwork…
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My happy place is a bookstore, a library or a comfy couch for reading. This design is my recreation of these happy places, and I hope stitching it brings you some comfort too… It is also one of the first designs to feature the new Bookshelf range – my collaboration with Cottage Garden Threads and…
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An antique reproduction I must confess – I have a real love for Victorian needlepoints and have been collecting them for some time. When I reproduced “Mary Barton’s Work” last year, I wasn’t sure anyone else would want to stitch it – and I’m thrilled that Mary’s weird little bird found so many homes with…
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An antique reproduction The mysterious origins of this sampler Some samplers are a mystery. This piece, reproduced from an original in my collection, tantalises with its enigmatic initials and charms with its details – that little dog hiding under the table laid out for refreshments in the garden, that rooster standing proudly, and that figure…
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An antique reproduction Sometimes you can be lucky enough to stumble across an antique piece of needlework that just makes you smile. The original of this design was done completely in petit-point – the tiny stitches creating such a lifelike image, I could almost see those ears turning and those noses twitching. I tried several…
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This is a long-promised post, and one that’s just a beginning. The more I work with Cottage Garden Threads in my designs, the more I discover about their potential for bringing new & exciting things into cross-stitch. The following are some tips & tricks that I’ve discovered so far, but I’d love to hear your…
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This design arose from the wonderful opportunity to create a design for the first Dark Mojo Retreat in Hobart, Tasmania in June 2022. Kerrilyn Packer at A Stitch in Time has been a fantastic support for Australian designers, dyers and needleworkers and working with her has been a delight. After I suggested doing a design…
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I must confess a secret. I often look at antique samplers and embroideries and wonder about the lives that the stitchers lived. I wonder about their hopes and dreams, and how they stitched themselves into their work, which survives long after them. And so I want to stitch my hopes into my work, each tiny…
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Mojo Stitches 