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Archive for the ‘NeedlePaint Inspiration’ Category

St Patrick’s Day NeedlePoint

Instead of just needlepointing a normal photo, this week I was thinking that it could be fun to add a theme around an image on a custom needlepoint kit.

St. Patrick’s Day is a great opportunity!

I was thinking a clover with your dog in the middle would look pretty cool!  It took me a little while to find what I wanted, but as I’m learning to edit photos better, I found that taking the face works pretty well.

St Patricks Day Doggie Artwork

Below, we have just 10 colors on a 12” square canvas.  I did 18 mesh in this case, to catch the details in the dogs eyes.

St. Patricks Day Needlenoint Doggie Kit

Of course the ideas here are unlimited!

If you are interested in having us help to design a background photo, please contact us, we’d be happy to talk over some ideas and help create your design for you.  We offer this service free of charge on orders larger than 12 x 12”.

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NeedlePaint Inspiration, Needlepoint

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Amazing Photo’s Make Great NeedlePoint Kits

Recently, I was came across some amazing stitching work done by Su Embroidery Studio.  I found their work at Mary Corbet’s Needle ‘N Thread blog.  If you have time, you need to see these images!  This got me thinking about how many beautiful animal portrait needlepoint kits we’ve made at NeedlePaint.com and how thrilled the response has been by our customers.

Normally, people will send in the best images of their pet, but I think that there is a lot more opportunity for people who are looking for other types of special projects.

One of the great things about NeedlePaint.com, is that we are 100% custom, so if you can’t find great needlepoint kits of your favorite animals, you can have us make it for you!  I’m using the bald eagle as an example.  I searched and I could not find anything really good.  You can see my search results below.

Product Search Results on Google

After that, I just looked for images of “bald eagle head”, and found thousand of spectacular images.  Please be careful not to select a copyrighted image, if you cannot find a free image, then I recommend going to iStockPhoto.com There you can view thousands of animal photos that cost under $5.  You can purchase the XSmall size.

Source Image for Bald Eagle Canvas

Next, I uploaded this picture onto NeedlePaint and look how great it looks!

NeedlePaint Preview on 12 x 12" white 14 mesh canvas

I can imagine thousands canvases for people who love ducks, cows, and all types of animals.  Istockphoto really has a great selection of both farm and wild animals, just type in the name and enjoy!

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NeedlePaint Inspiration, Needlepoint

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E-Reader Needlepoint Cover

According to shopping reports, Christmas 2010 was the Christmas of the e-reader, and I was the recipient of one – a Barnes & Noble color Nook. On Christmas day with e-reader in hand, I was not only excited about the present but itching to get started on a new project – a personalized  needlepoint cover for my Nook.

I blocked out a simple three-color pattern for 18-mesh canvas and decided to use a trianglepoint stitch made popular by Sherlee Lantz in her 1976 book Trianglepoint, because it covers the canvas quickly and I wanted to get the cover finished before I scratched the screen of my new Nook. The canvas was the same width of the e-reader and an inch longer.  I planned the cover to be like a narrow box with a flap at the top which would fold over the top and fasten to the back with two snaps.

I was in such a hurry to start that I forgot to photograph the canvas before I started. Sorry!

The photo above shows the finished canvas with the piping, backing and gusset fabric, and white fleece for lining which I used. The fleece lining serves a dual purpose. It protects the screen from being scratched and it also cleans the screen as the Nook slides in and out (Figure 2).

If I were to make this design again, I would extend the length of the needlepoint cover by another inch to have a longer flap. But mine is done now and I am a happy traveler with it.

I have to confess that I don’t read all my books on my e-reader, and I probably never will. But I travel a lot, and when I travel I always take books and needlepoint along. Now, my suitcase is lighter with reading materials on the Nook, including my essential needlepoint reference book The Needlepoint Book by Jo Ippolito Christensen

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NeedlePaint Inspiration, Needlepoint

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Needlepaint Traditions

Most of us have our favorite causes to which we devote time, energy and often money. One of mine is The Colorado Trail, a 500-mile Denver to Durango hiking trail that was built by and is maintained by volunteers. With the launch of Needlepaint .com, I decided that the Colorado Trial logo would look great on a custom needlepoint pillow and would made a wonderful door prize that the annual Christmas party in Golden, Colorado.

The logo is a simple stylized green mountain on a white background. Maybe a little too much white for a pillow?

So, why not needlepoint it in reverse! (needlepaint screen shot)

This was a perfect project for something other than the traditional continental stitch. The lettering was done in an embroidery-styled satin stitch, working where possible with vertical and horizontal stitches to cover the canvas completely. The white mountain was done in the Shingle stitch, the green center of the mountain in Leaf #3 stitch, and the background in Giant Knitting from The Needlepoint Book by Jo Ippolito Christensen.

The pillow was finished with matching green cotton piping and backing over a 10-inch polyester-filled form from JoAnn Fabrics .

The finished pillow made it to the 2009 Colorado Trail Christmas Party. It was not given away but auctioned off bringing in $200.00. In 2010 another Colorado Trail volunteer came forward to needlepoint a second pillow which was also auctioned. We may have started a tradition. Why not do it for your favorite group?

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NeedlePaint Inspiration, Needlepoint, Pillows

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Cool Needlepoint Pillow Kit Concepts

I went into a Jonathan Adler store a few months back, and the pillows there still stick out in my mind.  I love them!

Attached are a few of my favorites, but what is great for needlepointers, is that you can use these ideas to create your own  custom needlepoint kit.

Needlepoint Pillows from Jonathan Adler

Look below to see what I designed.  I could imagine lots of ways this could go.  Kids names, lake names, or your city name!

A NeedlePoint Pillow for the a Summer Home

As far as pillows go, we don’t supply pillow kits yet, but I do have some website links that are very helpful.

This ehow article is pretty informative.  One important thing to note is that the canvas size should be slightly larger than the pillow form.  So if you want a 16 x 16″ pillow, you’ll want to order a 16.25 x 16.25″ canvas…

Another suggestion I have, is to follow Jonathan Adler’s lead, and use velvet for the back. 

Anybody who wants help designing a pillow, I’d be happy to talk and do the design that you want, free of charge if you are buying a kit! Our phone number is on our website.

For Pillow Forms, the best sites I’ve found are Fabric Farms and JoAnn Fabrics…

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NeedlePaint Inspiration, Needlepoint, Pillows

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Retro Needlepoint Design Inspiration

Coming up with cool ideas for needlepoint kits is not always easy.  As great designs come in, I’m always amazed how creative people are!

From my side, I’ve always appreciated the internet for its ability to help spur great ideas, so going forwards, as we come across fantastic websites for needlepoint designs, we’ll put them in a specific category called ‘NeedlePaint Inspiration’.

So where to start?

I recently found a pretty fun website where artists put up their work, it is very modern and fun. http://tewi.us/tegaki/ I found this site via Mr X Stitch’s contemporary needlecraft blog.  Also, we’ve had some traffic coming from Sprite Stitch, which is a website that people can show their love of stitching and older video games.

This site Tewi.us,  is almost all animated images, so  I pulled out a few colorful ideas to try on NeedlePaint.

Original Images

NeedlePaint Canvas Previews

The canvases came out really well, I did 12″ high, with 14 mesh, and all the kits use below 20 colors.

I did have one interesting thing to show to our users, which was on the violin player.  Originally, the website selected 40 colors, (see left), but I figured that would be very hard, so I reduced it all the way to 11 colors and it still comes out great! (see right)

Left Image has 40 colors, right has only 11!

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NeedlePaint Inspiration, Needlepoint

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