Doesn’t anyone embroider by hand anymore?

When I search for embroidery patterns, I mostly find embroidery files. You really have to look hard to find actual embroidery patterns. 

Knitting, crocheting, and so on are usually done by hand too, so why isn’t embroidery done that way anymore? Somehow, that makes me really sad.

I’m not looking for patterns here. I’m just interested in the topic: who still embroiders by hand, without a machine? 

Hi Mara.

They still exist, the hand embroiderers! There are also plenty of patterns for hand embroidery.
Unfortunately, knitting, crocheting, and sewing often take center stage, and I agree with you there.

Hand embroidery has actually seen a bit of a resurgence in recent years, and
there is a large, international community on social media that is passionate about it.
There are Flosstubes on YouTube, cross-stitch retreats are organized, and there are
always new designers emerging.

Here in the forum, you can also chat about hand embroidery if you’d like.
Do you embroider regularly? I really love embroidering, and I do it a lot, exclusively by hand.

Best regards
Karola

Hi, unfortunately rarely because of my illness, but I really enjoy it. I do half cross stitch, so to speak. I also really like satin stitch, and I’m currently watching 3D embroidery on YouTube—totally brilliant. 
The fact that more knitting is done, etc., doesn’t bother me so much, since I knit and crochet myself. It’s just that almost all embroidery is done by machine now, and I find that so sad. It would be the same if knitted items were only made by machine. I don’t think it’s the same when a design is scanned and the machine then embroiders it instead of you doing it yourself. 

Wow, that picture is really amazing. Unfortunately, a lot of my photos of my embroidery projects are gone. But I still have a really old one where I made the red one from Cars using a pattern I created myself. (Excel is soooo great with its options for making colored boxes—yay)  

Best wishes

Wow, your Cars picture turned out great.

I embroider by hand, too. But I have to say, I keep finding myself eyeing an embroidery machine. The price puts me off. I love the results, but how often will I actually use it? And like you said, I’m not sure if it gives me the same sense of satisfaction as my hand embroidery.

  I had an exhibition two weeks ago and showed my embroidery work. I had a lot of positive conversations and, among other things, met someone who also had an embroidery pattern made based on a picture.

Ruth, did you do the same thing with the picture of your granddaughter, or do you have a program that converts it?

I’ve been embroidering with an embroidery machine since 2007; back then, I was told I’d have to use a wheelchair before long. Thank God I’m not in a wheelchair yet—I’m fighting it as long as I can. My husband gave me software to digitize embroidery patterns I create myself. It’s really fun to design my own patterns and embroider them.
Before I started using the machine, I also did a lot of hand embroidery.

Love, Inge

Same here, Akela—I still manage to do it at least at home. When I have to go out for a while, I unfortunately don’t have a choice. But even if you’re in a wheelchair, that doesn’t stop you from hand-embroidering, right?

@Petra: Thanks—I’m super proud of it, too. Yours are great as well—not really my taste, but really well done. 

No, it’s not the wheelchair, but the arthritis in my hands—my fingers cramp up and I can’t hold anything anymore, so I use an embroidery machine.

Best regards, Inge

Online, you can find lots of companies that create and print an embroidery design based on a photo. Here, I even had the matching thread delivered right along with it. 

Hi Mara,
I do a lot of crafts, like knitting, crocheting, embroidery, sewing, felting, basket weaving, and painting—sometimes with diamond painting, sometimes the classic way with just pencils or brushes. When I embroider, I rarely follow any patterns; instead, I design the patterns myself. Last year, I embroidered intertwined initials onto a veil. 

Hi Mara,

as you can see, there are lots of women here who still embroider by hand. Hand embroidery isn’t going to die out just because embroidery machines exist. The two can coexist, and they produce very different results anyway. And since technology keeps evolving, there are more and more embroidery files available to use with the machines. And that’s becoming more visible now.

But hand embroidery is just different. It requires more dexterity in your fingers and sharp eyesight. The delicate hand-embroidery pieces by ZwergnaseBaer immediately come to mind. They’re something very special to me. She’s embroidered some truly filigree flowers. The pictures are somewhere in the gallery. But since the gallery doesn’t have a search function, I unfortunately couldn’t find them for this thread.

But I also like the embroidery by Petra and Ruth.

Best regards, Ina

Lately, I’ve unfortunately neglected embroidery, but I’ll definitely pick it up again. I do almost exclusively cross-stitch and especially love the old Graubünden patterns, as well as reindeer. For a while, I also used the limited embroidery program on my sewing machine, mainly the decorative stitches and, every now and then, a monogram.

I embroider every now and then, too.

I like cross-stitch best.

Or I also did those tapestry pictures for a while.
To me, that was always like “painting with thread.”
Especially when you used colors other than the ones specified.😃

...I was given a tablecloth as a gift 🙈 The design is “printed” on it, and I really like it.... but it’s mostly done in satin stitch, and I’m really at my wits’ end. It has reindeer and fir trees, etc.
For the reindeer, do I have to stitch around the outlines? 

Dear Steffi, I’d say it’s a matter of taste. If the design is small, I wouldn’t do it. With a larger one, it would create a nice contrast—especially with a darker color.

I did that once on a tablecloth. It had flowers on it, and I embroidered around them with a knot stitch.

And I don’t always use the satin stitch across the entire surface—especially if it’s large—but vary the length instead.  For me, that adds more vibrancy.

.

I hope this helps.🎄😃

Oh yeah.... That helps 😃 I’ll give it a try then. Split thread, a big mug of tea on the side, and off to work on the blanket 😀 

Dear Steffi,
that’s great—I’m so glad to hear it. 😄🧵

I’m already curious to see a photo of the finished blanket.

Have fun experimenting.😃

I’ve been hooked on embroidery ever since my 4th birthday.
I love cross-stitch the most, whether it’s for pillows or Christmas decorations.
I also make a lot of thread art cards for special occasions.
There’s no shortage of commissions among my friends and family.
I was at an Advent market last Sunday and was amazed. One woman had tons of embroidered pictures.
You can use them as pictures or sew them onto a pillow. The larger pictures cost 85 euros.
I could only shake my head—she sold almost nothing. I bought a pincushion with a little fawn on it for my grandchild. The pictures were great, but when you embroider yourself, it’s just something else.
People who don’t embroider, though, have no idea how much work goes into it.

Yeah, Hansi, that’s exactly it. Anyone who does handwork themselves knows how much work and time goes into it, and that’s why I always say NO when someone comes along and says, “Could you just quickly...?” Because it really isn’t quick at all. I take a very close look at the people I make something for and don’t jump at the first request

Best wishes, Inge

I do a lot of embroidery for our children and grandchildren because I know they love it and enjoy it.
Right now, I’m embroidering birds, and then the individual pieces go into the Advent calendar. Now they get to wonder what it’ll turn out to be in the end. Behind the last door, there’s a big Styrofoam ball. They get to decorate it and finish it themselves. Because I don’t really like doing that part. I don’t sell cross-stitch projects—they’re only given away with love. But I do make my thread art cards on request.