Designer Spotlight: Cotton Clara

This cheerful shop specializes in little, colorful designs, with a bit of a pop culture twist (and more than a few designs that have to do with food). Let’s check out Cotton Clara!

This shop based in the UK sells cross stitch charts, embroidery kits, sewing kits and craft supplies. The cross stitch patterns are all in one category, but there are only about 50 of them, so it doesn’t take too long to scroll through and see what’s on offer.

There are a few bookmarks with a variety of themes, including books, mushrooms and tea, but most of the patterns are small hoops.

I’m not actually a Swiftie but I feel like the I Love Taylor pattern is pretty indicative of the style and use of color you’ll find on the patterns here. The pattern apparently comes with other motifs and lettering so you can profess your love for Christmas or add words related to being born or married in a particular year. (I assume there’s a full alphabet but can’t tell for sure.)

It looks like the pattern uses about 10 colors, which you could of course change if you don’t love the pastel look. There are also other cross stitch sweaters on the page that have different sweater designs and include different motifs if there’s something else you are looking for.

I mentioned food above so I guess it’s time to talk about the food cross stitch patterns. I see choc spread, pickles in a jar, cherries, peanut butter, olives, kimchi, jam and more, which would be cute to stitch up for a friend who loves that kind of food.

You’ll also find some animals, Christmas designs, and a few text based designs as well.

Check out all the cute designs (and more goodies for stitchers) at Cotton Clara.

[Photo: Cotton Clara]

Most of the cross stitch projects I make are pretty small and not something I would consider heirloom quality (though I am working on a big project for my daughter that I hope to have done for her high school graduation in two years that I hope is something she’ll want to keep forever, but that’s another story).

But it is definitely possible to cross stitch projects that will stay around for generations, and one prime example of that is a cross-stitched linen tablecloth.

Linen tablecloths are classic, while stitching one can be a big project, depending on the size of your table, it doesn’t have to be really complicated.

Koekoek has a good, detailed post about figuring out how much linen you would need to make a tablecloth that you can cross stitch and/or embroider on (they also sell tablecloth linen in their shop if you don’t already have some or a linen tablecloth you already use). Of course for a project like this you’d want the best fabric you can find and afford, because you’ll be stitching it for a long time and hopefully using it for years.

The post walks through how to measure your table and determine how much fabric you’ll need including the drop you’ll want and hems. It includes the math for rectangular and square tables as well as circular tables, which helps take the guesswork out of buying fabric. It also talks about preparing the fabric and making mitered corners if you have a square or rectangular table, which will help the tablecloth sit nicely on your table.

The tutorial doesn’t include specific patterns to use for your tablecloth, but it does advise keeping it simple because this is a really big project. You can start with a motif in the center or doing borders, and this is a project you can add to through the years by, say, stitching a symbol for each family member or adding names, wedding dates, etc. and making it a real record of your family.

Would you ever cross stitch a tablecloth or have you done so? I’d love to hear about it!

[Photo: Koekoek]

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