Very large and complicated charts--growing trend?

I think you're quite right really. My *big* project right now is Mermaids of the Deep Blue by Mirabilia - lots and lots of beading - more than I've ever done before. So just to get a break I always have a smaller project on the side. I chose as my *side* project Belted Kingfisher by Crossed Wing Collection. I love cross-stitch and would do it 24 hrs a day if I could. :-))

Sharon (N.B.)

That's an interesting observation. I'm always looking for small, but detailed charts and try not to do anything particularly big. Besides, it takes too long to finish something like that and I'm impatient to see a finished project, and it costs the earth to frame a big picture. The cost doesn't seem as shocking when you do several small pieces, spread out over a length of time.

For me, covering a space with a very large picture takes up valuable space as well and that's space that won't be there to accept a new, different kind of needlework project. Personally I like a lot of little, different styled things for handwork.

Lucille

I think it is more a matter of what charts are currently on the market. Since counted cross stitch is not the trendy hobby right now, there is a lower emphasis on charts for beginners. When things cycle back around and it is once again THE thing to do, the market will again be flooded with simple pieces and one-night or one-weekend projects designed to catch the interest of those who are new to the craft. It will then seem that there are few large and complicated charts designed for the experienced/expert stitcher although I'm guessing the number of those doesn't change all that much from year to year.

Of course this is all just my opinion and I don't have market research to back it up!

I have noticed the same thing. When I first got into CCS in the late

1970s, it was almost impossible to find a chart that stitched up larger than 5x7 -- maybe the rare 8x10. And most of them were really simple.

Now I'm seeing more huge, complicated things and fewer small simple things. Not too long ago, I was looking for something small and quick for a gift, and apparently no one does small/quick gifts any more except the "comic" ones. Let's all stitch an 11x17 picture for every baby, every wedding, every anniversary.

Which reminds me, I have a 25th anniversary coming up for which I was going to design something small enough to complete in under two years.

I have a wedding sampler pattern I got out of a magazine. It's the only one I've ever seen that I liked, and I do it over and over again for family and friends. Yeah, it gets old, but I still love the sampler.

I think there designers that are mostly reaching the "smalls" stitcher - little pictures at could appeal to newcomers and to people that want quickie projects.

Cheryl

On Wed, 10 May 2006 10:28:13 -0500, lizard-gumbo defied the laws of time and space to say:

It's hard for me to tell, as I haven't been buying new charts in a while--these children we spawned over a decade ago turn out to be expensive little critters to maintain, and I've been trying to be thrifty. Fortunately I had enough stash to last me, and I do fall off the wagon now and then...

Anyway, when I was a newbie stitcher, one of the first charts I did was Teresa Wentzler's "The Castle." Big, detailed, lots of fractional stitches (and I did it on aida, because I didn't even know linen existed), lots of blended needle, a fair amount of metallic fiber to give it sparkle. That was probably twenty years ago. (Holy crap.) Maybe it's a case of a trend coming around again.

-Bertha

On Wed, 10 May 2006 10:48:13 -0500, lizard-gumbo defied the laws of time and space to say:

I've been keeping an eye out for an anniversary one that I like. There are tons of anniversary patterns, but they're all so freakin' FLORAL. Not just a basic bouquet like that one, but with flowers and garlands and doves and who knows what all, even for the smaller charts. I've just never been big on the floral stuff.

Although admittedly I'm not looking terribly hard, because if I do find one I'll like, I'll have to get it--and then the fabric and the floss and supplies for it, so I can do it... and I really am TRYING to be thrifty these days, it's not like I have a shortage of projects to do...

-Bertha

I like those too, for the reasons you mentioned, but anymore, all I see are the small (and not particularly detailed) charts are primitives/folk art, which I don't care for.

WELL, let me whet your appetite (so solly!).

I guess I was thinking that Mirabilia- and Lavender&Lace-type stitchers might be graduating to the above type designs.

On Wed, 10 May 2006 12:02:45 -0500, LizzieB. defied the laws of time and space to say:

[links snipped for space]

You... you... enabler, you!

Well, I WAS being thrifty... (pages through the tempting designs)

-Bertha

I can only speak for myself. As a male, I simply ran out of patterns that I felt like stitching. The only way I can get patterns I like to stitch is to find an appropiate picture, and use Pattern Maker to turn it into a pattern. Such a process consists of a number of compromises, not the least of which is that to get enough detail, you need a large size, and lots of colours. Another possibility is that it is quite expensive to design a really nice pattern from scratch, say like Teresa Wentzler does. To get your money back, and make a profit, you need to sell lots of patterns. If counted cross stitch really is in decline, there may not be enough profit in these sorts of patterns to make designing them worthwhile. It is much cheaper to use some form of computer generated, or computer assisted, method to produce patterns, and these tend to be large and complicated in order to get a picture that has enough detail in it. Just my thoughts.

I certainly see them out there, and have some largish ones in process, but right now I am more interested in samplers. As I mentioned, I am doing one called A Stitch in Pine that involves a row of pine trees each in a different counted stitch--mosaic stitch, Queen stitch etc. And after that I am promising myself to start Jeannette Douglas's Prairie West sampler. I think I am going through a phase when I want to be really interested in what I am doing,and the change of stitches so that every few hours there is something completely new, is what is working for me. Sometimes watching densely stitched blocks of colour build into a picture is engaging, but right now, that's now what I want. I am also finding a primitive style calling out to me, and these tend to be simpler and smaller. Good topic, Lizard. Dawne

Here's what I've noticed, the stitchery catalogs are becoming bloated with computer generated charts, rather than the designers own artwork. Some of them are lovely, but then the original artwork was lovely, so they'd have to have really screwed up to make them ugly (altho you do see total disasters of that sort on ebay time and again).

I do nothing but large projects, lately I've been a lot more tempted by samplers like the ones by Anagram Diffusion and Long Dog Samplers then I am by stuff from Heaven and Earth and other computer charting companies.

There are the occasional Mirabilias I like (but as I've said before, enough with the neon green and grey, Nora, please!), but it's been awhile since I've seen anything online that had me rushing for my local shops.

Caryn

Mind you, Jim, you`re very much like me, in that you PREFER a large and complicated picture, although I love old buildings, local scenery and some animals. I`m not one for angels and fairies and "twee" subjects at all - my favourite subjects are far more realistic.

I regard my designs as very much computer assisted as opposed to computer generated. I use scanned photos more as the basic "bare bones" and remove a lot of the complications and confetti stitches. This makes it a lot of hard work, but only for me. It`s easier for the stitcher!

Pat P

>

Had to go see that Prairie West sampler and found Northern Lights. It is gorgeous! Must have. . .

Now I don't know, but I doubt they come from good designers. They sound like charts pumped out by people with cross stitch software. I had the benefit of watching one at work at a stitch in and I think one would need to go through eliminating nearly all of the confetti stitches.

"lewmew" wrote ..

There is a completed model at my LNS--it is really beautiful done up. Personally, I love the little backstitched gophers on the prairie one. Dawne

Ooooh! Where to start! Monet, I think!!! I`ve bookmarked it, anyway!

Pat P