Cross Stitch Skull

I like a good cross stitch. Because I’m a badass. Obviously. This is a project that I started about 3 years ago. Cross stitch being such as it is, is a great project to have going on in the back ground. You can work solidly on it for 3 days. You can ignore it for a month. You can do a bit each day for 2 weeks. You can ignore it again for 18 months. I tend to do more in winter, simply because the evening are dark and I’m probably not going to go out on a week night, so I can stay in a watch a film and do another section of the cross stitch without feeling the pressure of “I’m must finish this!”

The design it totally stolen from a cushion that I saw in a window of a rather fancy and rather expensive interiors/ knick-knacky shop. I looked at the price of said cushion and thought “F*** that sh***, I’m not paying that much! I’ll make one myself!” I can’t now even remember if that cushion was actually a cross stitch or just a print or appliqué, but I had some spare wool and thought it would be a good idea.

I found an image of a skull online and printed it out. The roses are all Pierre-Joseph Redouté’s illustrations from his book “Les Roses” of which I have a small copy, “Golden Ariels”. I just went through the book, selected the roses I liked and copied, printed and cut them out, laying them round the skull before sketching the design onto the cross stitch canvas.

Here’s the start.

More progress.

This is where it’s at as of today.

I don’t think I’ll do many more roses, and instead start working on the background. I’ll do this in turquoise and use various different stitches to give texture. Initially I thought that this would be a cushion cover; after all that’s what inspired it. Now I’m thinking that I’ll frame it and hang it as artwork on the wall. That way it won’t get beer spilt on it.

As always, thank you for reading, and I hope you enjoyed the content.

P.S. I'm using The New Anchor book of Canvaswork Stitches and Patterns. Compiled by Eve Harlow. Available from Amazon.