I’m sure I’m not the only one to have a whole pile of cross stitch patterns that I’ve never started. In fact, some of them are over a decade old. The thing is, whilst these patterns are great, there’s something slightly off with all of them.
Now, I don’t mean they’ve got something wrong on them, I mean they have something that doesn’t work for ME. I won’t name and shame any patterns here, but taking the one of the top, I have an issue with the color of the boat. It’s a green boat, with loads of greenery around it. It looks like it could do with a splash of color. And that’s what I’m going to talk about today. How to change a colors on a cross stitch pattern.
 
Changing details on cross stitch patterns can make sure that what you’re stitching is suited to you, it can make it truly unique, and it can make it something you suddenly REALLY want to stitch.

So how to you start?

We’ll start with a word of warning; don’t go over the top. When you start out, its best to pick one element and change the color, rather than the whole thing. You might be called upon to do a few colors to make your new one match (we’ll get to that) but try to keep it managable to start.
 
First off, you’re going to need a pattern, with the above advise, we should pick a small element to start. You then need to work out which colors are in that element based off the pattern. I’ve picked a bonsai tree with red leaves; and we’ll change them to green.
NOTE: The colors you are looking at might be used elsewhere in the pattern, so you may stitch need them to finish your cross stitch.

The Color Card

The next step is to pull up your color card. Ideally you should have one of thread example color cards, however you can use printed ones if you must. We have both the new DMC color card and the Anchor color card as a free download to look at. If you plan to do this a lot, we would STRONGLY suggest you get a thread example one, and we’ll be going over why why you need a color card in a few weeks.

Identify your shades

The next step is to pick your specific shades. In our red bonsai tree, we’ve picked out the 5 shades of red, and we’ve arranged the up in order. This means we can see they are a simple run of dark red to light red.

Pick the new shades

This, is where we finally get to pick the shades we’ll be using, but the hard work has already been done. As we know its a run of 5 reds, we’ll need a run of 5 greens. On the DMC color card the best options are on lines 10 and 11. Honestly, you could pick any 5 greens, however each run looks slightly different. Those on line 10 look darker, so might be best for oily leaves. We picked the first run of greens on like 11 as we have those in our collection.

Swap the colors

Swap them. Its that simple. You could color in the pattern with pens or pencils, you could just change the number on the list, or just stitching with your new colors.

When it comes to finishing your cross stitch, there aren’t many things that go through your head other than “I need to show this to everyone!”, however many people feel unsure or confused about framing. However, that really doesn’t need to be the case. We’ve got a detailed guide on how to frame cross stitch on the blog already, but there is one big question that keeps coming up; should I add glass or not?
 
Sadly, this is one of those questions that doesn’t have an absolute answer. Sometimes you should, and sometimes you shouldn’t.

When You Should

In most cases, when you frame cross stitch, you should use glass. There are loads of benefits, such as keeping it clean, stopping strong sunlight and making it look more professional. However all of those things can only be achieved if you frame your cross stith correctly. Let’s look at the parts of a frame to get a better look at this:

When you want to protect it

As you can see from above, there are loads of parts to a standard frame, and each of these has their own purpose. The big two we’ll look at though, are the glass (obviously) and the window mat. This window mat is often the thing people forget, however its purpose is to keep the work away from the glass. In most cases this isn’t too important, but when it comes to cross stitch, where the stitches extend beyond the aida, its super important. Without it, the stitches get squashed against the frame.

When its required for the pattern

Sometimes however, you might need to get rid of the matting. And that’s fine! Take my Star Trek Voyager LCARS cross stitch for example. I wanted to make it look like it was a computer screen on a wall, and as a result putting in matting would ruin the look. But I still used glass. How did I get away with that? I used spacers. There are loads of different types, but they all work the same way; small bits of plastic that push the glass away from the cross stitch.

You don’t like the look of framed work

But what if you don’t like the idea of framed work? Well, that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t frame it. Take a look at the example below I found on Reddit. It’s a pacman screenshot cross stitch, fairly average (although well stitched) and when framing it, they added a bold yellow matting. The framing technique here has allowed the whole piece to stand out like a classic arcade cabinet. Now, bright yellow might not work for the cross stitch you’re doing, but by using clever framing, you can not only add to the cross stitch, but elevate it.

When You Should Not

Now, that said, there are times when you should ditch the glass. By doing this, you’ll loose the benefits of having glass, so you need to be more careful (see our tips at the bottom of the page) but sometimes glass just won’t work.

When you don’t like the glass

Yes, you can have a glass preference. 😛
When it comes to glass, some people don’t like the shine it creates, and if your artwork is somewhere glare is a problem, then you might know what I mean. So glass companies came up with solutions. Two specifically. The first is a slightly bumpy textured glass, which in my opinion makes the artwork harder to see. If you had a small count, this wouldn’t work. Equally, there is another type with a green coating on it (like eye glasses) which ruins the look if you’ve stitching with anything other than green.
The only solution? Ditch the glass.

When its required for the pattern

The other instance when you might not include glass is when its required for the pattern. Now, there really aren’t many patterns like this, so I’ve had to use another example of mine. In the below Pokemon 3D cave cross stitch you can see the cross stitch extends out of the frame, by nearly 30cm. There was no way I could frame this with glass, so I had to ditch it.

Tips for framing without glass

As seen above, sometimes there is a valid reason for not framing with glass, and honestly, that’s not a problem. However there are impacts of not framing with glass. With these tips, you should be able to keep those to a minimum!

• Make sure its washed and ironed before you frame it; it’ll last longer
• Keep it away from direct sunlight; the threads will keep their color longer
• Use a special acid-free backing paper for framing to stop dust leeching into the artwork