Used to decorate and embellish everyday household items such as tablecloths, handkerchiefs, dishcloths, doilies, bed linens, and others, cross stitch has been popular since the Middle Ages. Today, many cross stitch aficionados no longer decorate everyday-use items but rather create complex cross stitch patterns to be hung on walls as art pieces.
Just what is cross stitch? This popular form of what’s known as “counted-thread embroidery” uses simple X-shaped stitches layered together to create complex patterns that can form pictures, spell out words, and much more. The process may be simpler to actually do than it is to explain in words, but while cross stitch is a relaxing pastime for many stitchers, it is far from a simplistic artform, with accomplished cross stitch artisans capable of generating absolutely stunning results that have to be seen to be believed.
Modern cross stitch is alive and well, with many stitchers practicing and disseminating their craft via social media. Sometimes called “flosstubers,” these online cross stitch pioneers have built a vibrant community of contemporary cross stitch enthusiasts and artisans, and several major cross stitch influencers are represented among the authors on this list.
Whether you’re a newcomer to the artform or an old hand at counting stitches, you’ll find something particularly fun and involving in these 7 amazing cross stitch books!
Christmas Cross Stitch
Perfect for the holidays, this festive guide to cross stitch for Christmas includes more than 500 designs to celebrate the most wonderful time of the year. From religious images to more secular holiday design motifs, Christmas Cross Stitch offers easy-to-follow instructions, clear color charts, and beautiful photographs of both in-process and finished designs to help you get started stitching a whole plethora of unique and festive cross stitch projects this holiday season.
Fun for established cross stitchers and easy enough for beginners to use, this treasure trove of holiday projects makes a perfect gift.
Cross Stitch for the Soul
From its earliest origins, letters have been among the most prominent cross stitch patterns. Early stitchers often decorated linens and personal articles with the initials of the owner, while more complex patterns might incorporate inspirational sayings or quotes from the Bible.
This thoroughly modern collection of cross stitch patterns designed by Emma Congdon, perhaps better known as Stitchrovia, brings this age-old tradition to new life with twenty exciting new designs featuring inspirational quotes and motivational sayings that you will love stitching – and that make ideal gifts or wall-hangings for friends and family once they’re completed.
Embroidery for the Absolute Beginner
Cross stitch itself is ultimately just one of several kinds of counted-thread embroidery techniques. In Embroidery for the Absolute Beginner, author Caroline Smith not only introduces the fundamentals of cross stitch, but also several other embroidery techniques, so that you can begin making striking and attractive ornamental stitches, even if you have never so much as picked up thread before.
Besides easy-to-follow instructions and step-by-step photographs for more than twenty patterns, this essential book also explains how modern sewing machines can be used to complement many embroidery techniques, turning out exquisite work in a fraction of the time.
Feminist Cross-Stitch
Recent generations of activists have begun to reclaim and repurpose what was traditionally thought of as “women’s work,” and among these are author Stephanie Rohr, whose collection of more than 40 “bold and fierce” patterns “will speak to stitchers who share Rohr’s spirit and convictions” (Publishers Weekly).
These folk-art inspired patterns may evoke old-fashioned aesthetics, but their proclamations are anything but, and “Feminist Cross-Stitch is very much on-trend as a new generation discovers the joys of needlework” (Booklist), making it the perfect guest for the women in your life.
Hoop-La!
Almost as synonymous with cross stitch as the finished product is the humble embroidery hoop. Far from an old-fashioned relic, however, in the hands of author Kirsty Neale, the hoop becomes a part of the decorative art of embroidery, with one hundred projects that allow you to use, reuse, repurpose, decorate, and deconstruct your embroidery hoop. “The designs range from simple to detailed, and from stylish to incredibly cute,” raves Bugs and Fishes, while A Spoonful of Sugar calls the projects, “modern, fresh, and on trend.”
With a book that is “wonderfully photographed and delightfully colorful” (Feeling Stitchy) and brimming with creative projects, the result is a great gift “for someone who likes to dabble in a variety of techniques” (Gnome Angel), including applique, papercraft, painting, and more!
I Love My Dog Embroidery
Who doesn’t love their dog? With 380 designs contributed by Chloe Redfern, Mia Alexi of How Could You? Clothing, Valentina Castillo Mora, Miho Starling, Anja Lehmann, and Elizabeth Dabczynski, I Love My Dog Embroidery is an irresistible celebration of all things canine that makes a perfect gift for the dog lover in your life—or your favorite four-legged friend!
Sure, your pooch probably can’t cross stitch, but you could certainly make them some decorative items celebrating your friendship with these adorable designs including dogs doing everything from standard doggy tricks to dressing up in costumes, skateboarding, parachuting, and so much more!
Naughty But Nice Cross Stitch
Claire Crompton, author of Christmas Cross Stitch, returns with this book that is “chock a block full of fun patterns [that] will give you a chuckle” (Trish Alan Designs). The 50 fun and sassy sayings in this book of accessible cross stitch patterns may not necessarily put you on Santa’s “nice list,” but they’re the perfect antidote to saccharine mottos and bland platitudes.
Divided into themed chapters, these classic yet catty patterns make ideal gifts, framed objets d’art, or cell phone covers. “Perfect for the sassy crafter,” the book is filled with “simple images with comical phrases which make perfect cards and presents for that person in your life who enjoys a laugh” (Baking and Making in Bristol).
Featured photo: Olga Kalinina / Unsplash
