Customer Reviews

Mary Thomas's Dictionary of Embroidery Stitches

5 star:		(33)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I checked this book out of the library like I have a hundred other books on embroidery. Unlike all the others this was so clear and easy to understand I had to buy it. This one actually made sense and I was able to apply all that was in it to a great embroidered jean jacket for my daughter. The illustrations and color coding on the different stitches makes it so easy to follow. I am an avid hand quilter and I have never been "into" embroidery until I used this book. So many books have all these great illustrations but regular people like me can't go from the picture to the fabric. With this book I could and did! I used to just see quilts in every great design and unusual color grouping-now I see embroidery! I highly recommend this.

I bought this book for all the great photos in it. It is so nice to see the stitches on fabric and in color. This makes it so much easier to use your imagination to create beautiful textiles.The book covers all types of embroidery from pulled fabric stitches to canvas stitches and everything in between. There are very nice diagrams and explanations of all the stitches. It is a very easy and informative book to use for everyone from beginner to experienced embroiderer.I would highly recommend this book to anyone with an interest in this art form.

This book is hard to find and I am surprised that Amazon has it readily available.
It really is a rare jewel of a dictionary and though it has no projects the directions are simple and easy to follow and very inviting. Other contenders in this space are A-Z Embroidery and Lucinda Ganderton's offering. This book is better than Lucinda's in showing the finished product; all are standouts.

If you buy just one book for embroidery, this should be it. Not only does the book provide great illustrations and descriptions of each stitch, it also has pictures of what the "actual" stitch should look like-- a priceless tool for people like me who have trouble envisioning finished products. A fabulous book for beginners and very useful for more advanced stitchers wanting to try new techniques. I joke that this book makes me want to go out and embroider a kimono or some other large scale project-- I love it!

This is the first and best of the embroidery stitch dictionaries. This is a welcome start to any novice's collection and a wonderful addition to any expert's. There are other dictionaries out there, and many of them are fantastic for their specialties, this is the best single unit.

Vital for all stitchers (unless they never have a desire to venture out of 'plain' cross stitch--- it has plenty of x-stitch modifications for those who only want to work on linen), with sections on whitework, couching and canvas.

If I could only have one stitching book, this would be it.

I hadn't touched embroidery for about 40 years and this book is so detailed with TONS of photos that I had no trouble learning lots of new stitches. I took it to work and shared it with two very experienced embroiders and both were very impressed with the variety of stitches presented and the detailed images.

I wanted a reference of all the possible stitches I might want to use at any given point in my work. This is perfect for that. However, there descriptions on how to reproduce the stitches aren't intuitive and I felt at times there were steps missing. I made up the missing steps, but it meant that a couple of the stitches just never quite turned out the way I wanted them (i.e., like the pictures in the book). This was true especially for the very complicated stitches that resulted in complex geometric patterns. I would recommend this for any advanced embroiderer who wants a quick picture reference of what stitches might work in this situation. I would not recommend it for beginners.

This is simply the best embroidery stitch book I have ever read. An excellent buy. The pictures, instructions and phots all correlate with colour to make learning a new stitch a breeze. I have found the instructions straight forward and clear. Recommend this book to anybody working in textiles.

I am extremely disappointed that this book has been out ofprint, evenif unofficialy, because it is most certainly the most complete book on the subject. Please let the publisher of Mary Thomas' books know that there is interest out there on this marvelous book

What everyone says here is TRUE! Mary Thomas wrote the first classic encyclopedia of stitches and it has been lovingly updated. It is the PERFECT embroidery overview ever created for both total beginners and advanced. Clearly written with illustrated instructions, expect to be inspired and prepare to succeed!!

I was trying to find a good basic embroidery book and had no luck. Though found all kinds of needlepoint, or machine embroidery books or expensive software but it was really hard to find a good hand-embroidery book. I couldn't believe my good fortune when I found this. It is a total treasure! If the publishers could come up with a spiral bound version, that would be even better.

Have fun!!