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Hello, I'm working on a project measuring 635 x 444 stitches in 18 aida. It is a watercolour conversion of an Anton Pieck painting into cross stitch. Originally it was 650 stitches , but that was too big for the piece of cloth I had. As it is at 635 , it takes up the whole width of the cloth: no room for a traditional frame method.

So I was wondering to mount the piece between 2 pieces of glass. I have some old 1950s window glass, you know the type that is not flawlessly made. It adds an air of age to it. I want to mount the top glass without it touching the work...the back I'm not concerned with. My quest is to stretch it and have it in between the two pieces of glass. As it won't be finished untill I figure, in the spring of 2019 , I have plenty of time to explore the possibilities.

Any help would be appreciated... Alaric

That's inventive and very modern (up-cycling all all that). My second thought was how you would keep the piece dust and insect-free, because my first thought was that you'd need to integrate spacers of some sort to keep the glass off the stitching (or else the glass will flatten it).

Re the edges mentioned by Serinde.
Just thinking out loud. No clue if it is feasible.

You could always have a very thin (or wide, up to you) metal band around the edge of the glass to close it up. Potential to have it engraved/embossed with some sort of pattern. Thinking about it, could even be wood or plastic frame band. Probably would have to be made specially for you.

That or some sort of clear polyfiller glue type substance, but that could get messy and might reach the fabric!

Richard!? Allyn!? Where are you? Help!

My temptation would be to see if I could get a piece of foam board, card or very thin plywood, cut it carefully to fractionally larger than the image. Hopefully there is a hem width of fabric (2-3 squares) around the edge. If so, go and stitch reinforcing into the edge using thread that's a close colour match to the fabric. Then I'd lace the fabric to the backing using fabric coloured lacing thread.hopefully after a little gentle stretching, the image would be the size of the backing and all hemming would disappear. Then mount the supported image however is suitable.

If there really is no hem edge at all, becomes more difficult. I assume the piece will be fully stitched (no fabric visible). If so, you may well be able to stitch the lacing into the mat of threads behind the picture and still get a secure hold. If so, repeat the lacing procedure. It will take quite a while to mount this way.

Hope this idea may be food for thought.

Regards

Richard.

Keep in mind that I'm absolutely anal about museum-quality framing, so my advice may be more than you want to worry about.

No fabric margins presents a challenge. I'd do as Richard suggested and stitch a piece of fabric around the piece to make new margins, then lace it to acid-free foam board. I wouldn't use sticky-back board as some folks might recommend since 1) the adhesive can discolor the threads over time and ruin the piece and 2) sticky-back board usually isn't acid-free, again, it'll ruin the piece over time. If you want it to last long enough to pass down to your kids, everything that touches the fabric and threads has to be acid-free. Foam-board you pick up at the office-supply store isn't.

Are you planning to mat it? If you're using acid-free mat board around the piece, have the board cut to show just the last row of stitches and no more. That'll hide the stitched-on margins and if you double mat, that should provide enough room to hold the glass away from the threads. If not or if you're not matting at all, you'll need to add framing spacers to keep the glass from touching the threads.

I haven't used glass as the back. What is the purpose of using glass on the back? If the frame isn't sealed enough to keep humidity out, you'll be growing mold on the threads over a time and you may anyway by using glass backing. Usually, a thick paper backing is used. If you're using a frame and just using glass for front and backing, you'll want to use framing spacers on the back, too, I would imagine and use a frame with a deep rabbit to accommodate the width of both glasses, spacers and foamboard, which could easily be an inch and a half or more. You can get metal poster frames with quite a deep rabbit and the metal can have a very narrow reveal on the front if you're going for a 'frameless' look.

Serinde wrote: Richard!? Allyn!? Where are you? Help!

LOL Sorry. My Internet was down for a day and a half. I feel so out of touch.

Hi folks, thank you very much for all the wonderful suggestions. Problem is that y'all brought up potential problems I had not thought off. (Dust and so on) . Now I'm pulling out what ever remaining hairs I have...but I like the idea of putting a metal edge and some spacers around and in between the glass pieces. Thank God I have a whole 1950s old bay window to work with , because I will probably bust some pieces.

I may need to employ a very thin board on the back to keep the stitching stretched,if I can make it so that the board can not be seen. Total novice with this. Normally I let framers do this, but the only framers on my island are those that frame walls for houses...not much use there.... Alaric

Well, this is also where the internet is your friend. There must be YouTube videos on this subject! Down the rabbit hole you go, Alaric!