Framing with a Shadowbox

As my Goldwork Pineapple is so small and I was on a tight schedule, I decided to frame the piece myself. I definitely wanted protection for my piece which meant some sort of glass, but I didn't want to squish my stitching. The nicer solution would have been to use a frame with double mat to lift up the glass, the easy solution was to use a shadow box. I went to my local Michael's and found a size that would work perfectly. It only comes in a pack of four, but I was able to split it with a friend.

First step is measuring the inside of the frame.

Use those measures to cut out a piece of mat board.

To my shock, my measurements came out spot on. This would be amazing in normal circumstances, but in this case I need something a little smaller to make space for my fabric.

I trimmed the edges on the top and on one side to create that space. Just enough wiggle room for the piece to sit comfortably in the box.

I don't want my embroidery to come out flat, so I glued a piece of batting to my mat board.

I laid my piece on the mat and put the shadow-box over it to get an idea of what it will look like once completed.

At the last minute, I decided to do something I normally never do and that's sign my work. I usually keep the pieces I make so I've never thought of signing any of them. So for the first time ever, one of my pieces is sporting a signature. It's nothing fancy, just my initials and the year. The heart was completely accidental. I put in a line that I had to quickly convert to a heart so it wouldn't look weird.

Next step was the stretching. Luckily the piece is really small and the fabric big so I was able to get this done pretty quick.

Once it's been stretched, it's ready to be popped into a frame.

In my case, I needed something to stick my piece to the back of the shadow-box. I wanted something with a little height to push my piece forward. I found this double-sided tape by Scotch. It's not archival quality and non-toxic. If my piece was embroidered on silk, I would never use this but in this case it was okay.

My piece is ready to be gifted and I even wrote a little message for her on the back. My friend really liked it, I'm happy to say. I have a video of her opening it and I will always remember the look on her face when she got her first look at it.