Pet portrait embroidery: how to stitch your own dog

What you need (it's a short list)

• A 6-inch wooden embroidery hoop. See hoop sizes for why 6 inches.
• Oatmeal linen, about a 10-inch square, washed and pressed before you start. See linen vs cotton.
• One skein of black embroidery floss. You stitch with 2 of its 6 strands.
• A crewel (embroidery) needle, size 7 to 9.
• Printable stick and stitch sheets for a home inkjet printer.
• Small sharp scissors.

Why black on oatmeal linen? It reads like an ink sketch, and with one color there's nothing to match. All your attention goes to the lines that make your pet look like your pet. The full list, with what to skip, is in what you need to start embroidery.

Pet portrait embroidery, step by step

1. Choose the photo. Face toward the camera, both eyes sharp, soft daylight, head and shoulders filling the frame. How to choose a photo.
2. Get the pattern. Trace it yourself or use a pattern maker. Either way you want clean line art with a dot at every needle hole. Photo to pattern.
3. Print it and stick it on. Check the 1-inch bar on plain paper first, then print at 100% on the soft side of a stick and stitch sheet (not the shiny backing) and smooth it onto the center of your linen. Using stick and stitch.
4. Hoop it drum-tight. Tighten in small rounds, pulling the edges evenly, until the fabric sounds like a drum when you tap it. Keep the whole design inside the ring.
5. Practice first. Try back stitch and satin stitch on a scrap or in the free 3D simulator before you touch your pet.
6. Stitch the outline. Back stitch from dot to dot, starting at the top of the head. Stab straight down and straight up, one motion at a time. Back stitch.
7. Fill the eyes and nose. Satin stitch from the middle out, leaving each highlight bare. Eyes and nose.
8. Add the fur. Short stitches from the root toward the tip, the way you'd stroke your pet. Fur.
9. Rinse the sheet away. Trim the extra sheet, soak 5 to 10 minutes in lukewarm water, then finish under the running tap. Removing stick and stitch.
10. Press and finish. Press it face-down on a folded towel, re-hoop it tight and close the back. Finishing the hoop.

What a real pattern looks like

This is the real output of our pattern maker for Bruno, a sample French bulldog: the drawing, the dot pattern and a stitched preview. It's 403 back stitches and 6 small satin fills, which is a few evenings of short sittings for a beginner.

The only two stitches you need

Some stitchers use stem stitch on long curves, or a split stitch edge under satin. Both are optional. Back stitch vs stem stitch explains when each one fits.

Getting it to look like your pet

• The eyes carry the expression. If both eyes are sharp in the photo, the portrait has life. Stitch them slowly.
• The outline carries the shape. The ears and the line of the head are what people recognize from across a room.
• Simple beats detailed for a first hoop. You can add fur later. You can't easily take it out.
• Stop sooner than you think. Prop the hoop up across the room and squint. If it already looks like your pet, you're done, even with dots left. They rinse away.

How long it takes

Our sample patterns run from 379 to 681 back stitches, plus a few small satin fills. At a beginner's pace of 2.5 to 4 stitches a minute, that's roughly 2 to 5 and a half hours of stitching, best spread over a few evenings. Add an evening for printing and the practice piece, and a day for the linen to dry after the rinse.

Unhoop the linen when you stop for the day. It relaxes in the hoop, and a ring of hand oil is harder to get out than a crease.

Common problems and quick fixes

The fabric puckers around the stitches.

Re-tighten the hoop and let each stitch lie flat instead of pulling it snug. More fixes.

Grey shadows show through the linen.

Black thread is jumping across bare fabric on the back. Slide under stitches you've made, or tie off and start again. Keeping the back neat.

An eye looks flat or lumpy.

Unpick it from the back and redo it with fresh, shorter thread, coming up just inside the line.

The needle gets sticky.

The sheet's glue builds up on the needle. Wipe it with a little rubbing alcohol and carry on.

Grey lines stay after the rinse.

Soak it another five minutes and rinse under the tap again. Patience works better than scrubbing.

Questions people ask

Keep going

• How-to guideHow to turn a photo into an embroidery pattern (hand embroidery)Trace a photo into hand-embroidery line art yourself, or let a pattern maker draw it with every stitch marked.
• How-to guideHow to embroider a dog: a beginner's step-by-stepWhere to start, which stitches to use, and how to make the portrait look like your dog, not just a dog.
• How-to guideHow to choose the right photo for a pet portraitThe light, angle and framing that make a photo stitch well, and the checks a photo has to pass.
• Stitch guideHow to do a back stitchA solid, unbroken line for outlines, lettering and fine details.
• Stitch guideHow to do a satin stitchStraight stitches laid side by side to fill small shapes, like eyes and noses.
• Gift ideaCustom pet portrait you make yourselfStitch a custom portrait of your dog instead of buying a print: what it costs, the time it takes and how personal it gets.
• Dog breedsEmbroider your dog's breedBreed-by-breed stitch notes for hand-embroidered dog portraits, each with a real pattern made by our pattern maker: coat, ears and the lines that matter.
• Free toolThe free 3D Stitch SimulatorPractice back stitch and satin stitch on a 3D hoop you can turn, zoom and flip.