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Changing a Reproduction Sampler

I’ve been thinking a lot about some changes on Ellen Carr 1843.

Yesterday a reader commented about the big space between “A” and “faithful” near the bottom in that group of words. I thought about it briefly and that bothers me too but then as I looked at it, I saw the following things that kinda bother me:

  • The urn of flowers isn’t centered under the house.
  • If I moved the urn over to center it, I’d still have room to move the “A”. I’d probably have to move friend over enough that “is” would have to go on the line with hard.
  • I would have to move 1843 over and that would mean there wasn’t room for the two leaves on that row but I could put my initials there.

All of those changes would work but I started thinking about changing a reproduction sampler. This is a sampler done by someone and then it has been reproduced. I have two sets of thoughts when it comes to reproduction samplers:

  1. Leave it alone, stitch it exactly as it was stitched originally and preserve it as an authentic reproduction.
  2. Make it my own and use the chart as a guide but not an absolute with no changes.

The more I thought about it, the more I thought I’d leave it alone and stitch it as it is but when I read the blurb on the back of the chart, I found this: “We eliminated the over-three stitching and added a verse in case you wanted to fill in the open space on each side of the urn.”

Now that I know that, I am going to do some revising. I am definitely going to center the urn, even though that’s how Ellen Carr stitched it. Sorry, Ellen Carr. I will do something with the verse. In the least, I will stitch it to fit around the urn of flowers. I may change it completely.

What are your thoughts on changing a reproduction sampler?

Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. My thoughts: the house isn’t quite centered between the borders, either. Moving the urn to center under the house, which is already a bit too far to the right, might disturb the balance of the whole piece. A slippery slope! One way to fix the space between “A” and “faithful” would be to move “faithful” to the left a little. Can you make a copy of the pattern sheet, and cut out various elements and move them around to see? But I think the sampler should be your own, and doesn’t need to be a faithful reproduction. Ellen herself would probably have done it differently if she’d done it a second time.

    • I was wondering about the house, too….it (to me) seems like it’s a bit to the right of center – maybe if it was over to the left a little, you wouldn’t have to move the urn quite as much??

  2. I think it is ok to change patterns – we do it for quilt patterns. I would take out “Ellen Carr: and add your initials and repeat the right vine motif. The left corners for the border would bug me as wold the lack of a “Z”. Oh well….

  3. If you are stitching directly from the original sampler, then I think you would want to stitch it as closely to the original as possible. If you are stitching from something that is already an adaptation — you should change it however you want to, since you are doing the work, and you are going to be the one looking at it!

    • Most of this one is close to exactly as the original was, except for the words on the sides of the urn of flowers.

  4. I generally don’t change a reproduction sampler, partly to preserve the original charm of it and partly because I’m lazy!

  5. You know I’m a rebel! 🙂 There are stanch supporters of never ever change anything in a reproduction sampler but I’m not one of them. I’m not stitching them because it’s a reproduction and I must have it exactly as reproduced. I’m stitching it because I just like the look of it – or parts of it. I generally don’t put in the name of the original stitcher if it is charted in the chart nor the original year – none of that is going to be important to anyone I give the stitch to nor to me. I find the history of them interesting but that doesn’t mean I will stitch them faithfully as a reproduction. I had looked at the Ellen Carr chart (I had a friend by that name) but the first thing I noticed was things were not centered and you know that bugs me so decided it was not a stitch for me. I do really like the colors in that one and the blue house is so pretty.

  6. I debate about this A LOT! One of the reasons I love Blackbird Design charts is because they make them for you to personalize. I far prefer samplers “based on” or “inspired by” a reproduction because then I don’t do the whole debate about changing it or not.

  7. I like quirky…in my quilting and stitching. Resisting the urge to make everything balanced and even is my preference. It has taken me years to get over the need for perfection.

  8. You can go either way with this; as they say, there are no cross stitch police. If you want to revamp it some and are concerned with “destroying” the authenticity of the sampler just add a note that it was based on Ellen Carr. Non stitchers will not care to begin with and chances are next to none that it will end up in a museum as an authentic 1843 sampler. Just think how many “Ellen Carr 1843” samplers there are out there with minor differences. (Will the real “Ellen Carr 1843” please stand up?) I like some names on some samplers so would leave them. Others, not so much. I have plans to add my great aunt’s names to some small samplers along with their birth year just because I was fond of them. In a couple of cases, the names were similar which is what gave me the idea. The aunts were all born between 1880 and 1905 and I’m not even going to worry that the dates I stitch on the sampler match the style of the sampler. I’m just matching samplers that I like with my memories of what the aunts were like. Do what feels right to you.

  9. ..I agree with Denise. My home isn’t a museum and I’m certainly not a curator. :-). The sampler I’m currently working on has a lot of changes starting from the first stitch by changing the color scheme. I think you should do what makes you enjoy looking at the work. Change what you like. It’s your stitch.

  10. …my feeling is that you can change what you want…it is yours do as you like….no one will know the difference. I personally don’t change it because these young girls make mistakes. I think it gives it a certain character

  11. I make changes on most of the patterns I do, whether cross-stitch, knitting, or crochet. To me, the pattern is just a guide that makes it easier to get the finished look that I want. If you want an exact reproduction, then that’s what you should do. But if having things off-center will bother you, then change it. As long as you like the finished product, either way is fine!

  12. No one has mentioned the spacing of the trees on either side of the blue house. Why is there more empty space on the left side than on the right side? Just curious.

  13. All of those would bother me! But it also makes me wonder how old Ellen Carr was when she stitched it. I would hope she was very young and so she didnt care about centering – she just wanted to get the work done!

  14. a reproduction, I am not sure about..I always change something about a project to make it my own. if I were doing this sampler, the two red flowers in the urn/vase at the bottom bug me. I would have to put the blue in the middle. so, in that respect, yes, I would change this… and I would add the year I stitched it, and my initials

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