Introducing the Red Geisha

Small Red Geisha (Melissa Shirley Designs)

Since I have three purse canvases to stitch this year, I'd better get started, right?  The first purse piece is a Melissa Shirley design called Red Geisha.  This will be a model for Melissa Shirley Designs at the June Columbus trade show and I'll be selling a stitch guide for her.

The canvas itself is on 13 count canvas and it is 8 inches square.  There is a larger wedge-shaped Red Geisha design that is intended to be made up into a leather purse.  You can see both designs in the link to Melissa's website below.  Note the details you can see on the larger piece that you can't on my Red Geisha.  I looked at the larger canvas several times trying to figure out what I was seeing on my smaller version so I could stitch it appropriately.
http://melissashirleydesigns.com/gallery/?cat=27

Melissa also sent me a black Stirling purse to put Red Geisha into.  The Stirling bag she will adorn is their small tote bag.  The first thing I did when the purse and canvas arrived is to make a color copy of the canvas, then I cut it out so I could slip the paper copy into the front of the bag to see if I needed to stitch a row or two outside the painted lines.  They look like a perfect fit to me.  So the paper pattern was put aside to use as a reference as I stitched Red Geisha.  I can feel secure that she will fit nicely without any row additions or subtractions.
http://www.stirlingcases.com/products_sub.php?id=14

I haven't forgotten Luna but since I have a deadline to finish Red Geisha, I only work on Luna's cloak lining on nights when I need mindless stitching.  Once Red Geisha is done, I will finish Luna.

Written by Jane/Chilly Hollow Blogging at http://chillyhollownp.blogspot.com and at http://chstitchguides.blogspot.com