Who are we? Classic Stitch was founded in 1995 by Jonathan Black. Initially the company focused on original hand stitched pieces of original artwork commissions, clients include the Royal Armouries, The Hotel Bel-Air Los Angeles, Local Authorities and major Institutions. We can also proudly claim that prominent members of the Royal Family have original pieces.
Personal Profile of Jonathan Black FRSA
Jonathan has been designing professionally for over eighteen years and has built a reputation for his innovative and the creative originality of his designs for which in 2005 he was made a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts, the first designer to the best of our knowledge of cross stitch and blackwork to be made a Fellow.
One of his first commissions was to design a cross stitch of the Town Hall Wakefield which was so well received that even today framed printed images and hand made bespoke cards are being used as civic gifts by the Mayors office, samples can now be found in dozens of countries around the world.
His next groundbreaking achievement was to be commissioned by the New Royal Armouries in Leeds to create and design some of their well-known images such as the knight on Horseback, a copy of which was presented to Her Majesty the Queen.
In the following years he has designed and created a large number of original images which can only be described as the first in their field, like a portrait of Henry VIII played by Keith Michelle for the BBC film the Prince and the Pauper, for the research he met with Keith in his own studio in London. Keith was most supportive and paid a very high compliment later to the finished picture.
If you were to ask Jonathan which picture gave him the biggest buzz l’m sure he’d say the portrait of the late Queen Mother, created especially for her one hundredth birthday, Her Majesty was so pleased that she wrote thanking him and gave him special permission to use the image commercially.
With a varied collection of Patterns built up over the years, we are now making them available as E Books via Kindle. Anyone who does not own a Kindle can click here and follow the instructions to download the free Kindle app for your device. From anywhere you can browse our collection and have it on your device within seconds of selecting it. All that is then needed is time and patience to create your own unique piece of art work.
Happy Stitching
