How To Beautifully Display your Cross Stitch On Canvas

Once your cross stitch is complete, it deserves to be shown off! Mounting it onto a stretched canvas with a beautiful fabric backing is one of the loveliest ways to display your finished piece, and the results look incredibly professional. We've used Liberty of London Tana Lawn fabric here, which adds a gorgeous decorative border around the cross stitch, but any pretty fabric you love will work just as well. Here's how to do it, step by step.

What You'll Need

• Your completed and pressed cross stitch piece
• An acid-free stretched canvas (we used an 8 inch square)
• A piece of cardboard cut slightly smaller than the canvas (we used 6¾ inches square)
• Liberty of London Tana Lawn fabric (or similar), large enough to wrap around your cardboard with a seam allowance
• Acid-free double-sided tape
• A mechanical pencil and ruler
• A pin or two
• A pair of scissors (kept separate from your fabric scissors!)
• A rotary cutter and cutting mat (optional but helpful)
• A needle

A note on materials: using acid-free canvas and acid-free double-sided tape really is worth it. Regular tape and canvas can cause yellowing over time, and nobody wants to look back at their beautiful work years later to find it has taken on a yellow tinge!

Step 1: Find and Mark the Centre of Your Canvas

Using your ruler and a mechanical pencil, lightly draw a line from one corner of the canvas to the opposite corner. Do the same from the other two corners. Where the lines cross is the centre of your canvas. Mark this point very lightly as it will be covered by your mounted piece so no need to worry about it showing.

Set the canvas to one side for now.

Step 2: Mark the Centre of Your Cardboard

In exactly the same way, find the centre point of your cardboard piece and mark it lightly with a pencil. Then push a pin through this centre point so that you have a visible marker sticking up from the front of the cardboard. This pin is going to be very useful shortly when you come to position your fabric.

Step 3: Apply Double-Sided Tape to the Cardboard

Turn the cardboard over so the marked side is face down and apply strips of acid-free double-sided tape around all four edges of the back. Keep the backing paper on the tape for now. Give each strip a good finger press to make sure it's sitting flat and firmly attached.

Step 4: Find the Centre of Your Fabric

Fold your Tana Lawn (or chosen fabric) in half, then in half again, and give it a light finger press at the folded corner to create a subtle crease. This crease marks the centre of your fabric. There is no need to mark it with a pencil; the fold alone is enough to guide you.

Step 5: Mount the Fabric onto the Cardboard

Place your fabric over the cardboard so that the centre crease lines up with the pin you placed in Step 2. The pin should come through the fabric at its very centre point. Once you're happy with the positioning, you can begin attaching the fabric to the back of the cardboard one side at a time.

Peel back the tape on one edge, stretch the fabric gently over and press it down onto the sticky tape, keeping it smooth and taut as you go. Then work your way around to each of the remaining sides, one at a time, double-checking the position as you go and making sure the fabric is lying nice and flat on the front.

When you reach the corners, create neat mitered corners rather than folding the fabric in a bulky way. To do this, fold the corner of the fabric down to meet the cardboard first so it creates a small triangular fold, then bring each side over in turn, pressing firmly. This gives a beautifully crisp finish on the back and keeps bulk to a minimum.

Remove the pin once you're confident the fabric is well positioned and everything is stuck down securely.

Step 6: Trim Your Cross Stitch

Now it's time to prepare your cross stitch for mounting. Using a rotary cutter and ruler (or sharp scissors), trim around your stitched piece leaving five rows of unstitched Aida all the way around the design on each side. Count carefully to make sure the border is even before you cut.

Step 7: Fray the Edges

This is the step that gives the mounted piece its beautiful, characterful finish! Using a needle, hook into the outermost row of the Aida border and gently tease out the horizontal threads one by one, working your way along the edge. Then drop down to the second row and do the same. You want to fray back two rows all the way around, which creates a lovely soft, textured edge that looks stunning against the fabric backing.

There is something very satisfying and calming about this step, so take your time and enjoy it!

Step 8: Apply Double-Sided Tape to the Cross Stitch

Apply strips of acid-free double-sided tape around the edges of the back of your cross stitch, keeping the tape close to the frayed edge but not so close that it overlaps the fraying itself. The tape will also help to prevent any further fraying once it is stuck down. Keep the backing paper on for now.

Step 9: Find the Centre of Your Cross Stitch and Mark It

Cast your mind back to when you started your cross stitch and found the centre point of your pattern (covered in our earlier tutorial!). Use that same reference point now to identify the centre stitch of your finished piece. Push a pin through from the front at this centre point so that it pokes out of the back. This is your alignment guide for the next step.

Step 10: Mount the Cross Stitch onto the Fabric-Covered Cardboard

Push the pin back through from the back of the mounted fabric and cardboard piece so that it pokes out from the front, right at the centre point you marked earlier. You can now lower your cross stitch down onto the pin, lining up the centre point of the cross stitch with the centre of the fabric mount.

Take your time here as nothing is final until you press it down. You can rotate and adjust the cross stitch until you are completely happy with how it sits. Once you are, press one edge down gently to anchor it in place, remove the pin so everything lies flat, then peel back the tape backing on all sides and press the cross stitch down firmly and evenly onto the fabric. Work from the centre outwards, smoothing it down as you go to keep it neat and taut.

Step 11: Mount the Whole Piece onto the Canvas

Apply strips of double-sided tape across the back of your mounted piece, including a cross through the centre (but leave the very centre point free for now as you'll use it one final time to align everything onto the canvas).

Push a pin through the centre of your mounted piece from back to front so it is visible from the front. Lower the whole piece down onto your canvas, lining up the pin with the centre mark you made on the canvas in Step 1. Once you're happy with the placement, press one edge down to hold it, remove the pin, then press firmly across the back of the piece to secure it fully to the canvas. Pay particular attention to the edges and corners where the canvas has its wooden frame, pressing these down especially well.

Your Finished Display Piece

And there you have it - a beautifully finished and fully mounted cross stitch, ready to hang and enjoy! The combination of the frayed Aida edge, the pretty fabric border and the crisp canvas backing gives a wonderfully polished result that really does show off your stitching at its very best.

Happy Stitching!