Drawing inspiration from the objects, symbols, and stories explored in Objects at Play, in this special edition of Cross-Stitch Brooches, artist Luisa Mantelli invites participants to learn the fundamentals of cross-stitch while creating a series of wearable designs inspired by football culture and personal identity.
One of the most enduring embroidery techniques, cross-stitch is built through the repetition of X-shaped stitches that gradually accumulate into images, patterns, letters, and symbols. Passed down through generations in Luisa's family and shared within domestic spaces among women, the practice offers a rhythmic and meditative approach to making.
🗓️ Wednesday, July 8th | 6 to 8pm
📍 67 West St., Studio 513
"Through repetition, simple stitches become a way of recording stories, rituals, and shared histories." — Luisa Mantelli
Working with embroidery floss on an open-grid fabric, participants will be introduced to the basics of cross-stitch while translating objects and symbols explored throughout Objects at Play into stitched compositions. Drawing from a selection of simple patterns or creating their own designs, participants can transform familiar forms into wearable brooches.
Whether it's a football, a jersey number, a country's flag, your initials, or a personal symbol, each design becomes a stitched marker of connection, identity, and play.
NO EXPERIENCE NEEDED!
Registration includes all materials needed to create a set of two to four brooches, including:
- Fabric
- Embroidery floss
- Needles
- Beads
-
Backing hardware
Participants are also welcome to bring small personal materials if they would like to incorporate them into their work.
Each participant will leave with finished brooches ready to wear on clothing, bags, hats, or wherever they choose, plus drinks and bites.
ARTIST BIO
Luisa Mantelli is a Brazilian textile artist based in New York City. She earned an MFA in Textiles from Parsons School of Design in 2025, following earlier studies in architecture and urban planning.
She combines studio practice with education as a part-time faculty member at Parsons School of Design, a resident artist with ProjectArt teaching arts to first graders, and a resident in the NYFA Immigrant Artist Mentoring Program.
Mantelli’s practice explores the relationships between people and their environments, translating themes of migration, influence and transformation into sculptural textile forms. Textiles, like people, adapt to the place they are in, carrying memory while responding to change. Through crochet, weaving, embroidery, and natural dyeing with repurposed materials, she merges Brazilian and family traditions with materials from New York, exploring how environments shape behavior and how communities reinvent home.
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