Case study · 2024
Bloom in Bloom
A first-birthday gift to a granddaughter, built around a single piece of embroidery the client's mother had stitched in the 1960s. The brief was small, personal, and quietly important.
- Place
- Den Haag, NL
- Scale
- 1 disc
- Lead
- 3–5 business days
Client
Private gift · Den Haag
- Discs
- 1
- Source
- 1960s embroidery
- Print passes
- 2
- Lead time
- 4 days
The work
The challenge
The original embroidery was a low-resolution phone photo — creased, off-axis, lit by a kitchen window. We needed to honour the stitch detail without faking it into a glossy print.
Our approach
We rebuilt the floral motif as a vector trace, kept the slight imperfections of the original stitch, and laid it down in two passes — a soft cream underpainting, then sharper foreground petals. A matte topcoat dulls the disc's rainbow just enough to put the flowers visually in front.
The outcome
Boxed in a hand-set folder with a print of the original embroidery and a short note explaining the process. Delivered by hand the day before the birthday.
In their words
It looks like my mother's hands. I didn't expect to cry over a CD.
Materials & build
What's in the piece.
Dimensions
120 mm disc · 12 mm brass standoff
- 011 salvaged disc, mirror-grade after two-stage polish
- 02Vectorised motif from a client-supplied photograph
- 03Cream underpainting + sharp foreground pass
- 04Matte clear topcoat, brass standoff mount
In situ
The piece, from a few angles.
Before & after
Drag to see the restoration.
Every disc starts scratched, dusty, on its way to a bin. We hand-polish, mask, and print — turning a forgotten silver circle into the piece on the right.
Want a piece in this spirit?
Tell us about the wall, the room, the feeling. We'll come back with sketches and a fixed quote within two working days.
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