The Mirror of Erised

On April 13, 2005, I started working on The Mirror of Erised
(Erised for short)
which has quickly become the longest and most demanding project
I've ever tried to complete. Coming in at a whopping 70+ thread colors,
it will finish at 10x12 inches on 28-count Monaco antique-white fabric.

There are a total of 16 pages to the pattern,
and don't ask me how many stitches per page. Honestly, I simply prefer not to think about it,
because I'll just get depressed.

Please note that this is not an official pattern.
It is not for sale, nor did I purchase it from anyone.
The picture was taken from the Harry Potter Uno deck; if I knew the artist,
I would love to credit him or her. Obviously, I like it enough that I wanted
to look at it for the next decade. I used a pattern-making computer program
to create a pattern from that picture, adjusting for size and some coloring.

Harry Potter is the property of J.K. Rowling, Warner Bros., et al. No infringement is intended.

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The original picture

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Here's what it looked like the first day. Originally, I intended to go in blocks of 10 squares by 10 squares. I kept this up for much of the first page.

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The same square, a little closer.

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After a while, I gave up on the square-by-square plan. The fabric was warping pretty badly, and then I came across the description of parking, which is a method in which you don't actually tie off your thread, instead carrying it to the next square in which it is to be used.

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By parking my thread, I was able to move much faster, finally finishing the first page --- only five months after I started.

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A close-up of the first page.

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The second page went even faster, and I finished it at the beginning of March 2006. As you can see, I did not tie off the threads when I completed this page, so that it'll be easier to pick up when I begin the page directly beneath it. (I hope, anyway.)

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A close-up of the completed second page.

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Here is Erised, exactly one year after I began it. As you can see, I had done a lot of work in the span on a single month.

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A picture of the wrong side of Erised, taken only by request. I find it quite ugly, but my Russian tutor thought it more beautiful than the right side.

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The finished third page of Erised, completed in May 2006.

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