Fog creeps through trees glowing with colors of crimson, pine and gold on a hill in the midst of autumn. Artist Ekaterina Sinchinova captures the scene in her embroidery with thousands of tiny, intricate knots and smooth stitches—and photos and videos of Sinchinova’s needle working over a canvas reveal the technique behind the craft.
Sinchinova, 47, of Rockville said she spends anywhere from 80 to 180 hours of giving life to each of her embroidered landscapes. Soothing videos of Sinchinova creating her masterpieces have garnered her more than 100,000 followers on Instagram (katrin.vates) and 20,000 followers on TikTok (katrinvates). Commenters marvel that the works are “unbelievably realistic” and “stunning.”
Her embroidered images transport spectators from Longwood Gardens in Pennsylvania to former president Abraham Lincoln’s cottage in Washington, D.C.
Sinchinova said she finds joy in every part of the process, from visualizing her next project to selecting the threads to listening to podcasts while she stitches.
“Choosing among [the threads] is like choosing handmade sweets,” Sinchinova said.
Sinchinova, who attended an art college in her native Russia, started stitching in earnest about four years ago while her maternity leave from her job as a prepress designer was ending. Around the same time, she and her husband, Aleksei, and their two sons, Aleksei, and Aleksandr, moved to the United States where Aleksei, who is a software engineer, got a job offer.
“We didn’t know exactly where we would move, as my husband was interviewing for a job at that time. And I thought: We have enough time,” she said in an email. “I decided to decorate our apartments. I’ve always liked decorative embroidery, but I found that I can’t afford beautiful embroidery; a high-quality handmade [item] is expensive.”
Since she used to embroider in her youth, holding a needle in her fingers was familiar. Sinchinova gathered inspiration from Pinterest, embroidering items such as needle balls or cushions before she switched her focus.
Now Sinchinova draws inspiration from the natural world around her, from a lush park commanding attention away from buildings in Washington, D.C., to an autumnal scene in Rockville to a waterfall trickling down smooth, rounded rocks.
“I started to embroider the landscape outside the window so that it would remind me of this place,” she said. “Most of my landscapes are places where I live or that I have seen.”
Asian art has also greatly influenced her embroidery style, she said in an Instagram post.
Sinchinova started posting her work on social media in 2018 and began drawing a significant following when she posted an autumn landscape with fog. She posted stages of that work from November 2020 to February 2021.
“Step by step, I realized that my Instagram is turning from personal to artistic,” she wrote. “After that, I switched my accounts from personal to business.”
The images of her work have left many of her followers in complete awe.
“Absolutely stunning, such a pleasure to witness your talent in stitching and a huge thank you for sharing with the world,” one commenter said, “I just don’t know how you could sell it, too beautiful to part with and special.”
Eventually, Sinchinova began to receive requests to buy her pieces, and it became her full-time business. In June 2022, she made a post on her Instagram account announcing that her embroidery art pieces were available for sale. Her pieces cost between $1,300 and $4,500 depending on how long she spends completing a piece.
“My husband and I decided that I should try to turn my hobby into a business,” she said. “He’s working hard, and I appreciate the decision. I took the opportunity to improve my skills and spend a lot of time on them.
Sinchinova added that though her small business just started, “I had my first sales and commissioned work, and I happy with it.”
