About Anne Mende


Learning a craft is like wandering in an enchanted forest: at first, it is daunting, then you can’t stop exploring and most important of all: it’s much more fun in the company of others.

Hi, I’m Anne Mende of Pumora

Book author and embroidery enthusiast

Exploring the realms of hand embroidery brings me so much joy. On Pumora I love to share my knowledge and insights with you. I’m the author of two embroidery books (in German) and live in the rural Northeast of Germany with my family and cats.

What happened before…


Embroidery is…

more than just a needle and thread. It helps people to express themselves, to ease their pain in dark times, to bring joy into a world of grey walls, to spark excitement over a new project and what I like most about it:

It creates a bridge across continents to connect completely different people who otherwise would never have met.

People who I like to call embroidery enthusiasts.

My own embroidery journey started much later in my life.

But before that was a long history of textile crafts that I did excessively just like my mum. It started so innocently with sewing, then along came crochet and eventually I managed to relax my fingers enough to even knit things that were not as solid as a brick. When embroidery lurked around the corner, I fell in love with it instantly.

stitchlexicon hands

Why I love embroidery

  • it is portable
  • you don’t need a lot of stuff
  • even if you know just one stitch, you can do magic with it
  • you can stitch your own drawings/paintings
  • there are endless possibilities (seriously, look at all the embroidery artists, it is crazy what you can do!)
  • it is embroidery

Are you new to embroidery?

Over the years I have heard many life stories of embroidery enthusiasts. There is something powerful in the simple act of using a thread and a needle to create something.

It doesn’t have to be life-changing. Just sitting there and doing stitch after stitch can bring you into a state of peace of the mind – and sometimes it makes you tear your hair out because you don’t get it just perfect. But most of the time it is relaxing, I promise!

In order to get into that peaceful zone or flow, you actually have to start stitching. And this is something I can help you with. Here at Pumora, I share my knowledge with you so you can start picking up the needle and not be overwhelmed by the many things to learn. If you are a beginner, start here.

embroidery stitch sampler - beginner embroidery

What I teach on Pumora

I specialize in embroidery techniques that are rather unusual or not taught as much. For example, my hair embroidery email course that you can enjoy for free.

Additionally, you can look up over 200 embroidery stitches and how to recreate them in the Lexicon of Embroidery Stitches.

There are lots and lots of embroidery-related articles spread across the blog. I like to work in series, so if you want to learn more about embroidering flowers here is a whole series dedicated to this topic.


Do you want more tips and tricks on hand embroidery?

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