Can I Make this Design for Sale?

It’s all well and good to make original needlepoint for yourself using outlines or other templates. As long as you are making it for personal use (including giving as a gift), you’re fine.

You are also fine if someone gives you a line-drawn canvas and pays you to stitch it because you are being paid for your labor, not for the design.

What if you get approached by your local shop to make this available as a canvas to sell? Or what if your stitch several and sell them at a local crafts fair? Is this breaking copyright?

The answer is, quite simply, it depends. To know if you can use it, you need to look at the source of the material.

Non-copyright: Items such as cookie cutters are not copyright. If your outline comes from a cookie cutter, unless it’s a licensed outline such as Mickey Mouse, you are OK. The Christmas tree pictured above could be sold as a canvas because the outline was a cookie cutter.

Public Domain: Items are “out of copyright” or in the “public domain” if they were published before 1923. Items published after 1963 can also be in the public domain under certain circumstances. This article from the US Copyright Office explains this. If an item is licensed, for example Beatrix Potter, it is not in the public domain.

Creative Commons: This is only seen in newer works and is similar to public domain, except that there can be conditions for use, such as naming the original source. The license will say how it can be used.

Royalty-free: Although designs that are royalty-free can be used without payment, there can be restrictions on their use. Most of us have seen those Dover books of clip art. They carry a copyright but many of them are royalty-free. If you read the copyright statement you will see that the number of images you can use is limited. I may be fine to make and sell a needlepoint canvas but if I want to use a different image on each card in a deck, I will need to get specific permission.

Copyright: Unless it is stated otherwise, you cannot use copyright images for commercial purposes without permission. The conditions on commercial use can range all over the place. I’ve seen notices in the last week or so that tell me:

I can use it as I like for commercial purposes if I pay X to the designer.

I cannot use the item directly in a commercial database but it says nothing about using the designs as a pattern.

Use with credit line citing book

If you ever see the words “All rights reserved.” in a copyright notice, you must seek permission from the publisher or artist to use it in any way.

If you plan on using designs commercially, check the copyright before you make plans.