It was a serendipitous encounter with an antique French anatomical textbook that set Robert Mahar on the path to becoming a renowned embroidery artist and craftsperson. As he leafed through the book, the illustrations, rich in detail and saturated with color, captivated him. Despite their somewhat unsettling nature, they ignited his imagination.
“You transfer that to fabric, and you start stitching on top of it, it becomes this really beautiful, layered process,” Mahar explains. “That somehow just resonated with me.”
This idea came at a time when companies specializing in print-on-demand fabrics were gaining momentum. Mahar began stitching embellishments on his custom fabric and shared the results online.
“I got such amazingly positive feedback and reinforcement; it just started those wheels turning,” he says. “That’s what I’ve become most well-known for.”
Not long ago, Mahar notes, embroidery choices were limited to patterns that appealed mostly to women of a certain age and maybe their granddaughters whom they passed the craft onto. “Unless you wanted to do baskets of kittens, you didn’t have a lot of motif options,” he quips.
Mahar found his niche developing his own patterns by exploring vintage paper ephemera, such as botanical prints, maps, and postcards. Drawing on his background in graphic design, he combines those images — anatomical illustrations with botanical prints, for example — to create collaged, free-form embroidery samplers. One standout piece depicts blackberry brambles emerging from the ventricles of a heart; another, called “Crocus Cranium,” features a skull with a crocus growing through it. In Mahar’s hands, these unexpected pairings seem destined to be together. “What gets me excited is taking a heritage craft, like embroidery, and finding a new and modern way to interpret it or somehow make it my own,” he says.
With his naturally expressive and humorous demeanor, video quickly became an ideal medium for Mahar and he began doing embroidery and other craft tutorials online. His work soon caught the attention of the producers of NBC’s “Making it,” a reality craft competition series hosted by Amy Poehler and Nick Offerman. Mahar competed on the show’s first season in 2018, helped test run challenges in the second, and then became an associate producer for its third and final season.
Amid his growing success, Mahar and his husband, George, joined the pandemic-era migration from big cities to quieter locales, trading the glam and grit of Los Angeles — where he had spent the previous three decades — for a more relaxed life in Sonoma.
“It’s been this wonderful about-face,” says Mahar, who grew up in Grand Rapids, Michigan, and always considered himself a “city mouse.” “The fact that I get to have a yard, and a dog, and walk around a field every day is one of the happiest parts of my day.”
Another perk of life in Wine Country is having space for a home studio, where his senior rescue dog, Bunny — a German wire-haired pointer — always stays close. The room is minimalist, with white walls and ample space for creative projects, offering a stark contrast to Mahar’s colorful, vintage aesthetic, a passion that developed during regular weekend trips to swap meets and flea markets with his dad while he was growing up.
Craft supplies, embroidery hoops, irons, notions of all sorts, and a rainbow of embroidery floss are tucked away neatly in drawers and cubbies. Projects in various stages of completion are pinned to felt boards on the wall above his sewing machine, adding pops of color to the room.
There’s his blackberry heart sampler, with “George” stitched in cursive. He shows off a botanical piece, a teacup magnolia, where instead of outlining the flower, he took a more abstract approach, using dainty pink stitches the size of pinheads to represent the flower’s scent.
“Envisioning that as aroma floating off of the petals, that was kind of fun,” he says. “It’s all French knots. I freaking love French knots. I don’t know what it is.”
Two shelves of vintage books flank either side of the studio door — volumes on needlecraft, cooking, and even cowboys exist both for decor, and perhaps inspiration, including a particularly fetching 1950s-era Better Homes & Gardens Handyman’s Book.
“Have I ever used it? No. But do I love the aesthetics of it? 100%,” he says, laughing.
Since moving to Sonoma, Mahar has taught fiber arts classes at the Sonoma Community Center and through Crafted at Appellation. In mid-September, he hosted “Well Crafted Sonoma,” a five-day craft retreat at the secluded Westerbeke Ranch in the foothills of Sonoma Mountain. Two dozen women from 11 states joined him for a week of workshops on botanical dyes, felted miniature coats, and, of course, embroidery, using one of his latest fabrics: a bold and bright vintage kitsch map of Sonoma County.
Many participants were already familiar with embroidery hoops and “floss” (the six-strand cotton thread), so Mahar moved quickly into some of his favorite tips and tricks. Using an overhead projector, he demonstrated how to easily separate threads in a skein of floss and how the number of threads used can change the look of a stitch from delicate to bold, much like how brush size affects watercolor painting. He shared that a linen or cotton canvas is his favorite, explaining, “It makes a popping noise when you stitch through — a little crafting ASMR.”
After offering a refresher in several stitches — fly, running, back, star, satin, and finally tidy French knots — he encouraged his students to explore free-form embroidery on their maps. “The goal,” he reminded them, “is not perfection, it’s documenting a memory.”
Mahar’s fabrics, such as his vibrant map of Sonoma County, serve as canvases for creativity, inviting anyone — regardless of embroidery experience — to embellish the designs. “It encourages a newbie to want to dig in and do more,” he says.
Mahar holds himself to a higher standard, however. “I’ve been doing this for a long time, so I have a certain sense of artistry that I bring to it.”
There has long been a tension between art and craft, with the former historically elevated above the other. For Mahar, who has a degree in art history and spent more than a decade as a fine art appraiser, the lines between the two have recently blurred.
“We’re seeing a lot more fine artists incorporate elements of craft into their work,” he says, pointing to exhibitions like the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art’s recent retrospective of Ruth Asawa, famous for her crocheted wire sculptures. “It’s more driven by the creator than the culture,” he adds.
A particularly fortuitous discovery since moving to Sonoma has been the Sonoma Botanical Garden, where Mahar now serves as the director of learning and engagement. Over the years he has taught embroidery classes at botanical gardens in San Francisco and Palo Alto featuring his vintage plant and floral samplers, something he hopes to introduce into the programming at the Glen Ellen garden.
After two decades in an entrepreneurial career that required frequent travel, Mahar appreciates the opportunity to stay close to home and his family. He also relishes having time to stitch together a new network of resources, friendships, and community.
“I’m trying to lean into that with a sense of adventure that I haven’t had in a long time,” he says.
Gardens Aglow
Robert Mahar has created a Winter Workshop of DIY craft projects as part of the “Gardens Aglow” event at Sonoma Botanical Gardens. From 5-8 p.m. Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays Dec. 5-21. Tickets: $30 general, $25 members, $12 youth 5-17, free for children 4 and under. 12841 Highway 12, Glen Ellen. 707-996-3166, sonomabg.org