Cosy Christmas Sweater Cat Portrait

A christmas sweater cat portrait in the Cosy Christmas Sweater style dresses your cat in a green fair-isle cardigan worked with reindeer and snowflakes, a red velvet bow tie, white gloves and a heavy red tartan cape with a velvet collar — with her name stitched in gold thread across the velvet band at the bottom.

Behind her the background is a soft green winter haze with falling snow and blurred bauble lights, painted rather than drawn. The name is the detail people notice: it is rendered as raised gold embroidery on fabric rather than as lettering sitting on top of the picture, so it reads as part of the garment.

What makes a christmas sweater cat portrait different

Most festive pet art puts a hat on an animal and calls it done. This one commits to a full outfit — knitwear, bow tie, gloves, cape — and paints it with real texture, so you can see the stitch pattern in the cardigan and the nap on the velvet. The joke is that the cat is wearing the entire thing with complete indifference.

A christmas sweater cat portrait suits warm colouring especially well. Calicos, tortoiseshells and ginger cats sit beautifully against the green, because the warm colouring in the coat answers the red in the tartan. Grey and silver cats look sharper and slightly more formal. Black cats work well too, with the pale snow and haze behind giving a clean edge to the head.

How your christmas sweater cat portrait is made

Send one clear photo of your cat taken at her eye level, facing the camera, with light on the face and both eyes visible. Only the head is taken from your photograph — the outfit and the pose belong to the style — so nothing seasonal is needed in the picture at all. The photo guide covers the rest in two minutes.

Your photo is generated in this style and then individually reviewed and refined by a person before printing. Coat pattern is matched to your photo, eye colour corrected, and her head fitted properly into the collar so it does not look placed on top of the costume. Her name is embroidered from what you enter at checkout, so please send the exact spelling and capitalisation you want. You approve a proof, usually within one to three working days, and revisions are free and unlimited.

Sizes, framing and finish

Framed, canvas or a digital download. Framed prints are 200gsm matte paper in a real pine frame with shatterproof plexiglass and a hanging kit, ready to hang out of the box, four to six days after approval. Canvas is a slim 2cm stretched cotton-polyester blend, five to six days. Black framing suits the green ground and is the usual choice; dark wood is warmer.

Sizes are 8×12, 12×18, 16×24 and 24×36 inches. There is a lot of texture in the knit and the tartan, so 12×18 upward is where the stitch detail and the gold thread really read. Free tracked shipping on every order. The matching dog version and other festive styles are in the Christmas and Holidays collection.

Questions about this portrait

Can a christmas sweater cat portrait be hung with the dog version?
Yes. Same knit, same tartan, same green background and the same gold embroidery, so the two sit together as a pair.

Does my cat need to wear anything for the photo?
No. Everything below the neck is part of the style. A plain indoor photo of her face is all that is needed.

How long can the embroidered name be?
The stitching scales to fit. If it looks cramped on the proof, say so and it is corrected free.

Can two cats appear in one christmas sweater cat portrait?
It is composed around a single seated figure in a single outfit. For two or more, use one of the group styles in the same collection, which are built as rows and keep every face at a sensible size.

A share of every month’s orders goes back to rescued animals.