About Brooke Masek

I specialize in researching and creating reproduction patterns and kits of antique samplers from my extensive personal collection. My passion – which I also share through Secret Language Samplers – is to analyze the original not just as a piece of art, but also as a historical artifact.

My collection of antique samplers reflects my lifelong interest in design, storytelling, and craft. Each piece is a world of its own, reflecting the life and times of its creator and telling their story in myriad ways.

These stories span just over a century, with my earliest piece dating back to 1762 and my latest 1872. The majority of my collection is from the United States and Great Britain, with pieces from Mexico, Surinam (then a Dutch colony) and California, in the days when it was a neglected backwater of the Mexican state.

The hands that stitched these stories have unique identities, coming from different areas, different socioeconomic groups, and different times; all were young girls treading in tradition. To me, there is nothing better than digging deep into the history of a needlepoint sampler and placing a sampler within that tradition. The girls grew up and their family, times, and lives are long passed; or perhaps they died young, but through analysis, their careful needlepoint work, even on teaching samplers, brings everything back to life once again.

Why Do I Love Antique Samplers and Needlework?

Needlework has always been a source of great fascination for me. Some of my first memories are of Grandmother Blanche and Great-Grandmother Rose teaching me to thread a needle, cross stitch, and sew as a young child; a time-honored ritual that brought three generations of women closer together.

I’ll always cherish the countless hours that we spent together, sharing stories and laughter as they imparted their time-won wisdom and knowledge. And, of course, simply enjoying each other’s company with the ever-present needle and canvas work.

I carried these memories and passion for sewing samplers forward with me. I graduated college with a Masters in Art History and chose a career as a museum and arts administration professional, a choice that allowed me to pull together and blend the many different aspects of my interests together.  

But then the world changed.

Enter Needlework in the Face of Global Pandemic

The coronavirus pandemic threw my world into chaos. Like millions of other Americans, I lost my job and was left floating and adrift in a strange new world that none of us really understood and many of us feared.

Eventually, I wound up deep in the rural mountains of the Ozarks. If we were to isolate ourselves then where better? The Ozark mountains were also home to my ailing grandmother, who I visited as often as I could outside her nursing home.

I had plenty of time on my hands, and, aware of her age and frailty, I felt the need to reconnect with her again. Like so many women before me, I found myself stitching. As I sewed to while away the endless hours, I found a kind of Zen state in the meditative needlework that transported me away from the chaos of the world around me. Needlework also connected me to happy, familiar memories of my grandmother as the independent, present woman I knew her to be, rather than the frail presence with a mind ravaged by dementia. 

The comfort and control of the cross stitch, the isolation, the reconnection with my own past, and the unknowns of a world post-coronavirus caused an inventory of my life as deeply-buried dissatisfaction with the previous status quo bubbled up. What was I doing, what did I want to do, and how could I do it? 

I knew that I wanted more space in my life to be creative – and eventually, Secret Language Samplers became the answer. 

Today, wherever possible, I share my passion and the stories of girls through the ages through the samplers you can explore. Grandmother Blanche passed away in late 2020; the peonies in my logo are a tribute to her memory and my inspiration. This website is my small contribution to a tradition that spans centuries.