Simmons couple tied together through embroidery

Katie Cole, News Editor
March 12, 2021

This piece was featured in S2E1 of the Voice and Simmons Radio: the Shark’s podcast “Welcome Home.” Click here to listen.

Lauren Lanseigne and Grace Giles spent their first date embroidering in a Simmons dorm room. Lanseinge was practiced in embroidery and had an Instagram account to showcase her work. Giles, who met Lanseigne through the Simmons Dance Company, wanted to learn.  

“I had tried a whole bunch of different art forms. I did like crocheting for a while, I tried knitting and like, hated both of those. But like, I loved sewing growing up. And one day I texted Lauren or something and I was like, ‘Hey, please teach me how to embroider,’” said Giles, a senior neuroscience major on the pre-med track. “She came to my dorm and that was our first date, was Lauren teaching me how to embroider.”

The pair have been dating for a bit over a year now and each operate Instagram pages to showcase their work and sell customized embroidery hoops. They began selling their works after getting requests from friends and family for custom pieces and turned those requests into small businesses. They both have embroidered everything from memes to memorial portraits that commemorate lost pets or special places in a customer’s life. 

“I just feel very honored that people would ask me to do that,” said Lanseinge on creating commemorative pieces. Lanseinge, an education major, created a piece over the summer for her mother based off of a lighthouse at Acadia National Park, which she said is the piece she is the most proud of.

Giles added to this feeling of honor, saying, “you really feel like you get to know that person and this one little story that they’re deciding to tell through the piece.”

Giles and Lanseigne live about an hour away from each other during the remote semester. Giles in Alford, Maine and Lanseinge in Haverhill, Massachusetts. They still see each other every few weeks. Their go-to activity to do together is embroider while watching TV.