I have 7,175 cross stitch folders on my computer. I had them initially split up by subject matter.... scenes, flowers, animals etc. But I found this hard to manage so I made sub-folders as in the old DOS system you could only have so many folders on the root of a drive...... the subfolders work well. Under animals I have Cats which include wild cats, wolves, dogs, cartoon animals, horses, etc. Same with the flower directory, roses, lillies etc. Then I broke down and started by designer. The immediate want to start right away are copied into a directory that has a pound sign (#)at the beginning so it stays on top when sorting. I search my machine often and usually I find something either by designer, company or subject. Like Dimensions are in a dimensions folder ......... if I know its by dimensions I only have to look in subject or under the name Dimensions. I do have a download directory that need cleaning out quite often so they are sorted into the proper directories on another drive.
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I put them into folders with subjects as animals, tatty teddy, baby,...The HEADs I have I put in seperate small folders. The magazines I keep intact, and just keep them together. The files on my computer are not organized, it all stands in the same folder. So I still have some organizing to do!
If indexing by designer is not doable, try having themes in mind and place group of patterns that are similar in one group for example (flowers, cottages, garden, kitchen, landscape, Seasons ... etc
I hope this will help you, Im indexing by designer at the moment and I know sometimes this takes time ><
good luck :lol
I currently have them sorted by company, which makes it easy when someone requests a specific pattern, but I find that when Ive browsed a pattern I want to do later, I can never find the pattern again when later rolls around. :( i may have to start sorting by type.
Mine are in categories - samplers, animals, flowers, patterns, and misc for everything else. Within those headings I try to sort by design size but it usually doesnt stay that way for long. :)
The system I use for the brought designs or printed is with Lever Arch File and they are arranged in order of A-Z of Designer and then A-Z of Pattern Title. I also do the same on my computer. I am very geeky when it comes to organising my cross stitch - I have a spread sheet with all charts and threads too....:$
chekccard