Sometimes we get questions from mothers or grandmothers who are making a tallit on their own.

My grandson wants me to embroider the atara for him, so I need to find a tallit without an atara. Can you help? Thank you. Linda S.

I explained to Linda that it's quite difficult to find a tallit without an atara, but quite easy to take one off. With a standard stitch cutter, it should take no more than 10-15 minutes.

We could take off the atara by request, but it might be worthwhile for you to do the work yourself. Here are two reasons:

1) You will be able to see exactly how the atara is positioned. It's a bit counter-intuitive, because many people assume you sew the atara on the same side as the corner patches, which is not true.

2) Sometimes when you take an atara off, faint stitch marks remain on the tallit. (This depends on the type of fabric, and is not easy to predict.) You'll want to make sure the atara you make is at least the same width and length, so that those stitch marks are covered up by the new atara. If we leave the atara on, you'll be able to quickly measure it before starting work on your own.