Central London Embroidery School
After the success of our Valentino Roses video, we have expanded the London Embroidery School to be an actual YouTube channel. You will find a whole host of videos up there already from us, including some of our favourite tips and tricks for you to use as a reference resource.
There is lots more to come so we will be adding videos periodically so be sure to subscribe to know when we have added a new video.
Picture the scene, you have learnt a new embroidery skill on the frame, well done! And you’ve got all these ideas about where you want to put that embroidery, how you want to use it but it’s on a base fabric which is really a part of what you had envisoned. If you cut it out, the fabric will fray and all fall apart, but if you dont cut it away then it’s going to look a bit scruffy at best.
The alternative is to tuck the excess base fabric under the embroidery so that it gets finished and hidden, so that your pieces looks like it was freestanding all along!
Click the picture above to see the video in full.
First cut yourself a small boarder around the embroidery in the shape you would like the piece to be when finished, just a bit bigger. How large this boarder is will depend on your base fabric, if it is likely to fray, be a bit more generous, but about 3mm is a good standard. You may want to mark this first on the back with a pencil as a guide, or you can eyeball it if you are feeling lucky.
Once cut, turn you embroidery over to the back side, thread up a needle with a matching coloured thread, single thread, knot in the end (follow the link to our pro tips blog on knots to see how to do a knot like a pro).
Anchor you thread with a few small stitches on top of one another somewhere inconspicuous, then start to fold in the boarder of base fabric and secure with a stitch.
You should be catching the back of the embroidery and then the folded in edge with a small stitch, then move along a few millimeters, fold the boarder in again and stitch.
Every few stitches, you will need to create a little tuck to gather the excess fabric as the boarder is bigger than the finished embroidery, fold it neatly and stitch it down (may require a few stitches), then move on like normal
Repeat to the end and knot off your thread.
You now have a very neat freestanding embroidery which you can apply to whatever your heart desires.
Valentino Rose used as an example for tucking under
Framing up a frame might seem like one of the most basic things you could possibly do in embroidery, and in truth, it is. But here are a few little tips that might help to bring your embroidery up a knotch just in the preparation of your stitching:
1. Ironing your Fabric
For embroidery, you want a nice, flat, even surface on which to embroider as this will help to create consistent tension. Any creases in the fabric represent an area of fabric that has already been distorted before you begin. A crease will have lesser tension than the rest of the fabric and therefore has the potential to become a gather or pucker whilst you work therefore if you give it an iron before you begin you should be able to illiminate this risk. (Always test your fabric somewhere inconspicuous first before ironing all over and follow the ironing instructions for that fabric if provided)
Within the frame, whilst you work, you put pressure on the fabric which can change the tension. Wrapping your frame in calico or a similar fabric provides a bit more of a grippy surface for the fabric to pull against and maintain your tension (see our previous blog on this for more details). You may also find for some fabrics that the calico provides the extra bonus of a little padding which can decrease your chances of having frame marks on your fabric when you finish.
3. Pressing on the Frame
You’ve ironed your fabric beautifully flat, and your frame is wrapped to perfection. All that is left is to put the fabric in the hoop, how you do that can also makes a difference, particulally if you have a seat or clamp frame. Put the top side of your hoop face down on a table, lie the fabric centrally over the hoop then place the inside of the frame within in. You are looking for the part of the outer hoop that has the bolt in it to be smoothly within the hoop first. This is because it is the area of highest pressure due to the bolt and the ends of the hoop being there so if this goes in first, the pressure created when we push the frame into place is displaced equally around the hole curve of the hoop rather than condensed onto these corners.
4. Respect your Frame
This last one is more of a bug bear for us, but getting into this good habit will increase the lifespan of your frame. Anytime you want to look at the underside of your embroidery, loosen the screw that attached the frame to the stick so that it can move easily. When this screw is tight, is it what is holding your frame at your desired angle to work on, so when you force it up and down, inevitabley over time the screw will loosen and no longer be able to support the weight of the frame at your prefered angle (plus it makes a horrible screech). Loosening it will give it a much better chance of serving you long and well.
Other blogs you might find useful on the subject are ‘How to pick your embroidery frame‘ and ‘Stitching with both hands‘ for a little further reading.
Hope you found this helpful!
This week, we have frames on our mind. An essential for creating your best embroidery, the humble frame is often overlooked. We now have a range of 11 frame options for your to chose from so here is a little guide from us so you can make the best choice for you:
One of the big questions when it comes to stepping up from prepared embroidery kits to your own designs is how to transfer the design onto your fabric effectively. There are lots of items out there to try for various approaches which have their pros and cons, however our prefered method is the old school way; Prick and Pounce.
With price and pounce you use a needle to create a series of holes in your design on tracing paper which mark the areas you wish to see and then pass a fine powder (called pounce) through the holes to mark your design (Please see previous post for more details about pricking specifically).
Once you have pricked your design, you to pass the pounce over the design using some rolled up felt, or a chalk ball so that the pounce falls through the channels you have created. When passing the pounce, you should be looking to stroke evenly across the design in one direction to encourage the pounce to fall though the same way across the design to be accurate.
When you have covered the whole design, remove tracing paper and you should be able to see your design. Then when you are happy with your pounced version, very carefully, draw over the pounce dots to join up the lines in an appropriate medium (eg pencil for light fabrics, gel pen for dark coloured fabrics).
If you find you have made a mistake at the pouncing stage, eg. you’ve missed a section or that the draft moved mid pouncing, you can simply shake the pounce out of the fabric with a few good taps and begin again.
Prick and Pounce as a method of transfering a design onto your cloth is a great way to get an accurate draft to work from. Much of the embroidery process is about the preparation of your materials and design, as if your preparations are not right the final piece will never be that great no matter how skilled your subsequent stitches.
Prick and Pounce is the traditional way of doing this and they way we favour. This does not mean that there aren’t other ways of doing your design transfer that might be equally sucessful, or easier for your particular project, such as using a light box or dissolvable pens. Each method has their pros and cons, you just have to choose which you think is best for what you are looking to create.
Firstly, trace your design outlines onto some tracing paper with an area of unused tracing paper around the edge. This is important as when we come to pounce the design, we do not want any stray pounce marking around the edges (see future post for more details on pouncing).
Then using a pin or needle (having a needle mounted in your tambour handle can make this process easier as it gives you similar control to drawing- see previous post on using a tambour handle as a pricker for more details) make a series of holes through the traced lines you created. There are some conficting opinions on which side of the design you should use to prick from. We prefer to prick the design from the back (as shown) as each hole you make forces the tracing paper to create a little channel of the displaced tracing paper which is then on the rightside of your design. This makes the rightside rougher with the holes formed which catches the pounce as you pass it over the design.
Therefore when you are pricking, it is important that you keep the angle of the needle at 90 degrees to the paper (verticle) so that the channel created is straight through the paper so as not to distort the design when the pounce falls through it.
