QUILTsocial | Issue 08

4 ways
to transfer embroidery designs to fabric
Christine Baker
Transferring designs to fabric
I talked about 3 great uses for
WonderFil’s Eleganza thread – Sashiko,
hand embroidery and wool applique.
All of these techniques lend themselves
to quiet hand stitching time which is
especially nice in a busy lifestyle. But in
order to do some of these techniques
you have to be able to follow a pattern
that is marked on fabric. For quilting,
stitching and embroidery there are
MANY, MANY different ways to mark your
fabric. Here are about 4 ways to transfer
embroidery designs to fabric.
Marking quilt tops for machine or
hand quilting
When I’m machine quilting I almost
NEVER mark the quilt top. There are a
couple of reasons for this: 1. I’m always in
a hurry and don’t want to take the time
to do it and 2. Sometimes it’s really hard
to follow that marked line LOL. But, I do
know that lots of people like to mark
their tops before they quilt them so
when I’m teaching my machine quilting
class at our local quilt shop I do take a
bit of time to go over the different types
of fabric marking products and their
benefits and drawbacks. Here’s the list of
products I handout to my class:
Pounce: This is chalk in a bag. Pounce
or pat the bag on a stencil, leaving a
chalk design on the fabric. The chalk
disappears easily, so mark as you go with
a pounce.
Mechanical pencil: Use hard lead
(0.5mm) and mark lightly so that
stitching or quilting will cover it. They
mark very lightly, don’t have to be
sharpened all the time and they don’t
smudge. Only mark them as dark as
you need to see the mark when you’re
quilting, as darker lines may never
entirely disappear after washing. These
are good only on light fabrics.
A hand embroidered quilt label by Carla Canonico from her QUILTsocial blog
post on June 26, 2016
A free hand embroidery pattern from www.french-knots.com
Colored pencils: There are many quilters’
pencils on the market usually in white,
silver, and yellow, the choice depending
on the color of the fabric being marked.
These work just fine with two significant
drawbacks. They have to be sharpened
constantly and they break inside when
tapped or dropped making it impossible
to keep them sharpened. Clover makes
a mechanical pencil with yellow or silver
lead that works like the mechanical
pencils mentioned above.
Soapstone marker: If kept sharp, these
markers will show up on light and dark
fabrics. These make a nice line and come
out easily. They’re available in quilt shops
and need to be sharpened in a hand
cranked pencil sharpener. They leave a
pale gray line.
Soap sliver: Sharpen the edges of
leftover soap for a marker that washes
out easily.
Q
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