Thinking Outside the Hoop: Confronting Leather Embroidery Project
Lisa Calder shares her inside tips on embroidering on leather, displaying her award-winning tribal jacket as a testiment to the fact that tricky work will have its rewards in a beautiful finished product.
Materials
Project Preview Video
Cut Away Stabilizer - 2.5 Oz wt.
Cut Away Stabilizer - 2 oz wt.
Lisa Calder shares her inside tips on embroidering on leather, displaying her award-winning tribal jacket as a testiment to the fact that tricky work will have its rewards in a beautiful finished product.Leather is known to be something that no embroidery professional wants to hear that you need embroidered. We as embroiderers used to shudder at the thought of embroidering on leather, as the cost if destroyed could be outrageous. Would an $8 sew be worth risking the replacement cost of a $200 jacket? Most embroiderers just said "no". We can now consider this a thing of the past.
Leather comes in a variety of types, from traditional commercial leather that is very easy to sew on to really heavy leather like the real buckskin shown here. There are alot of do's and don't's with leather, so though you do not need to be afraid of the material, read on to ensure that you do approach your leather embroidery with some idea of what you are doing! |
Needles Insofar as needles are concerned, I have been sewing on real buckskin leather and have found 80/12 needles to work well. Speed I have been able to sew well on leather at a speed of 600. Some people slow their machines down to minimum speed to avoid thread breaks and needle friction. Use your judgement and go at the speed at which you feel comfortable. Backing I have had success with just tearaway backing and no solvy topping. I have also known people to put wax paper behind tearaway to avoid gum up on needles and to stop needle friction. Machine I have found that the single head machines seem to have a little more difficulty moving the heavy leather projects around on the sewing field area than the big four head machines. Of course this shuts down production time for a one head job, but it will do the job perfectly with no skipped or missed stitches. Everyone has their on beliefs and techniques for leather embroidery. As the cost of leather does not lend itself well to experimentation, if in doubt, consult a professional for more advise before tackling the job.
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