PROJECT

My desire to learn how to hand embroider was inspired by other embroidery artists I'd been following who practice the craft. I've always had a hand-me-down box of embroidery floss that was passed on to me as a teenager from my older sister's friendship bracelet making days. I'd always loved looking at all the various colors, both in my box and even at the craft store, so after seeing some examples of how this floss was used in embroidery art, I decided to try my hand at it.

PROCESS

After stocking up on hoops, needles, and fabric, I tried and practiced various stitches and mostly ended up frustrated. A small eyeball patch was my first completed project which I added to my flair decorated varisty jacket. Eager to make more, I drew up some sketches and detailed a few of my favorites.

However some designs were a bit too complicated for my initial skill level, such as the X-Files patch which I simplified in order to embroider. With the bee patch and later the skull patch, I realized the importance of different thickness strings and utilized that to create finer details. Both of these patches are approximately three inches square.

The skull design was refined in Illustrator using an isometric grid as a guide. A few different variations of this design might pop up somewhere else in future projects, but I used a more basic pattern for the patch due to the smaller size.