Cross Stitching Clothes

Cross stitching motifs on clothing is a great way to personalize your look, or promote your message. In this article, you'll find tips for cross stitching, including what materials work best.

Cross Stitching Clothes
Cross stitching sayings or motifs on clothing is a great way to personalize your look, or promote your message, whether you want people to know your grandkids are the greatest, or that you like horses or cats.

You can stitch directly on some fabrics if the weave is even enough not to warp the pattern and the fabric is sturdy enough not to be pulled into warps and bubbles by the stitches, but it takes a good eye to count the individual threads and there are easier ways to get your design on the fabric. Fabrics not suitable for cross stitch include any finely woven soft fabric like silk and its artificial imitators such as rayon. Some linens are sturdy enough to hold the stitches, but try a tiny piece first and see before you spend a lot of money on a great piece of fabric only to discover it buckles when you pull the threads.

The best clothing items for cross stitch are sweatshirts and ball caps. And the best way to get an even-looking pattern is with a product called 'waste canvas'.

Waste canvas can be bought in any craft shop and most fabric stores. It is a very loose, open-woven fabric that is very stiff with starch. In fact, the starch holds it together, which will become important later. Waste canvas comes in all popular thread counts, but for stitching on sweats and caps, 8-count is a good size. You will have to use three or four threads in your needle to get enough coverage. (See How To Cross Stitch for a discussion of cloth thread counts.)


Calculate the size of your design. If it is 50 stitches wide and you are planning to use 8-count canvas, your design will be 50/8 or 6.25 inches. If this is larger than you wanted, use a higher-count canvas and vice versa.

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Author: Jane Harmon



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