How to embroider on leather and vinyl
In this blog, we will talk about how to embroider on leather and vinyl and how that goes. In the last section, we will give some tips for embroidering these tricky fabrics.
Table of Contents
Leather embroidery
If you are new to leather embroidery, don’t panic. Here’s a complete guide for how to embroider leather in either a bag, jacket, shoes, vest etc.
Required material:
- Leather vest
- Embroidery design
- Cutaway backing stabilizer
- Hoop
- Embroidery machine
- Sharp scissor or rotary cutter
Step 01- Start with cutaway Backing
We’re using a nice cutaway thicker style backing here. I have cut around it in the shape of my design and this is going to help stabilize this vest. The leather stretches a little bit. It also has this underliner here that’s going to cause some moving so this cutaway backing is going to help with that stabilization.
Step 02- Hoop the material
Now I’m going to go ahead and put my hoop on my embroidery machine here but I just want to point out to you guys how tight my hooping is for this project. Leather does move, it can stretch and you don’t want that to cause problems for your embroidery so you want a nice and taut hoop job. for more about embroidery machines. you can visit: Best Embroidery Machines
Step 03- Select the color on the machine
This motorcycle club logo is a very detailed design so it does have a lot of color changes but when you do jobs like this, they’re going to be very detailed and your customers will pay more for that high-quality product. I went ahead and put my color changes in here. So not to bore you guys but as you’ll see the Avance 1501c makes that easy for me. It has my color threads on the screen so I can easily just assign my colors. For more about threads. you can visit: 5 Best Embroidery Thread
I’ll then go to my next screen here and this is when I want to position my hoops and make sure we’re nice and centered. for more about hoops. you can visit: How To Use Embroidery Hoop
Step 4- Trace the design
So the next step is going to be to trace our design. Now this step is essential in making sure you get a great finished product. You want to make sure that your design is centered correctly for this we’re doing a little bit of like a right chest logo placement so it’s going to be right up here above our pocket.
Step 05- Select the hoop from the machine
So we want to select our hoop and make sure that it’s sized correctly to fit where we want so. I’ll just go into my hoop screen here and I’ll select the correct hoop for this job. You’ll see that my hoop will move a little bit and it will center it for me. On-screen, you can tell that this design does fit in this hoop just about perfectly but we still want to do that trace and make sure that we’re good to go. So the first thing I will do is I want to exit out of the screen and make sure I’m on needle number one. For more about needles. you can visit: How To Thread An Embroidery Needle
Needle number one will now position itself right in the center of my hoop. I can go back into my hooping screen and I can now perform my trace. So you’ll see it’s going around the full border of my design here and this is going to make sure we don’t hit our hoop and it’s going to allow us to align it. However, we want it so that it’s nice and straight. Now that looks good.
Step 06- Start embroidery
We’re ready to press go and let the machine start. This design has 75000 stitches. Something like this is gonna take a little bit of time. This is the kind of job that I like to call a set-it-and-forget-it kind of thing. I’m gonna go ahead and I’m gonna let the embroidery machine get to work while it is mesmerizing to watch the whole thing sew out.
This is a great time to get other things done in your shop. Now you can see on the screen about 64,000 stitches out of the 75,500.
I’m going to take it off, unhoop it.
Remove the backing and here you see
the finished product.
So I’m going to go ahead and finish cutting my backing all right. So, here’s the finished leather embroidery.
Embroidery on vinyl
Here’s a detailed guide on embroidering with vinyl within a few easy steps.
Material required:
- Vinyl
- Four by four hoop small hoop
- Tear away stabilizer
- Double-sided tape
- A pen and a ruler
- Ballpoint needle
- Embroidery machine
- Scissors to cut vinyl
Step 01- Mark the center area for design placement
So, the first thing I’m going to do is take this pen and put it in the center of the design. So we need to take halfway between four inches and two. There’s a little bit of math.
So I’m gonna go two and three-quarters of an inch up from the bottom like this. And then I’m going to roll the line all the way across because it’s going to be easier.
And then I’m going to fold it in half to find my center which is right here.
Make a little snip and so that’s where the center line will be instead of snipping it. You could also just actually measure it so you will notice that the design is not in the center.
And the reason for that is because when we put down our press stud, we don’t want the flap to cover it so that’s why I’ve worked it out this way.
Step 02- Hoop the stabilizer
So now I’m going to take my hoop and I’m going to hoop just the stabilizer. I never hoop my vinyl as it gets marks and dents that are very difficult to get out. It should be loose enough that if you wiggle this, it doesn’t just pop out but it shouldn’t be so tight that it cuts through the stabilizer as you put it on. Now I’m going to take my ruler and a pen and in my hoop, I have these little kinds of notches. For more about stabilizers. you can visit: Machine Embroidery Stabilizers
These are the center points. I’m going to take my ruler and from center notch to center notch, I’m going to rule a line like this. And so now that shows me where the center of the hoop is. So now I just need to stick to that.
So the first thing I’m going to do is put some double-sided tape right at the bottom of my vinyl because this is not going to go all the way to the bottom. Now the hoop is bigger than 4×4 and that allows for a border around the edge.
So I will always put my double-sided tape in the border and then I’m just going to pick up the backing and take it off.
All I have to do is match this cross with the cross on my hoop so I’m going to fold it in half like this. So I can see and I always face it sideways.
I’m going to take that center point and match it up with the center point on the hoop. And then I’m just going to smooth down that end where the double-sided tape is. Make sure that this is following up on the same line and then push it on that piece of tape. Now pick this up and it is effectively stuck down.
Step 03- Prepare the machine
I have loaded my design into the machine already just to save us a bit of time. So I’m going to install the hoop, I’ve also threaded the machine now. Before we go, you have to do these two things.
Step 04- Set the needle
First, you need to have a ballpoint needle in your machine. I just get normal ballpoint sewing needles because the ballpoint will help make a bigger hole so the thread goes through without snapping. You can use an embroidery needle but if you find that it’s snapping repeatedly, it means you need to change to the ballpoint needle because of the vinyl.
Step 05- Adjust embroidery speed
The second thing I’m going to do is go into my settings and the speed of the embroidery. I want to slow it down to the slowest speed which for me is 350. If you go too fast through vinyl, it will also break your thread so you want to slow down.
Step 06- Start stitching on vinyl
And then we’re going to start stitching, you’ll also see me clip down the sides of the vinyl so it doesn’t get stuck under the machine.
Tips for embroidery on leather and vinyl:
Tip#01– Choose a light design for leather embroidery. If you have a higher stitch count design, leather gets popped out of the garment and you have a little cutout on leather that we don’t want on it. Go with a simple design and make sure it is backed well.
Tip#2– Trilobal polyester is a 40 weight which is what almost all commercially made embroidery designs are made from. It is also colorfast so if you say you are embroidering a baby onesie, you can always bleach the onesie and the thread will stay the same color. It will not fade in the sun.
Tip#3- A stable stick cutaway by Oesd is the stabilizer I’m going to recommend. You can use a layer of ultra-clean and tear with this if your design is a little bit dense but again I want you to reduce the density in your software. Because we don’t want to perforate and tear our vinyl. if you want to get more knowledge about embroidery software. Then you can visit: Best Embroidery Software
Tip#4– keep in mind that leather is going to be more dense so in some cases, you might need to glue a seam and I would recommend either hot glue or e6000 for permanent seams.
Tip#5– Many people recommend you use leather needles because they have a cutting point on the edges which is intended to slice through leather and help make a straight seam when stitching apparel. But they can also be destructive to leather. So, I recommend using a sharp needle (75/11 or 80/12) for making dense leather and a ballpoint needle that is 70/10 for softer leather to prevent flapping. For more about apparel. you can visit: Tips to Grow Your Custom Apparel Business
Tip#6- Use specialty feats such as walking feet which feed the leather through a machine along with the feed dogs. It doesn’t jam up the machine. You can also use a Teflon foot which is usually a plastic foot with a layer of teflon on the bottom that prevents the foot from sticking to the leather.
Conclusion
We hope you learned all about leather and vinyl embroidery along with the material considerations such as needle, thread, and stabilizer. People find working on this stuff a little daunting but with the right material and practice, you will be a master of it. Some of the key points to be kept in mind are hooping, choosing the right design for leather, and digitizing it properly. Try these tips and let us know how it turned out.
FAQs
Chrome-tanned leather is commonly used leather for machine embroidery.
I recommend using a sharp needle (75/11 or 80/12) for spongy and stiff leather. And the ballpoint needle that is 70/10 that protects against flapping when you are working on thinner and softer leather.
Leather is a dense material so you might need to glue a seam and I would recommend either hot glue or e6000 for permanent seams.
If your design is a little bit dense, reduce the density in your software. Because we don’t want to perforate and tear our vinyl.