This is my first foray into stitching on clothing. If you’ve never done it before, read on and learn what NOT to do. But first, some listening music that inspired the title of this post: The Who - Baba O’Riley
Typically, when I think of cross stitch on clothing, I think of some excessively flowery thing on a jean jacket that would appeal to a gardening, 40-something, suburban cat mom who mixes her own organic potting soil.
Like This!
Now there’s nothing wrong with any of those characteristics, but it’s just not me, ya know? I’m a rock guy. So it took me a while to realize that maybe some rock cross stitch could work. Perhaps something in white on the back of a casual black button down shirt. Enter Siouxsie and the Banshees!
Spellbound!
Stitching on clothing requires something called waste canvas. Waste canvas has holes spaced just like aida, but instead of a tight weave of four threads in each direction, it is a loose weave of two threads held together with water-soluble glue. The idea is that after stitching your piece, you wet it down to dissolve the glue, slide the canvas threads out, and you’re left with perfectly sized stitches on fabric that otherwise is not designed for cross stitch.
What a waste!
I had the foresight to wash my shirt in order to make sure that the fabric wouldn’t shrink with subsequent washings. I also ironed it to make sure there would be no wrinkles stitched into the finished design. I then marked the horizontal center with a pin. So far, so good.
Next I safety-pinned the waste canvas to the shirt, being sure to smooth out the shirt underneath and not to pin in any wrinkles. I decided to use Q-Snaps to hold everything secure, figuring the waste canvas might be too stiff to use a hoop. Based on where I wanted to position this design on the shirt, I chose to start at the top center (rather than the center center,) and worked my way down.
Let the stitching commence
The first thing I noticed is that the holes in 14ct waste canvas are bigger than the holes in 14ct aida. With aida, a standard #24 tapestry needle has to kind of force its way through the hole a little. With the waste canvas, however, I had to shoot for the center of the hole and hope all my stitches would be the same size. It was hard to tell while stitching because even though the shirt is black, the waste canvas is white, and I was stitching with white thread. (More on this later.)
My design is in three parts, and after stitching most of the top part, I had to add some pins to the waste canvas to keep the shirt from wrinkling while stitching the middle and the bottom sections. I recommend checking the fabric tension periodically as you work and adding additional pins as necessary.
STUPID GOOF #1:
My instructions recommended cutting away the waste canvas about ¼” from the stitches. If I had read it a little more carefully, I would have read the note that said “be careful not to cut your underlying fabric.” That’s right! I put a nice little cut into the shirt. After some self-flagellation and a LOT of cursing, I regrouped and was ready to solve the problem. The cut was clean, so I figured I’d just patch it. Problem solved, right? WRONG!
STUPID GOOF #2:
I carefully positioned the patch and pressed it in place. I was so focused on my precious design that I promptly ironed the patch under the as-yet-to-be-removed waste canvas. This means that I ironed this permanent patch on the O-U-T-S-I-D-E of the shirt. There is no way to remove it without (a) leaving permanent adhesive residue, and (b) turning a small cut into a giant raggedy hole.
It’s...um...A DIY, punk rock aesthetic. Yeah...that’s it.
What followed was more chewing myself out, and a whole lot more cursing. I mean, if I had a swear jar, I’d be out buying myself a new motorcycle right now.
I fished the shirt out of the corner of the room where I had angrily thrown it and decided to at least remove the waste canvas threads and see how the actual stitching came out. I wet the waste fabric down without soaking the entire shirt (small win), grabbed some tweezers to make it easier, and started removing threads.
The best way to do this is to remove all the threads in one direction first. It also helps to pull straight out, rather than up and out. This part of the process went off without a hitch, and the more the design was revealed against the contrasting fabric the better it looked. So let’s “press” on.
The next step was to iron some fusible interfacing to the inside of the shirt. This serves the dual purpose of giving some body to the design and keeping the stitches from pulling out. Fusible interfacing is a gauzy kind of fabric with heat-sensitive glue on one side. Simply hold an iron on it, and it fuses to the fabric. I was very careful to hold the iron in place rather than move it around in order to prevent the fabric from accidentally sliding and wrinkling. That said, you don’t want to hold the iron there too long, or you may burn the fabric!
Sealed for eternity
STUPID GOOF #3:
As I sat there and admired my work a mistake raised its hand and said “Don’t forget about me!” Because I was stitching with white thread on white waste canvas, it was sometimes hard to visualize exactly where to position each stitch. Because I was stitching with white thread on white waste canvas, it was sometimes hard to visualize exactly where to position each stitch. On a handful of the stitches at the top of my design, I had brought the needle down the wrong hole which resulted in some elongated stitches. If I had done it intentionally, it might have looked kind of cool, but nope - there are some random goofs. Unfortunately, without the waste canvas there, it’s very hard to go back and correct mistakes. With the interfacing permanently fused to the inside, it’s impossible.
Oops!
But wait, there’s more...
STUPID GOOF #4:
I accidentally left out three stitches of the top of the “X” in Siouxsie, making it look like a finger permanently pointing up in the air. Guess which one?
It’s OK, I hate you too!
STUPID GOOF #5:
Finally when holding it up to the light, I can tell that even though I didn’t move the iron, I also didn’t fully straighten out the fabric. So now there are little wrinkles permanently being held in place by the interfacing.
Wrinkle, wrinkle in my cloth.
Did you do this to p!$$ me off?
So after all this, I have two choices. I can wear my shirt as is - proudly displaying all my DIY mistakes so that everyone knows this isn’t mass-produced fast fashion, or I can ball it up, throw it out and try again. Honestly, I’m about 50/50 on both of these options. (Nah, I'm sure I'll find somewhere to wear it.)
But all is not lost! The design itself came out great, and includes both a black and a white option. You can get them at Siouxsie - Eyes cross stitch pattern – The Manly Art of Cross Stitch
Peepshow. Creepshow. Where did you get those eyes?
Please, young Padawan, learn from my mistakes. Now go forth and stitch!
Oh, and I know I started this post out with The Who, but with all this focus on Siouxise and the Banshees, how can we not give them a listen?
"Pass on what you have learned. Strength, mastery. But weakness, folly, failure also. Yes, failure most of all. The greatest teacher, failure is." — Yoda