how to quilt an image onto an upholtery fabric accent pillow ?

Machine Trapunto seems to fit the bill here.

You need to acquire some soluble thread (be careful not to sneeze on it, or lick the end to thread the needle!).

Draw on or mark your design in some way on your top fabric - if I were doing it I would make outline templates and quit round or through them as I am not a successful marker or remover of marks, so I don't.

Place a piece of batting behind your design - poly is fine, using the thick variety if you want your design to really stand out. You can use duplicate layers, but you might find slippage a problem unless you really anchor all the pieces down.

Quilt round your design using the soluble thread as the top thread, anything as bobbin thread. When you have finished, with a sharp pair of scissors, and very carefully so as not to cut the top fabric, trim round the piece of batting used just for the design.

Then put your full size piece of batting behind your cushion top, and add muslin behind that. Baste the layers normally (close together if you have already experienced problems with feeding through under the presser foot) and quilt, wherever you wish, but certainly over the soluble thread lines. Finally, rinse the complete top so that the soluble thread disappears. The spare bobbin thread will just stay there in the sandwich, it's not a problem as far as I have ever heard or experienced.

I hope I've remembered all the stages - it's getting late here, and I'm just about off to bed!

It sounds like a very nice idea. . In message , robb writes

machine trapunto should work. one layer of batting, water soluble thread in the top of the machine, regular thread in the bobbin, sew round the design, cut away the excess batting that is outside the design lines, add another full pillow sizse layer of batting, use regular thread on the top and bobbin, go round the entire design again, then make the pillow. when washed the first lot of thread will dissolve.

if in doubt practice on some plain muslin first. i've done one of these with a simple dahlia design, centre 2" or so circle,

2 or 3 rows of petals. first row was about 6 petals iirc, then alternate the next row of petals. as the first thread dissolves no need to worry about the second sewing is exactly over the first lot. just needs to be close, the second lot is what is the final outcome.

do not lick the thread to get it thru the needle, it will dissolve on ya and keep the thread in a waterproof container, small zip lock should be sufficient/ hope all that is clear, if not google machine trapunto. should be something somewhere online, everything else is out there for the learning. good luck and dont forget we want pix of your work. j.

"robb" wrote... hello, I am a recent lurker here. I have a sewing dilema involving a quilting/embroidery embellishment.

I am making a set of accent pillows for the In-Laws and i want to quilt an image onto front of the accent pilows. The pillows are

16"x16" and the images i want to quilt are nautical or marinelife motifs like various conch, nautilus, clam shells, sanddollar or starfish images. I want the images to have a substantial raised appearance, not gargantuan but not subtle either.

I experimented with sandwiching 4-6 layers of quilters poly-batting between a muslin backing and the top upholstery fabric. Then sew the outline of the image. A few problems occured with bunching of top the fabric around the sewn image if i do not keep the layers pulled tight. The machine struggled a bit with feeding the fabric batting sandwich if i did not keep some feed pressure on.

The image and raised quilting effect looks good until i attach the pillow back, turn it in/out and stuff with poly-fil. Then the quilting image gets flattened and you mostly just see the image from the stitches which is not a great image as the raised quilting provided a significant reveal of the image.

Does anyone have any advice/tips on how to accomplish what i want to do ? Which is a raised quilted image on front of a stuffed accent pillow.

thanks for any helpful advice. robb

machine trapunto should work. one layer of batting, water soluble thread in the top of the machine, regular thread in the bobbin, sew round the design, cut away the excess batting that is outside the design lines, add another full pillow sizse layer of batting, use regular thread on the top and bobbin, go round the entire design again, then make the pillow. when washed the first lot of thread will dissolve.

if in doubt practice on some plain muslin first. i've done one of these with a simple dahlia design, centre 2" or so circle,

2 or 3 rows of petals. first row was about 6 petals iirc, then alternate the next row of petals. as the first thread dissolves no need to worry about the second sewing is exactly over the first lot. just needs to be close, the second lot is what is the final outcome.

do not lick the thread to get it thru the needle, it will dissolve on ya and keep the thread in a waterproof container, small zip lock should be sufficient/ hope all that is clear, if not google machine trapunto. should be something somewhere online, everything else is out there for the learning. good luck and dont forget we want pix of your work. j.

"robb" wrote... hello, I am a recent lurker here. I have a sewing dilema involving a quilting/embroidery embellishment.

I am making a set of accent pillows for the In-Laws and i want to quilt an image onto front of the accent pilows. The pillows are

16"x16" and the images i want to quilt are nautical or marinelife motifs like various conch, nautilus, clam shells, sanddollar or starfish images. I want the images to have a substantial raised appearance, not gargantuan but not subtle either.

I experimented with sandwiching 4-6 layers of quilters poly-batting between a muslin backing and the top upholstery fabric. Then sew the outline of the image. A few problems occured with bunching of top the fabric around the sewn image if i do not keep the layers pulled tight. The machine struggled a bit with feeding the fabric batting sandwich if i did not keep some feed pressure on.

The image and raised quilting effect looks good until i attach the pillow back, turn it in/out and stuff with poly-fil. Then the quilting image gets flattened and you mostly just see the image from the stitches which is not a great image as the raised quilting provided a significant reveal of the image.

Does anyone have any advice/tips on how to accomplish what i want to do ? Which is a raised quilted image on front of a stuffed accent pillow.

thanks for any helpful advice. robb

dont know if this will send as my full reply didnt, will try nonetheless. sew over the design again with the full size batting behind. j.

"Patti" wrote ... Machine Trapunto seems to fit the bill here.

You need to acquire some soluble thread (be careful not to sneeze on it, or lick the end to thread the needle!).

Draw on or mark your design in some way on your top fabric - if I were doing it I would make outline templates and quit round or through them as I am not a successful marker or remover of marks, so I don't.

Place a piece of batting behind your design - poly is fine, using the thick variety if you want your design to really stand out. You can use duplicate layers, but you might find slippage a problem unless you really anchor all the pieces down.

Quilt round your design using the soluble thread as the top thread, anything as bobbin thread. When you have finished, with a sharp pair of scissors, and very carefully so as not to cut the top fabric, trim round the piece of batting used just for the design.

Then put your full size piece of batting behind your cushion top, and add muslin behind that. Baste the layers normally (close together if you have already experienced problems with feeding through under the presser foot) and quilt, wherever you wish, but certainly over the soluble thread lines. Finally, rinse the complete top so that the soluble thread disappears. The spare bobbin thread will just stay there in the sandwich, it's not a problem as far as I have ever heard or experienced.

I hope I've remembered all the stages - it's getting late here, and I'm just about off to bed!

It sounds like a very nice idea. . In message , robb writes

How heavy is the 'upholstery fabric' that you are using? Home dec cotton weight - heavy upholstery - muslin home sewers' weight - canvas

- ch> hello,

Jenn, that's what I just spotted in the question. Some upholstery fabric might be too stiff to achieve a 'puff' or raised effect. Trapunto is fun to create - but you have to have some 'give'. Polly

"Jennifer in Ottawa" How heavy is the 'upholstery fabric' that you are using? Home dec cotton weight - heavy upholstery - muslin home sewers' weight - canvas

- chintz - etc. Each one of these weights has its own solution to give you the effect that you are looking for. jennellh

One other small suggestion in addition to Pat's excellent instructions- if you quilt very heavily in the background area it will flatten the background and make the trapunto'd area stand up even more by contrast. A small stipple or cross hatch would be two suggestions. A single or double row of echo quilting around the trapunto before stitching the background quilting helps, too.

Leslie & The Furbabies in MO.

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robb

[ trimmed - OP]

Thanks Pat on the hill,

For the reply and the great helpful instructions i will give that a try.

robb

instructions- if

the background

small

double row of

background quilting

Thanks Leslie frothe help and reply. I will try out out all the great suggestions to see what works for my fabric choice. robb

[trim ]

robb

[trim - OP]

machine,

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dissolve on ya and

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Thanks j. , For yours and everyones helpful advice and instructions. robb

[trim - OP]

- chintz - etc. Each one of these weights has its own solution to give you the effect that you are looking for. jennellh

Thanks fro the reply Jennellh(Jennifer),

I am not sure what the weight or style of upholstery fabric this is (not alot of experience). I grabbed it off the remnant decorator fabric table at local fabric retailer. It was supposed to be for practice while i looked for some other fabric but then i found i actually liked this fabric and the colors seem to work well with the existing decor / furniture.

It is a pretty heavy Jaquard where there are two layers of fabric. The top layer uses finer threads and under that is a layer of ? light yarn weave ? and those yarns create a subtle images of smallish tropical leaf fronds in the top fabric. The fabric is very soft and supple though it does not have much give except on the bias. The weight is similar to a heavy 10-12 oz duck , bull denim or light canvas.

Is this a good description of the weight ?

Thanks again for the help. robb

On Jul 29, 4:11 pm, "robb" wrote: [trim - OP]

Thanks Pati,

For the reply and helpful advice. With all the great responses i am sure to find something that works.

I very well could be overstuffing i had not though of another backing layer to prevent the top layer from stretching out. Since i already had the backing layer it would seem like overkill in my in-experience to add another layer even though it makes sense when i think about your suggestion.

i guess one uses what it takes to get the desired effect.

Thanks again, robb

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