What stitch would you recommend...

snipped-for-privacy@yahoo.com skrev:

I would backstitch the letters

Trailings, whipped stem. Trailings is really the best, I would think, for this size. Since stitches should be about 1/16 inch, if you used stem stitch, you'd only get two on some characters, the most four on the capitals. So you won't get much effect.

Try it on muslin to see what you like. You can even use whipped chain, which I like better than whipped stem. But you *really* have to make tiny stitches!

With stem and chain, going around points (like the letter N) can be tricky to do well.

Dianne

Boy, do I have a lot to learn! I thought I'd heard of most stitches, but I haven't heard ot "trailings". Where can I find a description of it? Also, I've not actually used whipped anything except on a practice scrap, so I hadn't even thought of using it. Do you think a whipped backstitch might work? I'll try it on scrap, like you suggested & see.

I tried a stem stitch, and it looked terrible on the little letters because of the curves. Very frustrating.

" snipped-for-privacy@yahoo.com" ,in rec.crafts.textiles.needleworkwrote: and entertained us with

Hard to say until we know what fabric you are stitching on, what type of stitching you are doing i.e. crewel, cross stitch, canvas work, also what sort of threads you using.

How about couching them?

Cheryl

Well, that's a sensible question and one which I didn't think about. However, due to the size of the lettering (and I've seen cross stitch done that small on very fine fabrics) I just assumed surface embroidery.

Dianne

I'm writing this under the assumption you're working on a fabric that is closely woven and not normally thought of as countable fabric.

If you do stem stitch this way:

will solve your curve problems. However, that may mean that you only pick up 2 or 3 threads of the fabric.Trailings is teeny tiny satin stitch done over a loose ground thread (or 2 or three, depending on how high or wide you want it to be). It allowed you to have good control on curves and points, but it's tricky to do well: you have to pull on the loose threads every so often. Yes, you can back stitch and then whip it. You might need to whip each stitch 2 or 3 times to get the effect you want. My brain isn't working, but I think this stitch (whipped back stitch) has its own name.

Dianne